RANDE DE JAMES A.K.A. Why I Love Ballet

Hi There!

I haven't written in a really really long time, and I really really need to write again so here it is. I have promised a 10 things I like and don't like about ballet post for quite a while now, and I haven't gotten to it. Because I like to rant it's split up into 4 parts. YAY!!!

1. Those people who dance so well you can't take your eyes off them
You know when you see a dance, and although you want to look at the group as whole but there's that one person the you can't take your eyes off of? Although this person might be 'disliked' among her friends, the person makes me so happy. They really got into the dance connected with you and dragged you into the story they were telling and you got to experience it for the whole 2:30min dance. It's amazing and that's what dancing is all about (in my opinion) connecting with the audience and speaking your emotions though movement.

Can you tell what emotion she is trying to get across? It's a powerful image.

2. The companions you make
Iv'e never had the chance to be with the same people in my studio for more than one year, but every year all of us connect.  The best thing about your friend you make in dance is you can go up the them and be like, "Her arches are so beautiful they make me cry." (actual thing said by Mikelle) and your dance group will totally understand. Also, your dancing group is probably almost always with you, (A.K.A. during school and dance which is the only thing I have time for) so you never run out of things to laugh about, and you connect on a different level than normal friends.

My wonderful dance group (from 2014)

3. EVERYTHING ABOUT RAND DE JABMES
OHMYGOODNESSGRACIOUS I LOVE RANDE DE JAMBES SO MUCH THEY ARE MY FAVORITE  THINGS EVER AND I LOVE THEM SO MUCH AND I COULD JUST WRITE MULTIPLE SERIS OF BOOKS ABOUT THEM BECAUSE ITS ALL OF THE THINGS MIXED TOGETHER IN TO ONE I LIVE THEM SO MUCH THEY ARE MY FAVORITE THINGS EVER THEY ARE EVEN BETTER THAN CHOCOLATE AND NOTHING BEATS CHOCOLATE.

I LOVE THIS SHIRT SO MUCH I WANT IT SO BAD!!!!!!!!!!!
The best picture ever courtesy of: spreadshirt 

4. Preforming
I really really like preforming almost as much as rand de jambes, but not as much. (rand de jambes are they favorite can you tell?). I love the ability to preform to others and have them get a taste of why I like dancing so much. I love the Nutcracker soooooooooooooo much!!!!! I love the chance for people to come and take way something from my dancing and I love the thrill of preforming and the whole process.

Last year's Nutcraker (Taylor is the Soldier King on the Right)
Photo Courtesy of: Park City Dance

5. Stage Makeup
Some people might think I'm a little crazy but I really like stage makeup. This might sound a little strange because I hate normally makeup, but I love the process of putting on stage makeup. It helps me get my game face on, (haha see what I did there?) and it is fun I really like putting on crazy makeup that makes me look insane in person.

Stage Makeup
Photo Curtesy of: Dance-for-Kids

Thank you so much for reading my post, the next five will be out soon, and I have an exciting announcement, I'm giving y'all a Christmas present!!!! I will post five more times before Christmas and you get to read them YAY!!!!!! For more check the Announcements tab it will be up soon.
- Ali Grace

Feet Fetishes

Hi there!!

This post came completely out of the blue, but this is a topic I feel like needed to be addressed and I needed another blog post. I do realize that this post is rather disgusting, but it is a post I am passionate about. So if you do not like hearing stories of my gross feet, than you can skip this post and come back next week.

I am a little obsessed with taking pictures of my feet, ask Mikelle. I personally like it's keeping a diary of your feet, by taking pictures of them when ever they are bleeding or when a new blister appears. You might ask, how do I get so many blisters on my feet? Well, because you asked her is a story of my beautifully bloody feet. You're welcome :).

1. My first blister

My very first blister before it popped

I first got this blister, not even from my pointe shoes, but from Claire's mother's Ugg Boots. It was Autumn Aloft and it was getting very cold, and I had flip flops on. Claire's very kind mother offered me her Ugg boots. I was very thankful for her giving me them because my feet were getting cold. there was only one problem, the boots were a tad to small for my left foot, and would rub on my heal when ever I walked. At fist I didn't notice, but then it began to get more painful. After I took of the boots, I saw indeed I had a large blister. The next was Monday a.k.a. pointe class. It popped and it was very painful. It also didn't go away very fast, and hurt very much.

2. My bloody blister

Photo taken from my locker at school

I didn't even know I had this one until one day I was at school when a kid stepped on my foot. It was no big deal, I knew he/she didn't mean it but it hurt pretty bad. The more I walked the more I felt the bottom of my flip flop getting stickier. I thought it was juice I had stepped in but it wasn't. My blister which the kid had stepped on was bleeding profusely all over my flip flop.

