That time I ate pizza in a bikini

Best pizza party EVER!

Last week I went over to Liora K's house to participate in a little photo shoot to promote the Body Love Conference. The theme? Eating pizza in our bikinis. I was totally down with that idea, even when a cold wind blew in and it started raining! Luckily the weather cleared up just in time for us to lounge around the pool. And lounge we did. This is just the start... a lot more beautiful women showed up lately and one of them brought cookies and brownies. I can't wait to see the rest of the photos!

All of this was to provide images for this article on the Body Love Conference in The Tucson Weekly. Apparently there are three full-page images in the print version! I need to go pick one up today, and if you're local I recommend you do, too. I also recommend attending the BLC if you can, because we all need to learn to be more loving of our bodies.

Body love has been on my mind a lot lately, not just because of this photo shoot and the fact that the BLC is just around the corner, but the fact that once your eyes are opened to a concept, you see it all around you. Earlier this week I got an e-mail from Sephora offering me a gift of 5 summer must-haves. What were they? Five self-tanning products! Well, I don't tan. It's not in my nature. I burn and I freckle, and I'm OK with that. I used to dislike my freckles because I didn't want to be "cute" but I have embraced the fact that I can be cute AND sexy. I love my long white legs, and I'm not going to tan them or my white belly and back to fit some arbitrary sense of beauty. I think I'm beautiful the way I am, pale skin, squishy belly, freckles and all.

Aside from the body love aspect, my favorite part of this photo shoot was Liora's neighbor's dog. He was a HUGE weimereiner, and he kept putting his feet and head on top of the brick wall and just watching us. No barking, growling, or anything else, just watching. I'm pretty sure he wanted pizza and ear scritches. He was absolutely adorable!

Oh, and while I was writing this, Liora sent me MORE PICTURES! YES!

 No big deal, this is just how we eat pizza. In our bikinis.

Look at those beautiful, happy faces!

30 Days of Dance Photo Challenge

I'm kicking off the year with this #30DaysofDance photo challenge started by Faizeh! It ties in nicely with my goal of branching out into more social networks. You can now follow me on Instagram for these pictures and more! Don't mind all of the Cthulhu pictures, I used to only use Instagram to document the adventures of my beaded Cthulhu plush. I'll still post him from time to time but it's going to mostly be dance stuff.

So far my year of dance is off to a good start. I didn't end up having time to dance yesterday (other than some hip work while I was cleaning), but my family had our gift exchange and I received two types of poi which will help me with my goal of mastering my prop collection. These new poi are much softer than the practice set I made for myself, which often resulted in strange bruises. And as for today, I've already put in a few hours working on Open Stage and my social media stuff, I'm about to do a little practice and then it will be time to put on my face and head over to Sky Bar. This will easily be an 8 hour day of dance-related work. Awesome!

In Black and White

No serious, thought-provoking topics or updates on the status of my dance career today, I just wanted to share this nice picture that Ashley Grove posted of me yesterday, from Open Stage a few months back. I really like how I look in black and white for some reason. It's an especially good look for Open Stage photos, because sometimes the lighting there gets a little wacky (I don't even bother trying to take photos there anymore, you need a real camera with proper light settings, not an iPhone).

The Meat on our Bones

Jes The Militant Baker is on a crusade against nasty autocomplete messages in Google. Read her original post here. Although she started out with fat shaming, she branched out into skinny shaming too, because all shaming is bad. She opened up submissions to her readers and FB fans, and I decided to do the above image.

I'm not very good at graphic design and image stuff (as you all know from my beautiful "gettin' opinionated" image that I make constant use of), so I didn't put an autocomplete drop-down in mine. Instead I took my inspiration from the yucky quote "Bones are for dogs, real men want meat." How disgusting. Not only is it skinny-shaming, but it reduces curvy women to a commodity, comparing them to a big, meaty steak. Don't get me wrong, I love steak, but I don't love it in the same way that a living, breathing, thinking human being deserves to be loved. And I also love bones, because without them, I'd be a floppy pile of skin and muscles and organs, and wouldn't that be gross?

