irish dance practice logs

keeping track of my dance progress as i return to irish dance after a six year hiatus! about

[seehowthisturnsout]

i have not entirely forgot this blog, but i did 1. move, 2. need to take another week's break bc i hurt my ankles, 3. go on vacation, 4. get engaged (!!!), 5. lose internet due to the move and have yet to turn it back on, so really really my bad on letting it slip but it was not just out of carelessness!

but everything is hopefully starting to calm down so back i come.

hopefully i will be back to regular posts and practicing pretty soon! my ankles are giving me some trouble. i need to find myself a theraband so i can do some strength training! releves are great but honestly a little high-stress for my poor ankles and feets at the moment. mostly it's fine, but my old bones do not like landing on my toes at all.

top dance priorities as of right now:

ankle strength

stamina

in other news, though, I have learned TWO (2) lead-a-round reels and TWO (2) slip jigs! i like the reels. i love the slip jigs. i forgot what a slip jig girl i am. they are so so fun!

still lots to practice of course......

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my legs hurt so badly after yesterday's class, wow!!!!

[seehowthisturnsout]

1/22/15

RETURN TO DANCE!!!

i went to a one hour private lesson

i learned exactly one lead a round reel

i more or less have the steps and know how it fits to music

it is very sloppy

i’m VERY EXCITED!!!!!!!!!

more seriously:

worked on a reel for an hour

showed Girlfriend again when I got home, she is a very good dance girlfriend and audience member

did static stretching when I got home - calves (!!), hamstrings, hips, quads. stretching felt much more productive today, doing it after class! i think i only stretched about fifteen minutes, but it was very nice.

also, today I read that you should do dynamic stretching (more movement) before class, and static stretching (where you hold it) only after. i want to learn more about this.

oh also i used a tennis ball to roll my arch over

we’ll see if i can move tomorrow - Girlfriend is on standby to carry me places

yay!

ouch

things i need to work on

core strength

other strength

stamina

literally everything else, but i’m just going to say those

but honestly? my turnout and my crossing are better than I was expecting! they have a lot of room to be developed but they are honestly not on the tip top of my list at this moment (this will likely change at some point of course)

there was a REALLY COOL moment, too. like at first my teacher was showing me choreo and I was like “how did I used to understand this omg” and then I slowly began to understand it again, I just kind of felt like a caveman flopping around. especially on the spins in the leadaround she taught me! and then, I remembered that I have dance training and I have been taught to spot when I spin. so I remembered to spot my spins and they started to WORK! and I started to feel like maybe I was actually dancing again :)

same time next week, I guess, and of course practicing in between providing I can peel myself out of bed 

[seehowthisturnsout]

get home from work before first dance class

try to make a healthy dinner

manage to mess up the eggs-and-avacados thing

so it's really just scrambled eggs and hot avacado on wheat bread

and also you oversalted the avacado bc you were shaking the salt while trying to fend off your cat

also you're dealing with anxiety bc it's an hour and change until your Return To Dance

try not to cry

make a post about it

[seehowthisturnsout]

1/20/15

warm up!

calf stretches

releves/calf raises/whatever - in first and in parallel, slow and fast

more calf stretches

hamstring stretches, like a lot. i worry about that one where you lay on your back and bring one leg up to your face. my leg keeps wanting to drift off to the outside instead of staying over me.

the turnout dance - still trying to track down a copy of a better video of this…..

I didn’t want to stretch today but Renn made me! I’m so anxious for thursday and so anxious about going back to dance. aaaaahhhh……

[eirinn-go--brach]

I will not be discouraged by bad practices

I will not be discouraged by bad practices

I will not be discouraged by bad practices

I will not be discouraged by bad practices

I will not be discouraged by bad practices

I will not be discouraged by bad practices

[seehowthisturnsout]

1/19/15

back at it again!!!

usual warmup

usual hip stretches - fewer of them, because i had more other stretches i wanted to work on. i pushed it harder than maybe i should have? i'm horrible at slowing down. but when they hurt, it was only in the good stretch burn kind of way, so it's fine. probably.

I tried this new exercise from the article i reblogged recently. I was pretty excited about it as a way to improve turnout rotation! but i think it is similar to an exercise from the dance.net get-your-splits article that I think contributed to me hurting my quads. when I lunged forward my left quad, especially the part going into my knee, was not having it. it wasn't a normal stretch pain, but a pretty clear ouch from my body. so i did not do that. i was able to do two repetitions on my right knee, and that was fine, but towards the middle of the third repetition that began to hurt too, so i immediately stopped. dang quads. gonna have to take anything to do with my quads pretty slow, I guess :(

calf stretches and a shin stretch where you put your feet together, put one foot behind you on the toe, then stretch the shin like that

a looooot of hamstring stretches - normal legs together, bend over at the waist, that kind of thing, plus the leg on the barre, and then terrible horrible where you lie on your back and bring one leg into your chest. ouch. but a good ouch, not a bad one!

stretching out my quads, too. pretty gently for today, just the basic bring-your-foot-to-your-butt thing. i found some interesting looking ones on popsugar that i want to try later but they are not for me today....

the turnout dance again! i want to find a good video of this because i know it's a training exercise more widely known than danceboards. i need to search it out, in this, the year of our lord 2015, with youtube etc.

so that was that!!! i felt pretty stiff and worried a lot. i'm nervous about hurting myself and nervous about not being good enough to go back to dance!! i'll just keep going along, i suppose. just a couple more days before my first private lesson!!!

