Lost in Bead-Land

It's that time again! The gem shows have hit Tucson, and I am shopping and working and socializing alllll the time. If you thought that closing my jewelry business would mean an end to my gem show days, you were wrong. I still love beads and making jewelry, and I still love seeing my beading friends. Plus I can find awesome supplies for my costumes, and jewelry to match my costumes.

Today I'm helping set up our booth for the week, and I'll be busy vending until Sunday, when we then have to tear everything back down again and make it fit in the back of the truck. It's always an adventure! Luckily I don't have to figure out how to make things fit, I just have to follow instructions.

Anyway, the blog will be pretty quiet this week, but next week it's going to be nose to the grind stone with DANCE!

Gem showing!

Just a quick note apologizing for the lack of updates... Since Tuesday I have been working at one of the many gem shows that invades Tucson during February. I'll be working until Sunday. Regular blogging should resume on Monday or Tuesday, depending on how tired I am!

I've managed to squeeze in two great performances during this week, so I look forward to talking about those and reviewing some more makeup and featuring some vendors and all those things I've been wanting to do with my blog.

Quiet Mood

I haven't really been in a networking/blogging sort of mood lately, honestly. I suppose I haven't really had any profound insights to share lately, and sometimes it feels like I'm just speaking into a void anyway. So here's a quick recap of the past few days:

Classes: Anaya classes on Thursday, went well, worked on some moves I already knew fairly well but could use the practice on. Really struggled with staying focused though, because my husband got home from a biz trip while I was at class and I wanted to be home with him instead of dancing. Anyway, on Saturday I tried out Jolie's community class, along with my friend Jen who was visiting from Tempe. We had a good time, got to do a mini-choreo that focused on various 8 shapes.

Shopping: Hey, it's gem show season! I went out shopping! I failed to find more tribal hair sticks, which made me sad. I did get a new belt and a long tassel made of smaller tassels, and another strand of coins, because I can never have too many coins. Also I bought a basket, because tribal girls carry their stuff in baskets and it was green! And two pairs of pants which can be worn for class or solos or fun, and they're also green. I even found a cool cover up and guess what? IT'S GREEN!

Solo: Working on a new solo to perform at the Open Dance on the 23rd. I may do Lovely Creature instead, but it's good to have something new to work on.

Family: My brother is now a performer, too! He's been doing fire spinning for a few years, and working as a fire safety for our local fire troupe, Elemental Artistry. He recently decided that it was time to try his hand at performing and on Friday he had his debut, doing rope dart. It was pretty badass and he didn't light his beard or the audience on fire. I'm such a proud big sister!

New and Exciting!

Well, hello there! I pretty much took last week off from dancing and blogging, because working at the bead show was pretty exhausting and honestly, after over a year of daily practice, I felt like I needed just a little break. There were tiny bits of chair dancing here and there, and lots of balancing things on my head for the amusement of my booth-mates, but no dedicated practice. And you know what? I'm fine with that.

But now it's a new week and gem show is mostly behind me, and I'm back to my regular dancing ways! Not only that, but tonight was the first meeting of Fire & Gold, Jolie's student troupe. I am so excited to be part of it, and I love how our first choreography is shaping up! I also love that tonight was relatively low key, because I am still wiped out from the show. Things were at just the right level for me to throw myself fully into it, but still have some energy left over for the rest of the night.

Gem show and classes

No rest for the wicked -- I went right from Unmata weekend into gem show week! Yesterday was a little shopping and vendor-visiting, and today was 5 hours of grueling labor setting up the Beyond Beadery booth -- which actually takes a lot more than 5 hours, I just got to leave early because I had a dentist appointment. Lucky me?

I was bad last night and skipped class in favor of hanging out with beading friends, an awesome local beader has a few out-of-towners staying at her place and I was invited over to eat chicken and bead, which seemed like a good way to rest my sore Unmata leg ;)

Tonight I went to class, but I only did 101 and skipped drills -- I have a ton of stuff to do tonight and I couldn't really justify staying out until 9:30 for class when I need to be in bed no later than midnight! Class was challenging, even though we were doing some basic-basics. There was a lot of balance work and my legs were tired from schlepping beads so it was hard to stand on one leg at a time! But we also did some practice on being graceful and focusing on intention, so that was nice -- more emotional and mental challenges, less physical ones.