I chose the image I did because, well, I still really like how my shoulders look, but also the composition was perfect, there was enough open space over the fan veil to put my text and make it legible. Plus I knew Liora would be into the idea of her photo being used for a body-positive message!

Speaking of body positivity, if you're into it and you're in or will be in Tucson in April, you should totally come to the Body Love Conference (also organized by Jes). I already have my ticket and I am really excited to be part of the current movement away from shaming and towards healthier attitudes.

You should also check out the ever-growing album of posters made for this autocomplete campaign, because there's some really good ones!

Shakedown Rundown!

Photo courtesy of The Fantom Fotog/Santa Joe.

The title of this post is doubly accurate, because I'm going to give you a rundown of what happened at the Shakedown, but also I am feeling rundown from the Shakedown (seriously, what did I DO to my shoulders? You'd think those fan veils were made of of lead with how sore I am).

I got there bright and early for the Spanish skirt workshop with Rajani. I was happy to see that even though it was held at 9am, there was a nice crowd and we all had a good time learning a whole ton of moves and some historic/cultural context. My troupemate Melanie was there too, so hopefully there's some skirt work in Fire & Gold's future. Rajani provided us with a really good handout that should help me actually remember what I learned.

After that it was off to lunch with my BFF Jen, and then she let me take over her bathroom to put my face on, and she didn't even steal my new Kat Von D palette, so you know she's a good friend (stay tuned for a review of said palette on Friday, it's a goodie).

For my solo, I performed with my stunningly beautiful fan veils, to "Desert Dance" by Children of Paradise. I think I did a pretty good job, I'll have to wait to get the video to see how well it actually went, but I got a lot of compliments and not all of them were on my costume and fans. I feel like the painted background makes for nice photos, good job on dressing the stage, AZMECDA!

Then it was shopping time! I was finally able to get my hands on a really pretty new 25 yard skirt that I had ordered back at the Bisbee retreat (no big deal on the delay since Yasmina didn't ask for a deposit), and I also bought a cool barrette and some yummy tea. I had to restrain myself from buying more things, but I really should start saving up for the shopping bonanza that is Tribal Fest. Still, it's important to support your local dance vendors!

Soon my troupemates showed up, so we wandered around together, watched some performances, shopped, and got ready to dance. Jolie did a beautiful solo and then we had an 8 minute set with two of our favorite choreos and a mini drum solo from Brandye. The crowd enjoyed it and we got some nice photos. Success!

We finished out our night at Cracker Barrel. In true bellydancer form, we were wearing normal clothes but still had on our sparkly stage makeup, some jewelry and bindis. Probably more glamour than Cracker Barrel is really meant to handle. It was nice to sit down for a meal together, though, to chat and plan for the future and daydream about costumes and workshops.

I'm feeling really inspired by the wonderful dancers I saw at the Shakedown, and I'm looking forward to hitting my training hard this week, even if the first couple days may have to be focused on some yoga for my poor shoulders! 

I've been working out

This photo by Liora K makes me feel pretty awesome, because I think it's the first time I've ever been able to see my back and shoulder muscles. I wasn't even aware that they were visible until this shoot, because it's not like I can easily look at my own shoulders.

I'm feeling pretty buffed-out because I just finished a 30 day challenge where I built up to doing 250 squats and 100 push-ups. For the entire month of June I worked out 3 days on, 1 day off, no matter what else I had going on (except for one day when a gig ate my entire day and left no time or energy for workouts, so it ended up actually being a 31 day challenge).

I have mixed feelings about these 30 day challenges. On the one hand, I feel pretty proud of myself (and my husband too! He even kept it up when he went to NJ for a week) for accomplishing them, and I definitely see results in my back, shoulders and thighs. I have better range of motion in my push-ups now, too. On the other hand, I feel like my body probably would have been better served by doing a more varied work-out, and there were days when my thighs and hips were constantly sore and tired (I was very glad we didn't have dance class for the last 10 days of the month because I don't know if I could have handled both). Also, while my push-ups improved, my squats didn't get any better because I had to focus on increasing the quantity I did rather than the quality.

