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.

  • Living the Single Life

    Here's what I do when there's no one around (and there's no threat of anyone catching me doing any of this):

    • I eat a huge bag of Chex Mix and a huge bag of Whoppers, and nothing else, for two days.
    • I talk to myself… a lot.
    • I talk to myself… loudly.
    • I practice my sexy dance moves.
    • I never open the curtains (see above).
    • I go to sleep at horrendously late hours of the night.
    • I get up at 6am.
    • I fall asleep at 9am and 9pm for 15 minutes.
    • I have a TV show constantly playing on my computer.
    • I don't wash dishes.
    • I keep using the same, unwashed plate/bowl/spoon/fork/cup for every meal.
    • I don't do laundry.
    • I wear pajamas all the time, unless I have to leave the house.
    • I sing loudly.
    • I play the same song over and over and over and over and over. 
    • I leave all the lights on when I go to sleep.
    • I don't drink ANY water, but lots of coffee.

    What do you do when you're alone?  

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     One year ago: Ladies' Afternoon, in which the ladies lunch.

  • A Place For Amateurs

    Maybe you're a long-time member of the thriving Twin Cities ballroom dance scene, getting bored.  Maybe you've never danced a box step in your life and are wondering where, if you ever had the inkling, one would even start such an undertaking.  Maybe you're just feeling like there's no foothold for amateurs in the state of Minnesota (see what I did there?).

    For your relief, I will provide a hearty list of places, businesses, and people whose MAIN PURPOSE is to serve the student population of the ballroom dance community and provide them with training, parties, fun (and nearly free, or free) events, and performance opportunities.

    Major studios in the Twin Cities area:

    Independent Ballroom Instructors:

    Studios and independent instructors provide quality ballroom dance instruction.  Studios also generally offer group classes, practice parties, and a social environment.  Independent instructors often have a clientele focused on competitive ballroom dancing ("dancesport"), but teach all levels of dance, from two-left-feet to I-might-go-pro.  

    Ballroom and Partner-Dance Clubs:

    Clubs hold regular dances and/or group classes, offer a venue for meeting other dancers (or wannabe dancers), and are a low-cost option for a night out or way to practice your skills.

    Venues For Dancing:

    These locations have live bands or DJs playing ballroom, salsa, argentine tango, or swing on particular nights of the week, often for no cover charge.  Many places have a group class before the festivities begin.  

    Ballroom Dance Events:

    Any of these events are a great way to see and participate in THE GREATEST SPORT OF ALL TIME.

    Still jaded at the options or prices or businesses/professionals/clubs available to help you enjoy ballroom dancing?  

    Try this:

    • Dancing in the Park - free.  outside.  live music.  Saint Paul.  pretty.
    • Project Dance - USA Dance sponsors FREE quality group dance classes (Sundays at Tapesty Folkdance Center, 1:30 – 3:00pm, taught by YOURS TRULY for the month of July).
    • Lynne's Dance News - a comprehensive and exhausting list of ALL the dance opportunities that are happening EVERY DAY.  Updated often.  

    Disclaimer: I did this without the Googles, off the top of my head, with a headache.  If I somehow missed your studio/personhood/locationality, I apologize profusely.  Feel free to email me your contact info and I'll add you to the list. 

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    One year ago: The Garden of A Little Bit of Evil, in which the plants become cannibals.

     

  • List of Last Week’s Labors of Love

    – a whole new world, like Aladdin sings about, in the bra department.  
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    Does this qualify as TMI?  Maybe you're one of the male persuasion, or maybe you've been wearing the correct size undergarments for your adult life, BUT I HAVE NOT.  

    Last week, I had a little karmic alignment in which I actually read something on the Interwebs (as opposed to "looked at pictures") about finding the right bra size and a friend, who is very similarly shaped, told me her unbelievable story about a bra fitting.  Since the universe seemed game for me to go shopping, I ventured into the nearest VS, grabbed every style of doodads they had in sizes heretofore seeming ridiculous to me, and dove into a dressing room.

    Let me tell you, people, the clouds opened up and angels sang and double rainbows shone over the mall.  

    In other words, I now possess several brasseries that actually fit the way they are supposed to.  I highly recommend this experience if you haven't already.