Sadly, that was the only class I get to take this week! I have to work the show until 8 tomorrow, which means no Fonda, and driving to Tempe on Thursday is just plain out of the question.

Six weeks under my jingly belt!

Day 42 of practice. 42 days = 6 weeks!

I wasn't going to buy myself anything special to mark my six weeks of practice, but then I saw this beautiful tribal faerie pendant at the gem show and I just had to have her. When I asked how much, the vendor said "$25, but for you, $20" which I found funny, since we hadn't met before and hadn't spoken at all, since she was on the phone. Perhaps "for you" means "since the show is closing in 2 hours and it's one less thing to take home." Still. $20 for an awesome faerie! Happy day!

Practice tonight consisted of skipping around through my slow play list trying to decide on a song for my veil solo. It needs to be less than 5 minutes and the Stellamara song I've been practicing to is 5:01. Currently leaning towards Faith and the Muse or Portishead, but I'll need to practice some more to see what feels good. I also drilled all the new moves I learned last night, since there's no class next week (boo hoo!) and I want to make sure I don't forget them. I'm horrible about remembering long combos, I always forget some key part.

Now time to go window shop on Etsy for a veil I won't trip over!

Practice where I can get it

Day 36 of practice.

What a day it was! To think I thought yesterday allowed little time for practice. Today started on the wrong foot when I slept through the alarm! That's never happened to me before. In fact, I'm the sort of person who usually wakes up a few minutes before the alarm goes off, as if I'm equipped with some sort of magical internal alarm. But not this morning! I guess my body was too tired from all the partying last night. I overslept by an entire hour, which left me with no time for breakfast and definitely no time for dancing.

I did get a silly moment of practice during work, when I balanced a cone of thread on my head and did isolations while waiting for a price check on aforementioned thread. It was a lot easier to balance than a sword, but I don't think it would wow an audience. A couple of my classmates from Tempe did come down for the shows and visited me at work, but it was too busy in the booth for any improv tribal!

After putting in my eight hours at work, I went to an awesome dinner at one of Tucson's best restaurants (courtesy of my awesome boss!). Then I had to go straight to a party and make a slightly-more-than-token appearance. Both events were great, but I didn't get home until nafter 11pm, and I was stuffed and tired. So tonight's practice consists of isolations in the shower, and chair dancing to Beats Antique while updating this blog. I can't wait to get back to real dancing!

No class for me, boohoo!

Day 34 of practice.

Due to working the gem show, there's no way I could have made the drive to class and back tonight. I'd just be too tired! Plus the temperatures were in the 30s or lower all day today (28 degrees on the way to work this morning! This is unheard-of in Tucson). These temperatures froze up pretty much all the water in the city, rendering me unable to cook oatmeal this morning, so there was no dancing while preparing breakfast. AND I was supposed to dance at work today, for the entertainment of my co-workers, but we had a constant stream of customers in our booth. Great for business, lame for dancing! (It was tempting to dance FOR the customers, in hopes that they would tip me in beads, but that's a little too attention-grabby for me)

So it's another day of drilling belly-rolls (including in a blissfully hot shower once our water was back). Hopefully tomorrow morning will be less chaotic!

Shivering does not count as shimmying

Day 33 of practice.

Brrrr! Sudden cold snap here in Tucson! I could barely dance my way through cooking breakfast, my muscles were too cold. It's below freezing outside and none too cozy inside my house tonight. My furnace has been incredibly unreliable this season.

Anyway, practice was split up between breakfast, work, and after dinner. Mostly belly rolls and mayas and shimmies and floreos. I'm sad that working the gem show kept me from class, but I heard it was cold in the studio, too, so I wouldn't have been very happy there. Sure hope the weather gets better soon!

Practice-ish

Day 32 of practice.

Today was the first day of my gem show job, the day of setting up the booth -- which took about 6 hours. My practice consisted of dancing around the house while I cooked breakfast and got ready for work, which was hampered a bit by the fact that my husband and his co-worker were working from our dining room table, so I didn't feel like I could dance too much. I also did some belly rolls and mayas during brief breaks throughout the day. I'm not sure if my practice really totaled half an hour, but I'm calling it close enough!

Putting on my dance music in the morning really helped! I am not a morning person by nature, and I had a hard time falling asleep last night (busy thinking about the gem show!). The energy of the music really got me moving, especially paired with the knowledge that I wouldn't have much time for practice later in the day.