Going forward, I want to keep doing squats and push-ups, because they are good for me, but I want to do less of them and throw in some other things, like crunches or something, so more of my body gets a workout. My main worry is that without a 30 day challenge hanging over my head, I'll be more likely to not do my exercises when I'm too tired or it's too hot.

Oh, and speaking of too hot? It was 100 degrees or over every single day of June. I don't recommend choosing the hottest month of the year to start a new workout routine.

A Feminist Message from Liora K and Sophia Ravenna

While I was at Liora K Photography's studio on Saturday she asked if I would like to pose for a feminist photo too, and I said yes! It was something I'd wanted to do for a while, because I really love what she's doing, but I also wasn't sure what I wanted to say. She'd already covered a lot of my hot-button issues, but she came up with a new twist for me. Hooray! Here's what she said about it on her Facebook page:

Wait, aren't all the feminist photos naked?

Not this one. Sophia Ravenna is a good friend and talented dancer. I used to dance with her in Skirt Full of Fire Dance Company and Fire & Gold Belly Dance. As a bellydancer, she and her peers frequently have to correct the misconception that during their performances, key parts of their costumes will be removed, and that this is done for the purpose of pleasing an adult male audience.

Stripping and Burlesque are amazing forms of performance. It's entirely possible that in those acts, performers may draw on bellydance moves. Fusion dance is amazing, and it's great to watch!

This should not give anyone permission though, to assume that they have the right to see a performer take their clothes off, or ask a performer at an event advertised as "Bellydance" if they will take their clothes off while they perform. It's disrespectful to their craft, and can make performers worried for their personal safety.

Admire the hard work that goes into costumes - many are made by the dancers themselves! Ask questions about the craft, learn, educate yourself. Enjoy the performance! But never assume, and never approach, that a dance is always done to titillate.

#teardownthepatriarchy

Even with that comment in the middle about stripping and burlesque being amazing, at least one person still thought we were trying to slut-shame strippers, which was absolutely not our aim, so I'd like to reiterate: I am 100% cool with stripping, burlesque, and pole. I know lots of great ladies who perform in those styles and I love what they do. But it is not what I do, anymore than I do tap, line dancing or traditional Israeli folk dance. I am a belly dancer and I do belly dance, which happens to not involve taking my clothes off. I don't leave my clothes on because I think it's wrong for other women to take theirs off, I leave them on because they are part of my dance. I am not ashamed of my body, but I am proud of my handmade velvet bra adorned with Afghani coins and Turkoman buttons.

The important thing is, a woman should never be asked or told to take her clothes off just because she is dancing. It is our choice whether or not we strip, not yours. Even in arts like burlesque and pole, there's no guarantee of a "reveal." Many pole performers choose to stay fully clothed. Many burlesque acts only do a partial reveal, or no reveal, instead focusing on a cheeky sense of humor. Even some performers who do strip may not do so at all events, if it's not appropriate for the audience or they just don't feel like it.

So in conclusion, the only people who I want to shame are the people who think they deserve more control over my body than I have. I won't take it off, and you just have to live with that.

Professional Photos -- A Worthy Investment!

This past weekend I finally took the plunge and invested in a professional photo session with my dear friend Liora K Photography. Liora's been getting a lot of attention from the media lately for her feminist photo series and the Attractive + Fat photos that she took for The Militant Baker, and for good reason. She's great at what she does.

It's hard to make the decision to invest in professional photos as a semi-pro dancer. The majority of my gigs are still unpaid, and my main investment of course has to be my education, followed by the occasional new costume piece (or, if I'm at Tribal Fest, a whole BUNCH of costume pieces since I could try them all on). However, I felt like the time had come to make sure that I had a great headshot (see above!!!) and plenty of beautiful photos for my website, blog, and any promotional materials I might need to make. Since I had a bunch of great new costumes and Liora and I both had a weekend free, it was time.