3. My infected blister

This photo was taken in the better days

I got this one during Waltz (waltz of the flowers) rehearsal. My toe pad was bothering me very very much, and the side of my right foot my rubbing up against the box of my shoe. over the hour and thirty minute class this gradually got more and more painful, until for about a minute the pain was unbearable. That was when I realized that a blister was created and popped in one hour and 1/2 class. Over time this blister began to get more and more disgusting, until one day when it looked quite infected. My father who is a doctor, had to agree that it wasn't infected badly but it was infected. (It was pusing). After many nights of pure hydrogen dioxide and pain it recovered and it is looking much better today.

4. The one on top on my foot

It's beautiful isn't it?

I really have no idea how i got this one. It just appeared.

Thank you so much for reading, I know this post is fairly disgusting but next week will be back to normal.

- Ali Grace

The Battle between Ballet and my Life

Hi there!

This post was due along time ago because you voted on it, now a new poll is up if you want to vote for next week's blog. So I'm doing this a little different than I normally do my posts, I'm doing it in conversations between dance and various other things such as sleep, P.E. and social life. I think this helps to bring the pointe across (ha ha see what I did there) and brings a little humor. Here goes nothing!

Anywhere with long hallways
Dance: I'm going to Chaines down this whole hallway
Life: DON'T DO IT!!!!
Dance: YOU CAN'T STOP ME!!!!
Life: People are looking.
Dance: YAY!!!!! That means I'll have an audience...
*does Chaines down the whole hallway*
Life: Don't I know that person?
*covers eyes and walks away fast*

Photo Courtesy of: quotesgram

Dance vs. Social life
Person: Hey wanna hang out tomorrow?
Me: Let's see I have ballet from 5:00 - 6:30 and conditioning from 4:00-5:00
Person: Okay, Saturday?
Me: I have two rehearsals we could do in-between.
Person: *walks away defeated*
Dance vs. School
School: Homework time!
Dance: Time to fix the elastics on your pointe shoes!
School: Homework time!
Dance: Remember how you couldn't that combo, let's practice that.
School: Homework time!
Dance: Time to randomly choreograph every song you know
School: I give up.
Dance vs. Friends
Social life: You should start to make new friends outside of dance.
Dance: I have tons of friends.
Social life: Ya, but how many of them aren't dancers
Dance: 1...1.....2 um she dances but not at my studio does that count?
Social life: YOU ONLY HAVE ONE FRIEND THAT IS NOT A DANCER!!!!!??????
Dance:.....maybe?......
Dance vs. P.E.
Dance: I can do this!
P.E.: Oh ya?
*P.E. teacher says to run laps*
Dance: How long have we been running?!?!
P.E.: Not even one lap.
Dance: Why is this so hard for me!!!!! I can run around all day with pointe shoes on and go to a 2 1/2 class on Friday but I can't even run one lap?!?
P.E.: This is pathetic.

This is sooooo true.
Photo courtesy of: Pinterest

Dance vs. Sleep
Sleep: Time to go to bed!
Dance: Okay just let me go through every dance in my head.
Sleep: STOP!!! Just go to bed!
Dance: Wait, did I take my toe pads out of my pointe shoes?
Sleep: Alright do that but if you want to be able to dance tomorrow you have to sleep.
Dance: Oh no! I can't go to bed without cleaning my blister!!!!
Sleep: *sighs*
Dance vs. Body
Body: OWWW!!! This hurts stop!!!!
Dance: But I've almost got my 90º arabesque!!
Body: My blister just popped. New record a blister made and popped in one hour and half class.
Dance: Must.......do.........full.....out!!!!!!!
Body: You know your going to be sore tomorrow.
Dance: Ya but I'll be stronger!
*next day*
Body: Can't ...... move.
Dance: And I have dance today.

I hope you liked that!!! It was a ton of fun to write and I hope you found it relatable and funny. Thank you so much for reading my blog!!!!!

- Ali Grace

My Attempt at Being the White Swan

Hi there!

I know I haven't been very active on this blog recently, I'm sorry! A lot has been going on, but I plan to keep getting a post up every week. This post is about Halloween, and I know it wasn't called for but... I'm still going with it so here it is!

Once upon a time there was me on a lazy summer day, bored. Being a ballet fangirl my first instinct was to watch a ballet on YouTube. Because I happened to be very bored I decided to watch my favorite ballet of all time, Swan Lake. Long story short, Prince Siegfried must get married for his birthday, but can't find a bride and next thing you know he falls in love with a swan princess, invites her to the ball pledges his love to the wrong girl, shoots the girl he fell in love with and drowns himself. It's very sad, but stunningly beautiful. So I was watching this when I got an idea. I grabbed my phone and texted Taylor, "I KNOW WHAT WE SHOULD BE FOR HALLOWEEN!!!!!!!!", she totally agreed and we were dead set on being the black and white swan for halloween.