    – I cut off all my hair.  Well, I'm not bald or anything quite so Britney Spears, but I do not have any hair below the ears and it is great.  Maybe there's still a picture over on the Instagram feed?  If not, I'll tell you more about it later this week.

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    Of course now I want to go shorter… and blond.  But one thing at a time!

    – I ordered The G's 30th birthday gift.  I am basically the best wife ever.

    – Zoo insists she can put on her own diaper.  She's trying to do it as I type.  There is a lot of rolling around and giggling involved.  For not being able to talk, I love that her vocabulary consists of indignant full sentences:

    • I do it myself!
    • Stop it.
    • I can  do it.
    • I get it. 

    How was your week?  Enjoying any summer activities?  What are your plans for the Fourth?  Are you playing hooky all week?

    Sam-Claflin

  • Ukulele and Ballroom Dancing

    I've taken up the ukulele.  As in, I pick it up and pluck out the same four chords over and over with a small amount of variation and a lot of mistakes.   But I keep strumming.  

    The G effortlessly grabs the uke and plays recognizable songs without sticking his tongue out and in a constant tempo.  Granted, he's been playing stringed instruments for years, but it's a little frustrating when my hard work (and seemingly small rewards) are overshadowed by someone who has more training (and proooobably talent) than I do.

    Is my perseverance to learn the ukulele a waste of time, when I compare my skills to others? 

    Hell no!

    Is it a bash to my fragile ego?

    Hell yes!

    But here's some basic truths I've discovered about learning:

    • if you surround yourself with people who are better at something than you, you are likely to get better, faster. [See: trip to France when I spoke no French.  At the end of ten days, I could order a Nutella crepe, with banana!, and pay for it, including some pleasantries, in the native language.]
      Nutella-Crepe
    • there are lots of tools to help you learn something.  The most important part of that is "you".  [See: my stack of crocheting books, magazines, and internet printouts.  I sat down for a weekend with a ball of yarn and hooked my way through all the basic stitches and now I enjoy crocheting.]
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    • the biggest trick is to actually do it, because no one can make you learn something that you don't want to learn.  [See: my Calculus grade freshmen year in college.]
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    • sometimes, it is hard.  To quote Pineapple Pete, the ukulele [and ballroom dancing] has "really complicated, fine-coordination tasks to do, quick, in time, quickly quickly quickly".   [See: freaking bachacatas in Samba or fingerpicking any song, ever.]
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      this is what happens when you try to do Samba while playing the ukulele
    • there is always someone who is more talented or has more training than you do.  If you compare yourself to others, you'll often be disappointed in your own awesome and worthy progress.  Make goals, crush goals, make new goals, crush new goals.  [See: play "Twinkle, Twinkle Little Star" without mistakes with a metronome.]
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    • you and your new thing are going to have to spend some time together.  You decide on how much time that will be.  If you practice once a week for an hour, it'll take you forever to see progress.  If you do it for an hour a couple times a week, you'll have a decent repertoire in a few months.  [See: my knitting… not great… because I do it once a year.]
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      oooh, today is my knitting day!
    • like Julie Andrews says, you should start at the beginning; it's a very good place to start.  While jumping in to playing "Tonight You Belong to Me" or doing Open-level choreography seems fun, you'll be missing out on the process of understanding your craft and making things a lot more frustrating for yourself (and anyone who's listening or watching you) in the long run. [See: my attempt to copy "Tonight You Belong to Me" played by the phenomenal Steve Martin.  Sorry, G!] 

    Happy learning, everybody!

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    If anyone gets why this man is on the bottom of the page (in the context of the blog), I'll bake you cookies.

     

  • Living The Dream

    For awhile, I thought the Ultimate Prize would be going to Wanderlust Festival (in Whistler, BC, Canada: because traveling internationally [even in the same continent] is neater) for the FULL four days ALONE to enjoy the yogas and the Canadas and the not-childrens.  

    After spending a solid 10 days without my children and 3 days without my husband, I've adjusted the Ultimate Prize to having a trust-worthy, yet INVISIBLE nanny/housekeeper.  Like, a friendly ghost with telekinesis.  Or, a helpful ninja.

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  • Growing Up Via Vegetables

    I have an scale of perceived adulthood based on how many vegetables I eat a week.  

    Graph

    I average out as a toddler.

    In order to approach my actual age, or at least someone who can buy beer, I made that cauliflower-based pizza crust that's been all the rages on da blogs and da internets.  