The great thing about Liora is not only is she a true professional with a dedicated home studio, professional backdrops and lighting (not to mention training and mad skillz), but since she's also a bellydancer, she gave great directions, like "Channel Mardi Love" or "Give me a really big right maya." She knows the terminology, she knows what looks good on a dancer's body, and she didn't try to direct me into any cheezy stereotypical Egyptic poses.

I love the above photo, because not only is it pretty, but I think it really captures my dance persona, ethereal, mysterious, and probably daydreaming or plotting something.

I am really excited to share more of these photos with you in the future. And be sure to come back tomorrow to see what else we did while I was in her studio! I think you'll love it!

Pretty pictures

I'm happy to say that there were some really beautiful photos of me taken at the Legends of the Labyrinth variety show! Above and directly below are images by Kelly Bender.

 And this shot by Jake DeBruyckere is pretty much the best picture that has ever been taken of me on stage:

Wow!

How I feel when I dance

Photo by my wonderful troupemate Ashley Grove

 

Sometimes I look at pictures from my performances and I go "ugh, is that really what I looked like?" but not this time. Ashley managed to capture this image that just perfectly expresses how I feel when I dance. Graceful, blissed out, and dare I say beautiful? I like the lighting, too.

 

I'm especially happy that this picture is so nice, because it's from my improv solo, where I was dancing to a song I had never heard before. I was worried that I'd have a thinking face, or a panicked face, or that I'd be doing something really weird with my arms. But nope. I look like I'm dancing, not freaking out.

 

Speaking of freaking out, I'm leaving for Tribal Fest in SIX DAYS and I have so much to do. Ahhhhhh!  

No beauty blog today!

Thanks to Liora K, now I have the perfect filler image for when I write about makeup. Sweet!

Anyway, no beauty blog today. I have to get ready for a party at our house this weekend, and finish gathering supplies for the new costume. This means my Friday is pretty jam-packed, and when given the choice between doing my makeup and actually having some good dance practice, I of course chose dance!

I will try to make up for it by having a super duper GLITTER EXTRAVAGANZA next week, because I have a few different brands of glitter (at least half a dozen?) and I think it's time to review them all. Are you excited? I know you're excited.

Beauty Blogging For Bellydancers with Special Guest Liora K!

 

Are you guys excited? Because I'm excited! In case you didn't read about it earlier this week, this past weekend I went over to Liora K's studio and we teamed up to bring you a special edition of Beauty Blogging for Bellydancers! Liora did my makeup and took the photos. I provided the makeup and the words! Together we are an unstoppable beauty blogging team! Above you can see all the things that we put on my face, minus the concealer/powder, and the lipstick which somehow escaped.

 

 Here's my mostly naked face (with the usual primer/foundation/powder routine I discussed last week) ready to get greenified! We decided that since I wanted to review the new eyeshadow pencil and green lip tar I bought last week, the theme would be "How to do a monochrome green look without looking dead" because there's nothing worse than looking dead when you're not trying to be a zombie bellydancer.

We started with the Aqua Shadow Waterproof Eye Shadow Pencil from Make Up For Ever in color 8E. It's a really nice bluey-teal-green, a great compliment to the emerald shades that are in this year. On one eye you can see the basic shape she colored in, and the other eye shows how she blended it out with a pointy eyeshadow brush. This will serve as the base for the rest of the look.

Make sure to blend it out to where you want it pretty quickly, as it will set into place nicely and then if you decide you want to blend it further, you'll have to add more. Once it's there, it stays nicely! I didn't test this product out with dancing, but I did wear it all day and it stayed perfectly. 

 But wait... How about we layer some other colors on top? A little shimmery green from Belle Pierre (a review of their cosmetics is forthcoming)...

 ..and some matte teal from Urban Decay and a little light green from NYX makes for a nice gradated teal-green look.

 I'm liking it so far!

Let's finish those eyes with some golden olive liquid eyeliner from Urban Decay and that green mascara from the Pantone Emerald collection. Now those are some green eyes! Liora also defined my brows with some brow powder she had, and they're looking quite nice, don't you think? Now onto the lips!