[missgiven]

The Truth About Turnout

"DS" debunks six common turnout myths.

Very important to keep in mind as I go forward! My biggest focus going into this is my turnout. That’s what led to me hurting myself Back In The Day, it’s what I’m going to focus on now. Proper turnout and proper building of flexibility instead of cheating both of those! This article is very ballet-based, but proper anatomical technique is always good, even if you’re doing Irish and not ballet.

[seehowthisturnsout]

okay hello friends!! my quads are feeling way more like human quads. and the front of my shins started to hurt, like i was getting shin splints? but those are pretty much taken care of by now, too. it's kind of late tonight, but tomorrow, i am planning to stretch, so you can expect another practice log! i am saying this now to have some accountability :)

as i get back to it i want to focus on strengthening my hamstrings AND my quads, my calves AND my shins - working on whole muscle groups instead of just kind of doing things higgledy piggledy and hurting myself in the process. i will keep on the turnout stretches. but i also will try to kind of take it easy until i can meat with my private lesson instructor on thursday. i just don't want to do things incorrectly and hurt myself. but then hopefully after that i can get some pointers for at-home practice and feel more secure in the things i do at home! 

[lots-of-treble]

Missing the click at the very beginning of your step

[xfeelingsogatsbyx]

Me at the friggin Oireachtas 😂

[lots-of-treble]

Stretching goal

[steps-and-solodresses]

Raise your hands up if you are injured in some way from dance!

🙋🙋🙋

[irish-dance-blog]

🙋

[those-rhythms-though]

*raises both aching knees and arthritis ridden foot* 🙋

[abcoy]

🙋

[erin-irishdances]

🙋🙋🙋

[humusofbandon67]

🙋

[my-irish-dance-experience]

🙋

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1/14/15

yesterday, i was definitely lazy

today I was going to be very not lazy, but sometime last night i felt a weird twinge in my leg, and it was more pronounced today - i have this weird pain on the top of my thigh just above my knee, like where my thigh goes into my knee cap, just above there. i know self diagnosis is not the way to go, but it sounds like maybe I have done something to my quadriceps tendon?you can apparently injure it by like, running, which I haven't been doing, or squats (which I have, out the butt, all those plies), not warming up properly (guilty), and a strength imbalance between quads/hamstrings (likely). if i got all that correct. anyhow, tonight i am icing my left leg and will probably also ice my right leg because it feels like maaaaaaybe it's trying to do the same thing. i might take a few days off from stretching/exercising. when i come back to it, i think i will focus on strengthening my quads as well as my hamstrings. not that i have been focusing on hamstrings?

ahhh. i was supposed to have my first lesson back tomorrow, but apparently some of the steps have been changed a bit recently, so the girl who is teaching me has rescheduled for next week. this is probably a good thing if i'm right about my quad tendon (quads tendon? quads tendons? quad tendons?) being messed up - rest will be good instead of going into hard dancing.

ugh, i'm so mad i managed to mess up my body before i've even set foot inside a dance studio. what the heck.

maybe i'll hold off on stretches and that until after i've consulted at least with the private lessons teacher. i don't WANT to but i also need to not break myself!

[luckylisah]

I loved this article about setting goals in Irish dancing. Some great points are made and I’m excited to implement them in my already set goals for the year.

[seehowthisturnsout]

class soon???

I got a text from the girl who is doing my private lessons today!! I think we have something set up for Thursday. so I had better up my stretching/exercising game, honestly :) I can't wait!!!

[seehowthisturnsout]

1/12/15

I think my stomach just kind of is, unsettled, around that time of the month, and then I don't want to dance. this is pretty terrible. I need to eat healthier, or take probiotics or something, because if I want to dance seriously, i can't be this completely lazy one week every month! the alternative is that there's something seriously (and vaguely) wrong with my stomach, but I think it is linked to cycles. i'm just only barely getting over the vaguely-unsettled feeling - it's really still hanging around tbh. annoying.

anyway I did stretch today

warm up

tried the splits stretches from wikihow. I thought mostly they were written in a pretty confusing way so I got sort of dejected

BUT also, I found this post on dance.net: The Turnout Dance

and I did those exercises

some of them were very, very difficult, especially the foot circles with the leg in second while you're on your stomach

but I think my inner thighs feel pretty strong.

I like all the hip stretching I've been doing but I'm pretty sure I need strengthening as well, so I'm very happy about this find

I didn't do anymore than that, still feeling kind of blah

[seehowthisturnsout]

1/11/15

I totally stretched yesterday

for like ten minutes

I forgot to warm up

my stomach hurt (in a period way, not a stretch way)

I feel ashamed