Eastside Stomp Holiday Ball

Hope you all had a wonderful Christmas with friends and family! It's crazy to beleive that the year's over all ready. Didn't it go by so fast?!

This past Friday was the annual Holiday Ball at Eastside Stomp, which is always a fun night. It was also the official kickoff for the Syncopation Foundation, the new non-profit they've started, with the goal of expanding and sharing the love of dance with even more people.

The ball was tons of fun. Jacob Zimmerman was playing, the photoboot was fun, the live performances were great, and a fun time was had by all! My dear friend Carrie and her boyfriend were able to come, which made it even more fun. It's kinda funny as she's been there through a lot of my dancing history: she was at the same event in high school when I was first introduced to swing, went social dancing with me for our very first time, and took the into to swing class with me when I started dancing back in August 2016. She doesn't dance regularly, but enjoys coming out every now and then and it's always great when she does.

The floor was packed and there were so many people that there wasn't enough time to dance with everyone that I wanted. It was such a wonderful night though, with lots of great dances. Also, I need more red dresses in my life, as I loved wearing this one so much!

Carrie was awesome and got this clip of me dancing. It makes me happy as now I actually have video of me swinging out and it's helped me notice some things I can work on, which is always good.

The second performance of the night from Santa's Little Syncopators!

Social Dancing 10/27 Edition - Dancing Squirrels

The Friday before Halloween Eastside had a costume contest, so a lot of people came dressed up. It was fun seeing everyone dressed up and some of the costumes were really creative! Some of my favorites were the Swedish Chef, Willy Wonka, and a dust bunny.
That night Greg Ruby and the Rhythm Runners were playing (!!!!!!!) which made the night just that more awesome. About mid way through the night the band announced they were going to play a waltz and have a competition. Lily and I were prepared to waltz our hearts out and then they added a requirement: you had to dance like whatever you were dressed up as. I didn't have a costume, but Lily was Larry the Cucumber from Veggie Tales, so I lead her around the dance floor as she hopped, getting one heck of a leg workout. It's not everyday you get to dance with a cucumber!

In the video you can see the squirrel and the court jester, who apparently was juggling during the waltzing. That's impressive!

Go Get It || Greg Ruby & the Rhythm Runners

Do remember back in May that I got to be a part of the latest video for Greg Ruby and the Rhythm Runners during Camp Jitterbug? Well the video was released recently and I can't believe I haven't shared it until now! Talented musicians from across the country and lots of awesome Seattle dancers. What's not to love?!?

Social Dancing: 10/20 Edition - When You're on Fire

I don't know what it is, but I feel like my dancing has been on fire lately. Maybe it's all the great stuff I learned from the Follower's Technique class I took sinking in. All I know is I'm still using info I learned from that class to fine tune my skills even now, a couple months since the class finished. But every night I'm able to dance I've been super stoked and full of happy energy lately, which definitely adds to the feeling.



This past Friday we had the pleasure of dancing to Alex Guilbert's Stampede Seven Quintet. They were fabulous and played a lot of medium to fast tempo songs that was perfect given how jazzed up I was that night. It was great. There was one dance where I messed up and did some weird turn thing with my hand, which turned into me "fixing" it, and eventually my partner ended it with a high five. And at the end of the night I swung out at a personal record for speed for me. That felt amazing!

I can truly say lindy hop is my passion and I'm so thankful to be able to dance my heart out at Eastside Stomp every week. It makes me so happy!

Social Dancing: 10/6 Edition - Balhalla Kickoff

Ah, it's been a while. Here on the blog that is. I've still been dancing every Friday I've been in town, though I haven't taken any photos or video in ages, thus feeling like I have no content to share. But even with my lack of clips of the awesome bands I've had the pleasure of dancing to recently, how could I not share about this past Friday, the kickoff for Balhalla?!

Now the sad part is I wasn't actually able to attend Balhalla Weekend (boo!), as much as I would have liked to. Being that I'm only employed part time right now the budget is super tight. The good news was that the Friday night dance for the event was hosted at Eastside Stomp which meant that I at least got to enjoy a part of it, which made me happy.

The week prior I had taken a Balboa Mini-Workshop with Jim and Emily. It was aimed at those that have taken Balboa 1 and still felt under confident in their abilities and wanted to refine what they know (AKA me when it comes to bal). I really enjoyed it as it was great going over moves that I was familiar with, but was able to fine tune and polish what I already knew. Plus it made me feel more confident about wanting to dance it socially.

Anyways, back to the Balhalla kickoff. Slipped Disc was playing and they were awesome. I'd heard great things about them and they totally lived up to my expectations. This was also the first time I was at a dance focused on bal and dancing it so much in one night really left me encouraged and inspired to keep learning more. Yup, I definitely need more balboa in my life.

One of my favorite dances of the night was near the end when the band was playing a slow song. I got asked to dance slow bal and though I don't always enjoy slower dances as much (mostly because I have no idea what I'm doing) this one was an absolute dream. Sometimes you just have such a great connection with your partner that even when you don't do anything fancy it's perfect anyways. It all just felt so good. Days later and I'm still thinking about how lovely that dance was.

Another great thing is that Samantha came down from Canada and we went to the dance together and she crashed at my place afterwards. It's great having someone to gush about dancing and bal and events and all that fun stuff.