 Wait, Liora, you want to put concealer WHERE? On my mouth?

 Oh, ok! It looks kind of like I have a weird milk mustache going on here. Lining your lips with concealer helps keep creamy lipsticks from wandering around your face, and it also makes your lip color pop a bit by slightly lightening the area around your lips. Pro tip from Liora K!

Blend it out smoothly so it no longer looks like a milk mustache. You can also do this before you apply your foundation if you're worried about the concealer looking too obvious.

 Now what to do with my lips? It's really hard to do all-green on lips, it can really wash you out and that's how you get the dead look! So we used that lovely warm brown Minx blastflipstick (hahaha, that name never gets old), then dabbed a bit of Obsessive Compulsive Cosmetics Lip Tar in Power Plant on top of it and blended it out. This gives a lovely iridescent green sheen, while still maintaining the warm tones that keep my face looking alive.

 After warming my face up some more with some blush for a youthful glow, Liora decided we could add even MORE GREEN to my lips, and since MORE GREEN is a rule I live by, we went with it! A little dab of pearly green pigment from NYX adds an extra pop to the center of my lips, but as you can see, I don't look the least bit dead. In fact, I look pretty full of life and ready to go out for dinner!

Speaking of which, I did go out to dinner with this look on, and that lip tar stayed put! By the time I went to bed, I had eaten a meal, drank through a straw, from a glass, and from a sport-top water bottle and I still had plenty of green on my lips. This is a really durable product, and I am looking forward to trying it out in a more "normal" color to see if it can be my new go-to lip option.

 Let's have one more look at those pretty eyes. Ahhhh! Love the contrast between the green eyes and the pink of the blush. Of course, if you wanted to make this look even more green, for instance, if you're doing a character piece as a faerie, or mermaid, you could brush a little light iridescent green mineral shadow across your cheeks for extra sparkle. You could also line your waterline with green, or bring more green under your eyes. You could even color your eyebrows green, though that would probably look weird if you're not also wearing a green wig. Just make sure to really balance it out and try to stick with warm colors that bring life to your face.

Thank you again Liora for doing my makeup and taking all these great photos! You rock, lady! If you all aren't already familiar with her photography work, which ranges from fashion shoots to weddings to feminist art, you should definitely visit Liora K Photography and see what you're missing!

PS: If you've got any questions about the specific colors used, leave a comment and I'll dig into my train case for brands and item numbers and whatnot.

What a weekend!

 You might imagine that on weekends when I'm not performing or at a workshop, I lounge around my house, snuggling with the corgis and maybe catching up on some reading. But nope, even when I'm not in the public eye, there's usually something that I'm up to. This weekend was no exception, and in fact, it was pretty fun and exciting!

On Saturday I went over to Bellydance Tucson to film my first-ever audition video. Wow, was that nerve-wracking! You never realize how many tiny little things go wrong when you're dancing until you're trying to get a "perfect" take! But it was a fun learning experience and I finally got to wear this Anaya Tribal costume that I bought back in Autumn, and I did some new things with my makeup.

Speaking of makeup, after class on Sunday I popped over to Liora K's studio so we could collaborate on this week's Beauty Blogging for Belly Dancers column. I am SO excited! Not only did Liora do some fun things to my face (as you can see), but she took lots of pictures, which you know are going to be 5000x better than what I've been taking with my iPhone in my bathroom.

It's always fun to get together with someone else to do makeup anyway, because they see the things in my train case differently than I do. I pretty much have specific items that I use for specific things, and then everything else is something I saw on sale at Ulta, used once, and then set aside. Between my private lesson with Jolie and yesterday's session with Liora, I definitely feel like I need to be more open-minded and experimental with my collection and see what sort of fun new things I can do.

Be sure to come back on Friday to see more pictures, product reviews, and a nearly step-by-step breakdown of what Liora did with my eyes.

Underneath it all

 Let's face it: lips and eyes are the exciting parts of doing your makeup! But we can't ignore the importance of building our look on a good foundation (ha ha, see what I did there?).