    Here is the recipe I used: [the link for the recipe I used].

    It wasn't bad.  I mean, if you're looking for the guilty-pleasure kind of pizza that's laden with carbs and gluten, this isn't it.  It tastes a bit healthy, but also less like a heart attack.  Lose-win.   

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    The main controversy with most cauliflower-based crust recipes is that you can't pick the slice up with your hands.  A fork is required, and thus, your brain knows it's not really pizza and is on to your little ruse and tastes the cauliflower EXTRA.

    But check it:
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    Well, brain, I've fooled you.  The small children who inhabit my house didn't fall for it, but strangely, The G did.

    I recommend trying the fake pizza trend.  We can all grab a beer together afterward.

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    One year ago: The Garden of Good (and Barely Any Evil), in which I am sad about radishes, but happy about flowers and cement.

    Two years ago: Oh snap, in which I have a new blog design, which was referring to the old blog design. 

  • List of Last Week’s Labors of Love

    – rumors about me made their way back around into my ear.  Hey, silly people, I'm not opening a studio.  Do I have a business plan, business loan, a space to lease, or any of the other things needed to open a dance studio?  No.  

    If, at some point, I [we] decide to open a groovy place to learn and practice ballroom dancing, I'll let you know.  

    – here's my charm bracelet:

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    I ordered it all off amazon.com from a company called Queenberry.

    – blueberry muffins, or blueblerry muffins, if you ask Mae Cake.  I subbed brown rice flour in for the regular flour.  They were very good, but very crumbly and had a slight metallic aftertaste.  Has anyone else had this happen with brown rice flour?

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    – new running shoes.  I have about 300 miles on my old ones, so it's time to break in some "new" ones.  They're the same model as my current pair, just the BRIGHTEST YELLOW EVER. (Maladriot, we're twinsies!) 
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    – preparing for "summer vacation".  The ladies are heading to my in-laws for 10 days (not that I'm counting), so I dug up a crochet pattern that I've been dying to try, packed and labeled little girl clothes, and made a huge to-do list.  

    Since we're heading to a competition later this week, I think this hot man picture is relevant.

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    One year ago: LLLL, in which we see farm animals.

     

  • Dance Sarcastically

     

    One of my favorite movies is The Other Guys, which besides starring Mark Wahlberg and Will Ferrell, has one of the funniest lines ever in it:

        You learned to dance like that sarcastically?

    Often in tough practice sessions, when things just aren't working or I don't feeeeeel it, I dance sarcastically.

    I pick my favorite dancer to channel (Joanna!  Marzena!), or my least favorite, yet most expressive, over-the-top dancer (let's not name names!) and proceed with the following scene…

        Me (sarcastic tone): Hey Gordon, watch this [insert dramatic, confident, enormous, and silly-feeling rock step and spin combination, imitating So-and-So]

        Gordon (completely sincere): That looked awesome.

        Me: Shit.

    The dance floor is not the place to be in my head, listing off all the things I did wrong and chastising myself and getting self-conscious.  (That's what the practice floor is for, sort of.)  The dance floor is where I go, "Look at me!" and if I have to say it sarcastically, then so be it.

    LOOK AT ME!

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    One year ago: One Thing, in which I do… one thing.

    Two years ago: It's Getting Hot in Herre, in which MN proves it can get above 70 degrees in June.

  • I’m Not Lazy, But You Should Read This

    I don't repost full articles from other people.  

    But today I'm going to…  Sort of.

    I'm not being lazy; they are really amazing articles that deserve more than a passing mention, highlighted-text-style, in MAH BLOG.  They deserve more than a cut and paste of each article's headline also, but that's what I'm doing.  

    These are posts I read when I'm feeling whiny to remind myself to BUCK UP AND DO SOMETHING.

    Happy reading!

    Levar-burton04
    Two years ago: LLLL, in which I sleep a lot.

  • Food Revolution Day – Winner

    I have been remiss in announcing the winner of the Food Revolution Day giveaway.

    The delightful winner of my copy of Jamie Oliver's Food Revolution is longtime reader and all-around delightful lady, Patty H.  

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    Thanks for entering!

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    One year ago: LLLL, in which I alphabetize things.

    Two years ago: Bored Boards, in which I cover things with fabric.