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: October 2019

  • So You Want to be a Pro : Expectations

    It's been a minute since I had a take on this, but I've been making this list since being a pretty hard-core amateur, part of a few amateur partnerships, a long-time teacher, and now a studio owner.  That means I have a WHOLE LOT OF OPINIONS on this subject.  Even more than usual.  But don't…

  • Pants of Dance vs. Dance Pants

    Men wear black dance pants.  Pants.  That are black.  That they dance in. Ladies wear dance pants.  That are not pants.  That they dance in.  Under their dresses.  I say them like, “dancepants.”  They are also called dance trunks.  Dance shorts.  Dance briefs.  Opaque, high-coverage undies that you wear so your actual undies aren’t on…

  • Sabotage!

    I am typing in rhythm to this song, obviously: Not progressing as quickly as you'd like?  Seeing other dancers who started when you did zoom into higher levels?  First of all, THAT'S OKAY.  Stop comparing yourself to others.  Dance is a journey, yo.  Second of all, if you're unsettled by your lack of progress or…

  • How to be a Good Dance Partner

    Notice I didn't say "How to be the Best Dance Partner" or even "How to be a Great Dance Partner" because DAMN, SON, there are a lot of ways to screw this up and I will settle for "good" IN JUST THIS ONE AREA of dancing. Don’t date Yes, I'm putting this first. It's easy…