I'm really lucky in that I have pretty good skin, so I can get away with doing light coverage. This is especially important because I have freckles, and I just have to accept that. It's pretty obvious that I have freckles on my arms, and on my chest if I've been out in the sun, so it would just look weird if my freckles were completely obliterated by my makeup. So today I'm going to show you the two sets of products I used in these two different photos.

 We'll start with the look on the right, my old fall-back routine. This is super duper light coverage, really only appropriate for if you have great skin and you're not worried about being washed out by stage lights. It's also good for normal day-time non-dance wear.

First I start with an Urban Decay 24/7 Concealer Pencil in DEA (actually, I use this for the other look, too). Honestly, this product is a little more yellow than I would like, but it's easy to use, masks the darkness under my eyes, and usually by the time I put stuff over it you can't tell that it's yellow.

Next I put down a light layer of Pore Perfection Complexion Primer Potion. This is a lightweight, colorless product that makes your skin look kind of airbrushed. I love it! You may be able to see that I have pretty much squeezed that tube dry.

Lastly, I top it off with a dusting of Smashbox HALO Hydrating Perfecting Powder in Fair. The light tint of this powder makes up for the colorlessness of the primer potion. Also, it comes in a neat container that has this weird scraper that you can turn to get just enough powder. This is nice if you're clumsy (like me) because you don't have to worry about spilling makeup everywhere. Plus it's fun to use.

 Remember when I mentioned that I was pretty much out of my complexion primer? Well, I was running out as the date was approaching for our troupe photo shoot. The local Sephora was sold out, and Urban Decay was sold out on their website. I was seriously worried that it wasn't going to be made anymore! So I decided it was time to invest in some proper foundation and come up with a new makeup routine. This look is a little heavier, especially because you can apply the foundation with a wet sponge for more coverage if need be. It's also really nice for photography, as you can see from my headshot.

I splurged on the Makeup For Ever HD Complexion Starter Kit in 110 Pink Porcelain. This kit comes with a full-sized foundation and small packages of primer and finishing powder, along with a nice kabuki brush. For the photo shoot I used all three products, but in general I tend to skip the primer if my skin is looking good and I'm in a hurry. These products are really easy to use, you can apply the primer and the foundation with your fingers or a sponge, and then dust the powder on very lightly with the soft kabuki brush.

Of course I follow both of these routines up with whatever contouring and blush the day's look requires, but those are product reviews for another day.

Speaking of another day, do you want a sneak peek at some of my exciting recent cosmetics purchases that are waiting for their turn to be reviewed? Of course you do!

Eyeshadow pencil! Nail polish! GREEN LIP TAR. Oh, it's going to be good!

Dance and Body Image

You never realize how white you are until you accidentally stand under a brighter light than the rest of the troupe. Fire & Gold Bellydance, photo by Pedro Romano (I think).

From time to time I see surveys about how belly dance has affected a woman's self esteem or body image. For me, the answers vary from day to day. Sometimes dance builds me up and I feel like the most beautiful, wonderful person in the world. Other times it tears me down and I feel like a failure who should definitely wear a bag over her head.

Dance also changes what I love and hate about myself. On a normal day, I'm not too fond of my belly fat, and often I hate how it looks in photographs of me dancing. But when I do a big Egyptian shimmy and it jiggles all over and makes the movement look like an earthquake? Then I kind of love it. On a normal day, I am happy being fair-skinned, but on a day when everyone else I'm dancing with has a tan, I feel really out of place and awkward... especially when my spot in the formation puts me under a light that shouts "HEY LOOK HER BELLY IS SO WHITE!"

Some things never change, of course. I always love my hair (long! red! just thick enough!), and I always hate my teeth (overbite! yellowness! ugh!). And I always feel just a little too tall even if most of the troupe is the same height as me (I'm not tall, just limb-y), and like I am going to take someone out with my fingernails during a spin.

