Dancing4Jesus

 Last week I posted about packing and planning for a summer dance intensive that is almost 800 miles away. Today I wanted to talk about how it went.  We arrived early Saturday evening and I immediately started getting settled in to my dorm. I met my roommate and the other girls in my small group, and we all went to dinner together and started getting to know each other. Our counselor had us all meet in her room that night to play some games before showering and getting to bed.  The next morning we woke up and went to orientation before having some free time in the afternoon. I was assigned to take the second placement class so I got ready pretty soon after orientation. As I got ready and walked to the studios across the street, I got pretty nervous. I had never done any kind of audition so I was nervous about what it would be like and what level I would be placed in.  The class ended up going really well and I felt good about how I had done. The hard part was that we...

 I was out of town with some friends last December to watch a Christian ballet at a local church when we first had the idea to attend a specific dance intensive together. The intensive we were discussing is hosted by the company we were going to watch perform that weekend. They're a Christian ballet company and their summer intensive is open to ballet dancers around the world. We had heard so many stories from people about how attending that intensive made a huge impact on their spiritual lives, and my friends and I wanted to experience it for ourselves.   The dance intensive is almost three thousand dollars though, and is about eight hundred miles away from where we live. We really wanted to go, but the idea of raising the money in only four months, which is when the deadline was to pay the tuition, seemed pretty much impossible.  We kept talking and praying about it though, and soon we started coming up with ways to raise the money. On top of doing fundraisers, I g...

 Summer workshop starts in five days! Today I'll be talking about what classes I'm taking, my schedules, and more.  To start with, I'll be taking ballet, conditioning, pointe, variations, contemporary, musical theatre, and partnering. I do ballet, conditioning, pointe, and partnering throughout the school year, but I only do the other ones in the summer. We have two guest artists coming, one for each week. The first one is one of my studio's founders, and one of my past instructors. She's an incredible dancer herself and one of the best teachers I've ever had. The second is a world-renowned choreographer and I couldn't be more excited to have the opportunity to be taught by him.  I'll be there for about 7 hours the first week, including a 3-hour class on Saturday. The second week I'll be there for about 12 hours each day. The reason I'm there an extra 5 hours is because I'll be teaching! I'll be assisting in two classes, and I also get t...

 It's so beneficial for dancers to attend at least one summer intensive. This year I'm blessed to be able to attend two and I'm so excited! Today I'll be listing 6 reasons to participate in a summer intensive. You'll improve in technique.  This is probably the most obvious one. Dancers do intensives to increase their skill and technique. Intensives can also be one of the best ways to improve your technique quickly because you're dancing every day for long amounts of time.  You'll have new teachers. Most intensives will give you the opportunity to be trained under new teachers. This gives you the opportunity to be given new kinds of corrections, try new styles of dance, and learn different perspectives.  You can dance without the stress of school and other distractions. Most young dancers have full calendars during the school year. During the summer though, you can focus on just dancing without any other distractions.    You can try out different companies. ...

Today I wanted to announce that I just set up an Instagram account for this blog!  I've been working on this for awhile now, and I just finished setting it up recently. If you want to follow me on there, my username is @dancing4jesus20. Or you can click here to go straight to it.  I'll post every week about new blog posts, as well as posting day-to-day things that are dance or faith related. I'm planning on keeping it fun and interactive so I can connect with my audience on there.  1 John 4:19 We love because He first loved us. Dancing4Jesus Psalm 149:3~ Let them praise his name with dancing. (NIV) Contact me here: dancing4jesus20@gmail.com Socials: 📌Pinterest- https://www.pinterest.com/dancing4jesus20/ 📷 Instagram- https://www.instagram.com/dancing4jesus20/

Today I'm going to be sharing a story from performance week. Also, this post will be shorter than usual because post-performance week is still pretty busy for me. I've got quite a few future posts already planned though, so keep an eye out for those! It was Saturday night that this happened, which was the second and last performance for the semester. The performance had been going really well, and we made it to the last song without any major issues.  When the final song came on, I started dancing as usual, and we got to the partnering section. Halfway through the choreography, my partner forgot a lift, and because I was already starting to go into the lift, I slipped on my dress and fell. I was completely on the ground and I knew we had missed the lift, but without hesitating, I grabbed my partner's hand, pulled myself up, and continued with a smile.  I've never really worried about falling onstage, because I didn't think it would ever happen to me. I was surprised...