Fan Veil Routine

It's been a while since my last blog; life has been a little crazy. All my classes have gone for the 13 week session starting tomorrow night; yikes!!!! It has been over a month since we have had classes at the Mesa Art Center (MAC); way too long, I'm ready to get back teaching again!!!

I have been teaching several workshops during the interim plus classes at my home studio; thank goodness :-) Last Saturday was Tribal Fusion Indian Style and it was our first class back outside and it was still a little to warm to hold class outside; sorry ladies. I taught the class a short dance using about 10 different Mudras and several poses. I took the dance from the ATS blessing or salutation that is done before each performance. I explained to everyone the meaning of the salutation; it is so beautiful… We thank Mother Earth for her beauty and apologize for stomping on her. We thank our teachers for their knowledge. We thank our sister dancers for their support and we thank the audience for watching. Each gesture is represented in the blessing within the dance. I added more to the dance still keeping the meaning. I was so pleased to hear that they liked the workshop; hey!!!

This Thursday night will be the 7 veils class which should be a blast. It's hard enough to dance with one veil at times and we will be dancing with 7!!! It will probably take us an hour to put the veils on and that's the entire class; oh my I didn't plan well on this one :0) Thank goodness it’s starting to cool off so it will be in the 90’s by Thursday.

I finished choreographing the double veil routine I will be teaching my intermediate cabaret class. I had this braining idea to put it on video so my class will have something to watch to help them practice. Okay I live in Arizona and it's still over 100 degrees outside, there is a slight breeze today and no make up; what I wouldn't do for my students :-) I really don't have an area to film in my house so it's outside on my patio. Just standing outside doing nothing you start glistening (you know dancers glisten we don't sweat) :-) So you will see in the video I'm having a difficult time sliding the fan veils off my shoulders. Thank goodness the breeze was not a factor. The katydids were making their noise they must have liked the music ;-)

The music is from the CD Caravans by Armen Chakmakian and the song title is Bird song, the journey.



My husband is such a sweetie to film me; what a great guy, I'm so lucky to have him. He does a fantastic job filming it must have been all that practice from having our TV show The Joy of Belly Dancing. He knows how to follow me pretty well without ever seeing the dance.

The fan veils I'm dancing with is one that we dyed lasts week. I was amazed how loud they are when I snap them open. I still need to work with these fans to get them loosened up so they open easier they are still really stiff. The fan veils flow really well and so much fun to dance with.

The flirty skirt I'm wearing I just got in stock. Rukshana out did herself with this batch of skirts. She went to LA to the garment district and found some fabulous material. I'm finding it very difficult to resist getting one skirt in each color and pattern!!!!

Back to work listing more items in my eBay store and Shimmy Bliss website...