Body image was much on my mind yesterday as I looked at proofs from out photo shoot and mused about what I loved and hated about my body, and how I looked compared to other members of my troupe (ladies, I think you're all more gorgeous than me, so no worrying that I told myself "Well at least I look better than XXX." I would never think that about you). Then my family came over and our conversation took an interesting turn.

True fact: As a young man entering the Air Force, my dad was 6'2 and 107 pounds. That is not a typo. One hundred and seven. At six foot two. As a full grown adult. I expressed amazement. I knew my Dad had been skinny, but I didn't know how little he had weighed back then. And let's be honest with ourselves here: I'm 5'6"ish and I don't think I've weighed 107 or less as an adult.

So my Dad started telling a string of one-liners about how skinny he was, finishing with "I've heard them all, and told most of them about myself." And it made me think about being a skinny teenager (back before I developed the curves that ensure I will never be 107), and how no one ever said any of those jokes about me. No, all skinny teenage girls get is well-meaning adults (usually older women) telling you to eat more. I got told I didn't eat enough to sustain a bird, which was pretty ridiculous because I ate until I didn't feel hungry any more, and then I ran around and biked and was a generally active girl, so obviously I was fueling myself well.

For teenage girls and adult women, the general expectation or goal is skinniness. Especially for teens, when we haven't finished developing. Our peers find other things to tease us about (for me, it was my teeth, no wonder I hate them). It's not until we become adults that skinny suddenly becomes a sin. The media holds up airbrushed images and stick-thin models, sure, but your Facebook friends constantly post memes declaring that "real women have curves" and "it wouldn't be fair to the other women if I was this awesome and skinny." They build themselves up while tearing others down. I feel like I've talked about this before, though.

I have never been more aware of my body than I have been since I became a dancer. Sometimes it's a wonderful awareness, the soreness of abs well-worked in class, the admiration of arms that creative beautiful lines. And other times it's looking at a picture of myself at the bottom of an undulation and going "great. I look pregnant. I hope no one in my family gets the wrong idea." And it's painful sometimes, that constant worry of whether I'll be able to make progress as a pro while I have braces, the question of whether I need to make serious diet changes or just run more, the possibility that weight loss will mean smaller breasts and suddenly I need to remake all my tribal bras.

I feel like this will always be a complicated relationship, this threesome between my body, dance and I. It will only get worse as I age, and my knees get creakier and my face gets lined. It's something I just have to accept, and just remember not to let the struggle ruin the things that I love about dance.          

What I did today

This morning was the photo shoot for Skirt Full of Fire and Fire & Gold Bellydance! There are not many things that will get me out of bed at 7am on a Saturday, but this was one of them! I had to be fully made-up, coiffed, dressed and over to the venue by 9am. Luckily I live 5 minutes from downtown.

There's a lot more photos coming but Liora K is a super busy lady, so she just posted one as a preview for us... the whole group snuggled up on some couches. Super cute! The whole shoot was this fun. Liora's great to work with, and of course I love all my troupemates and "big sisters" so it made for a good time. And while it was rough getting up and ready so early, it was nice to be done early, too. This was the first time I've had my Saturday afternoon and evening free in a long time.

Keep your eye out for more pictures soon!

Pretty Picture

The event I performed at this past weekend had a "photo booth" set up with this beautiful backdrop and a professional photographer, Pedro Romano (who also photographs a lot of the local fire dancers). I love it! The curtains and carpet really give it the look of an old timey stage from the early days of bellydance, a little bit of Orientalism. Makes me wish I had more of a vintage look going on with my costume, but I still love this picture. I'm wearing a hi-lo skirt and tie-top over my troupe costume pants and bra... I wanted a little pop of color for my solo, and this was easy enough to switch out between numbers.

I have been dancing a lot lately... Not just performing in a lot of events (I have two more this week), but doing a lot of numbers in each event. For our Mijana's troupe showcase, I was in all the troupe numbers, a duet with my troupemate Elyse, my own solo, and then Elyse asked the rest of us F&G girls to be part of her solo by standing on the sidelines and chasing her back "on stage." It was funny, you should have been there!