The Black Swan is the White Swan's doppelgänger, sent to the prince's ball by the guy who turned the White Swan into a swan in the first place.
Image courtesy of: DailyPainters.com

Fast forward a while later, we bedazzled our stunning tutus and the day of Halloween arrived. We were planning to get together later after Waltz of the Flowers practice. (Yes, I had Nutcracker practice on Halloween). If you know anything about me you should know I am terrible at planning! So Waltz comes and goes and I'm at home rushing around my room throwing clothes and costume pieces into my black sleepover bag and rushing into the car. I arrive at Taylor's house where she and Alicia (who was coming with us as Giselle from the ballet Giselle) were already prepared and ready to walk our the door. I want you to picture how I looked in this scenario. My hair was a mess from my attempting to do my bun in the car, clothes were literally falling out of the bag I was holding and I had a look of panic on my face. Taylor was just like, "Your not ready at all!!!" like she was my fairy godmother getting me ready for the ball. I was rushed into her bathroom (a.k.a. makeup studio), and she slicked my hair into an impeccable bun and made me truly look like a beautiful, innocent swan.

From right to left: Me, Alicia, Taylor
Photo courtesy of: Taylor's Dad

So the night went very well and many people said that we were their, "favorite costume of the night" and were blown away by our pointe shoes. Now, about the pointe shoes. As for the pointe shoes beautiful as they were, they hurt! After we had done half of the houses Alicia had three blisters, and my arches felt like they were going to fall off. Long story short by the end we were leaning on each other to stand and singing Les Mis like our lives depended on it. Although pain happened to all our feet, and we fell asleep right as our heads hit the pillow, it was one of the best Halloweens I had ever had.

My feet after Halloween
Photo courtesy of: Me

Taylor's blood blister from Halloween
Photo courtesy of: Taylor

Alicia's three blisters
Photo courtesy of: Alicia

Thanks for reading! I hope you enjoyed this don't worry, more posts will be up soon! I'm so happy you took the time to read my blog!

- Ali Grace

How to Not be Bored in Ballet Part 3

Hey there!

So this post has two tips because they fit in with each other quite nicely, and are almost inter changeable. After this post, their will only be one more, and then onto another topic. These tips are best to help you not be bored in ballet. So......here they are!!!

3. Focus on something
 A lot of times you might have no 'focus' except for can we please just never do barre! during ballet. This will definitely make you bored so find something you can focus on. Find something a teacher called you out on a while ago or recently such as "Make sure you're keeping your turnout!" focus on that! It doesn't have to be something the teacher said just to you, it can be others to. If the teacher says, 'make sure not to drop your elbow' to the girl across the room, make sure you do it to. Even if she/he says it to no one in particular make sure you apply the correction. The majority of the time teachers have a 'focus' to the class. Last night in ballet, Brenda's class 'focus' was turn out. She had noticed it was something our whole studio struggled with. She gave us many great tips such as using your plie to strengthen your turnout. Although she did very simple and somewhat boring combos, it was so then we could focus on our turnout, and having a focus helped me not get bored.

4. Challenge your self
I always like to keep a goal in mind, it helps me focus and makes me feel really really good if I complete the goal. It can be something like can I improve my turnout, or have a strong accent where it needs to be in a combo. It can be as hard as getting both of your splits (THIS WILL NOT HAPPEN IN A DAY, but if you are really close then go for it), getting above 90º which I recently learned from this site that it means like a cross, (THIS WILL NOT HAPPEN IN A DAY IT TAKES STRENGTH AND FLEXIBILITY, but it's a good long term goal). It can be as simple as having fun or completely focusing on ballet.

My attempt to get an attitude arabesque, it was my challenge

I hoped this helped you with how not to be bored in ballet, I really hope that this makes ballet exciting to you even on the dull days! I'm so happy that you have taken the time to read my post!

- Ali Grace

Okay so these posts was meant to be up a week ago, but I got really really distracted, and ended up with an hour of dance footage so if you would to interested in that, here is a little bit:

Anyway posts will hopefully be up every weekend preferably by midday Saturday, but no promises.

If you like the leotard I was wearing it comes from here, and the tights and shoes come from here. 

If you like any of the songs I got them from this playlist. 

How to Not be Bored in Ballet Part 2

Hi there!

