Ansuya

Zills by Ansuya. I can only hope to be half that good with them, at some point. She dances with the Bellydance Superstars. I don't know a whole lot about her, but I do know she has a few instructional videos out there in the world. My advice; google her to get more information.

Dancing On The Edge

I performed. I got on stage and performed not one, no. Not two, no. But THREE dances with the Strays!! :) EEE I've never been ore nervous or excited about anything in my life. I got the rumbly "wake you up in the middle of the night" jitters in my stomach and the night before I'm not sure I even slept. I got on stage and it all went away and I finally realized this is what I love to do most. I love swimming, I love reading, I love cuddling, but dancing tops it all. I still felt somewhat like a baby moose, but a little more graceful. The stray-kittens performed Aisa (choreo from beginners), then Shimmy (with the Strays). Later in the program a select few (who felt confident enough) performed Chifitelli (veil choreo from intermediate veils). Myself, Karen, Diana and Erika got on the stage elevated behind the main group and it was aweeeeeesome! I finally had a chance to show my friends and the people I care about what I do every Sunday evening and most mid-days and afternoons. My guy came up to me before the performance started and gave me a kiss. It was just what I needed to bring the nerves down to a tolerable level. I can't wait, and I mean CANNOT wait until Summer Dance this summer in July. It's the weekend after I get back from my Family Reunion, and hopefully we'll be able to perform the zill number! Who knows!?

Zills

I'm taking my 3rd class under The Neighbourhood Strays and this time it's Zills. Good lord. I love those things, although it seems like I'm the only one who does in class. I studied piano for 8 or 9 years on top of being in 3 concert bands growing up, and well the good old music class in high school. I guess you can say that I understand rhythms and timing and musical patterns. So when Andrea busts out a new zill flourish I can catch on almost instantly. The steps and combinations we learn for our bodies aren't overly complex, just tricky to keep them in line. For example, Laura was sub-teaching 2 weeks ago and she taught us a grapevine step with hip locks, with snake arms, and again with back bends. This week past she went through double-step grapevine which threw me for a loop , but I learned a trick pretty fast: don't turn your body when you switch directions, you're already set up to step front-front, back-back. Yay me. In either case, once you get around to it, it's not all that difficult for either of the individual pieces. Adding zills to the grapevine with a back bend is a little more complicated, but not impossible. I can see myself improving each week and it's fantastic. I think I might even want to incorporate my zills into my solo that I'm slowly dreaming up. It's pretty vague and spaced out so far, but it will involved back bends leading into a drop with some floor work, and it will also have belly rolls and mad isolations. I don't know how I can manage zills in that, might have to come up with 2 of them :) We'll see...

Next Class in the Fall: Improv or ATS

SHIMMY!

Hafla!

I went to the halfa I was talking about on April 6th. My parents were in town, so it was the first time that they got to see me in costume, which was a little more revealing than I had planned as I didn't find a shoulder shrug in time. I had red silk pannels made (triangular) and decided that they looked good around my waist, so that was that. Mom had stayed up late with me 2 nights in a row to make my pantalooooons. I love them. Andrea sold me a pair of pantaloons earlier this winter, but they weren't quite what I was looking to wear under costume. She didn't have any red silky ones left until her new order came in so mom and I went on an adventure: a sewing adventure! Anyways, everyone looked great, especially the newly formed unofficial sub-stray-training-group the Stray Kittens consisting of myself, TerriLynn, Mallory, Erika, Karen, and Diana, as well as some others who joined for the Dancing on the Edge gala in May.

We set up a bazaar and sold a few things for a while before we went to the dance studio and danced just for the sake of dancing. I had a ball. It was the first time that I just danced, without being led by Kristine or Andrea. I felt somewhat like a baby moose....awkward and unbalanced. I pretty much went home and started practising right away.

Can't wait until the next one!