Riot and Frolic

a mostly ballroom dance, but also a bunch of other stuff, blog

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about

I own and rock people’s faces off teaching ballroom dancing at Dancers Studio in St. Paul, MN. My husband and I compete professionally in American style and wrangle eight children in our spare time. I’ve been teaching and competing in ballroom dancing for over 25 years and have lots of opinions on it. I am an expert by any means, but there are quite a few dancers who are better than me and I have a solid knowledge of basic technique, so suck it.

Month: November 2011

  • Crazy Bread, Part Deux

    The other day, I made some awesome bread from this recipe.  It's this ridiculous recipe where you don't knead the dough, you just combine all the ingredients and then bake them.  Where's the technique?  The learning curve?  The skillz? This crazy recipe also says you can make pizza crust out of the same dough.  Nonsense,…

  • List of Last Week’s Labors of Love

    – cooked bacon in the oven because she told me to.  And she is a much better cook than me.  I think even my friend who doesn't like bacon (HOW am I friends with her?) would approve.  No grease jumping up to bite you!  350 degrees for 15-20 minutes?  Nice. – a slightly overwhelming shopping…

  • Learn How to Dance

    The best way to learn how to ballroom dance is to take private lessons.   I'd like to end my post there, but I will elaborate… Private lessons consist of you (with or without a partner) learning dance steps and techniques from a trained professional dance instructor.   There are community education classes available in…

  • The Pinterest Project- It’s Not Gross

    I was really hoping this week's project was going to be a Fail because I am hilarious when I write those. I mean, it's cookie dough dip made out of chickpeas.  It has to be gross, right? I was so excited when I was mixing the ingredients in my blender.  Can of chickpeas, a little…

  • Crazy Bread

    No, not the delicious treat from Little Caesars.   I'm talking about this bread recipe that my ma-in-law and I were discussing a couple months ago and that she sent me a copy of after our visit.  She had seen the recipe in an issue of Mother Earth News magazine from 2009.  My question is, how did…

  • List of Last Week’s Labors of Love

    – getting a handle to the new scrolling in Lion OS X.  Note to self: don't think.  If I start thinking about it, it turns out like my hair when I'm trying to braid it while looking in the mirror.  And that is bad.  And confusing.   – matching mama-offspring hairstyles.  I swear it's V…

  • There’s No Crying in Ballroom

    Except there is…  Because sometimes you think you should place higher. Because that one girl beat you and she is just not better than you. Because sometimes it's political. Because you feel uncoordinated.   Because you're not getting it and feel like you should be. Because you look goofy doing that move.   Because they're…

  • The Pinterest Project- Flowers and Flies

    Have you seen this fabulousness floating around the interwebs? It's from that brilliant Megan, over at notmartha.org  She made these amazing dahlia flower brooches in honor of Mother's Day, but with Christmas fast approaching, I could see them coming in handy. I followed her directions vaguely (I didn't measure anything because I'm sooooo good at eye-balling…

  • Let’s Talk About You

    No, I've had enough.  Let's talk about me.   I'm more of a rock star now that my hair is long.  If I say enough, it'll be true, right?  Any of these hair styles below would make me a more awesome person. Picture at left: clearly, I'm standing on a balcony in Paris, having just…

  • Clever Tart

    I've seen those little pop-tart presses (oh, sorry, toaster pastry press) at stores lately, so I thought I'd jump on the bandwagon (hopefully the wagon is carrying Elbow; they seem fun) and try to make my own breakfast treats. I had apples and bananas around, so I made apple pie and banana-chocolate-chip versions…  Because breakfast…