I really like it this way... Sometimes it is frustrating to spend 1.5-2 hours getting ready just to dance for three minutes! Even more so if I'm driving to Phoenix (which is why I've really cut down on performances up there). Plus dancing in multiple pieces per show is building up my stamina, and allowing me to really practice switching up the mood.

Oh, and if you like those candy-apple red lips, look forward to them being part of my next makeup review later this week!

From the Photo Shoot

I recently had a photo shoot with Dina Farmer Photography. It was a really fun experience, despite the fact that it was outdoors on a hot, windy day. I was worried about it, but the wind actually added a fun element to a lot of the images -- I particularly like this one, it makes me feel like a fae creature who has just walked up out of the lake, bringing the storm with me.

Shooting outdoors in the Summer is tricky -- our original scheduled shoot had to be postponed when the first monsoon of the season blew into town and dumped a bunch of rain on the city. But I like the natural backdrop.

Dina was really nice to work with, she has a great attitude and some wonderful ideas of poses. She got some very cute shots of me with my parasol, and some of my feathers blowing in the wind. She's also captured some beautiful images of other local dancers -- you should really go visit her Facebook fan page to see them.

I'm really happy to have some nice photos to use for promotional materials, blog posts, and my Facebook page. So many of my current images have the door to The Luxor's kitchen as the background, which is a little distracting!

Loving what I do

Duke Standberry snapped this picture of the ladies of Skirt Full of Fire and Fire & Gold Belly Dance* after filming for Walk on the Wild Side with Cat, a show that airs on the local Access TV channel. We're not sure yet when it will air, and then when it will be available on-line, but I'll keep you all updated on that.

Saturday was a hugely busy day. First I went to the Community Class, then my husband and I grabbed a delicious lunch (this is my usual Saturday now, as I really want to support the merchants on 4th Avenue during the construction that is going on downtown). Once we got home I had to get ready for my outdoor photo shoot! It was 100+ degrees and windy, so it was challenging to stay glamorous. Then I had to change into my troupe costume in the park bathroom (yuck!) and touch up my makeup and hair in the car (don't worry, my husband was driving) so I could be ready to be on TV with the troupe! The whole TV filming thing took a couple of hours. All told, I put in the equivalent of a full day's work into my dance career!

It was a great day, though. I am excited about the photos and the show, I had a wonderful time working with SFOF and F&G (as always), and I got to wear some exciting new makeup and hair accessories. I'm feeling more and more like a professional. I may not be making a living at this, but I treat it like my job and do my best to present a professional image, and demonstrate an admirable work ethic. Dance is one of those things where you get back what you put into it. I am pouring my heart, soul, and hours of my time into it, and in return I am gaining respect, happiness, and new opportunities.

*I personally feel that when we work together, we should be called Skirt Full of Fire and Gold. I'm pretty sure such a skirt would have to be made of Kevlar.

Dancing with my new veil

Day 181 of practice.

Ok, this is not the best picture because my camera apparently thought that it should focus on the doumbek on the counter, even though it's at the edge of the frame instead of the center. Really, my camera doesn't like taking pictures of dancers in dim rooms. It's used to an easy life of well-lit jewelry. But I like this picture, because it shows my veil a bit, and my cool pants that everyone liked, and it gives you an idea of the space I was dancing in.

I had a lot of fun dancing tonight! The Luxor is a nice spot to perform at because they have an open "stage" space, but there's also room to go between the tables if you want. Also, customers can see the dancers from pretty much wherever they sit, but some spots are better than others. And the food is delicious! And the other dancers were really good! There was a nice mix of soloists and student troupes, and a good variety of tribal, fusion, cabaret, and folkloric styles. Big thanks to Gina for organizing the event and letting me dance!

And even though I was busy getting ready for a performance, I actually practiced today! I did a dress rehearsal of my solo, and I also danced around to a few other songs because I felt like it and I wanted to practice. I'm already thinking ahead to future solos, although I'll definitely continue to perform to the song I did tonight, and Convivio, too. I just want to build up a nice arsenal of solos... but I'll discuss that more tomorrow!