This is is the second tip in the How to Not be Bored in Ballet series, and it is my favorite. I love prepping and feeling ready before events, even if it's ballet. Although this step is optional I would strongly recommend it.

2. Prep before
This step is optional and kinda goes with step one, but It's still really great to do. It's split into two parts, if you have time or if you don't have time.
a. Have time
So if you have a lot of time after you have gotten dressed and done your hair, depending on the time of your dance I would suggest making a smoothie. It's a great way to make sure you're not hungry and you'll be powered up for later in class. I love smoothies. I think I have one at least once a day. So, if you want to make it really easy to make one, just buy some Jamba Juice smoothie mix, and make it at home! I think they taste delicious and the only thing you need to add to it is water/orange juice/apple juice (one of the three not all three unless your feeling adventurous) I normally use orange juice and my favorite mix is Caribbean Passion. Another thing I would suggest to do it to get a water bottle and fill it up with ice. You can add other things, but I only really like water. A health nutritionist came and talked with our dance group over the summer, and said that if you are dancing for longer than an hour or and hour 1/2 at a time with no brakes, it might be a good idea to try power aid in the second hour. I have never tried this but I might. So for the final thing is that you should try to 'wake up' all your muscles before dance so then they are able to move, like your own warm up before class. I like _____ video, I've used it several time is it's amazing, once you've got it down you can do it in seven minutes or so. If you would like to hear more about my warm up routine, please vote for it on the side.
b. Don't have time
Alright, you can vary this depending on how much time you have, but the first thing I would do is to ask someone to make you a smoothie, I really like smoothies and I love having them before dance. Instead of warming up grab sweats and put them on, if you can wear them into dance that's great because you'll warm up your body more. I would suggest taking off the sweats after tandus. This is my favorite trick, If you don't have enough time to fill up a water bottle, bring an empty one and fill it up at the studio before class.

JAMBA JUICE SMOOTHIE!!!!!!!!!!!  The smoothie in the picture is Caribbean Passion from Jamba Juice

So that was the tip, I hope you liked it! My favorite tip ever is in here which is bring a water bottle to class and filling it up at the studio. I hope you found this entertaining, and thank you soooooooo much for reading my blog!

- Ali Grace

How to Not be Bored in Ballet Part 1

Hey there!

First of all thanks so much for voting on the poll on the side. I again want to emphasize how important this is for me!!! This literally takes 15 seconds of your time and gives me so much inspiration. If you want to know more about this please check out announcements and/or everything postable. So here it is what you've all been waiting for.........HOW TO NEVER BE BORED IN BALLET!! (Have you noticed I like capital letters? It makes everything so dramatic)

1. Find some way to say to yourself, okay now it's time for ballet, before class
Okay, so this probably sounds like a very weird tip, but it makes sense. When I enter my ballet class we always do reverence. It's a tradition my first ballet teacher started. It's a simple way to enter the class and get yourself into a ballet mode. Reverence literally means to give deep respect for someone, and in ballet class it's showing your teacher respect by bowing the teacher to thank them for teaching you. My ballet teacher Julianna said that she can always tell how the class is going to go by the reverence. The whole reason we do it is to get yourself in the ballet mood. You need to be in the ballet mood, because then you can focus on ballet, and really have ballet become a part of you. Now I know everyone has those days they just cannot do anything in ballet, mine was last Wednesday in Brenda's class, I couldn't do a turn from fifth no matter how I tried and I always ended up on the floor. (If you don't believe me, ask Mikelle or Alecia).

Reverence by me

So in addition to the reverence I would like to add other things that I do to get the mood of ballet. A thing I like to do is find things in my life that i would like to dance for. I know this is deep, but it helps a lot. Today when I was walking home I saw a little girl alone in her driveway silently talking to herself and drawing with chalk. I thought about how it felt to be very little and have that great big imagination. I will think of it when I dance and try to incorporate freeness and dreaming into my dancing. I looked around me and saw the whole beauty of the world that God created, and when I danced I thought about how beautiful it was and tried to incorporate the beauty into my dancing. 

Another great thing that i like to do is play a piece of music that reminds me of dancing or why I dance or compels me to dance, it makes me feel great and excited for dancing. My top right now are:

Flight of the Eagle - Brian Crain

It makes me feel so inspired and so ready and excited for dance

Where is my Mind - Maxence Cyrin (from the movie It's Kind of a Funny Story)

 I LOVE this song, I am currently choreographing a dance to it, and every time I hear it it makes me want to dance.

White Flag - Chris Tomlin 

I am obsessed with this song I know all the words, and it makes me want to dance. 

Thank you so much for reading my blog! Posts in the How to Not be Bored in Ballet series will be up soon. I hope you enjoyed this!

- Ali Grace