ballet Archives - Page 17 of 59 - Adult Ballerina Project

Kristen Gillette March 19, 2014

My Current at Home Exercise List

I’ve been trying to do better at doing my physical therapy-esque exercises to improve my strength. I wanted to share my current list of exercises so that I could get recommendations on what everyone else does for cross-training for ballet. More than anything, I was hoping that having it up publicly would help motivate myself to do them everyday!

Here’s my list:

10 First Position Calf Raises

10 Inverted First Position Calf Raises

10 Single Leg Calf Raises (each, 20 Total)

20 Clamshells (each side, 40 Total)

20 Leg Lifts (each side, 30 Total

20 squats

20 ballerina squats

60 second plank

30 second side plank (each side)

40 Bicycle Crunches

20 push-ups

Various Theraband exercises

I’m also looking to incorporate barre3 workouts a few times a week as well since HQ bought me a DVD set awhile back before I got injured.

What exercises do you do for cross-training? Do you have any recommendations for me?

Filed Under: Ballet, Blog Tagged With: ballet, cross-training, exercise, stress fractures, theraband 2 Comments

Kristen Gillette March 18, 2014

Do What Makes YOU Happy

I have to admit, it’s been quite a struggle getting myself into gear to get to ballet class the past few weeks. I had plans to go both last Thursday and Friday, but I couldn’t manage to get myself up off my butt and into the ballet studio. I did finally get there on Saturday, although it was no easy feat yanking myself out of bed in the morning.

My legs have done really well post stress fracture, but they’ve been really sore. Last week was especially tough. I pushed myself a bit too hard on a run on Tuesday (I started off too fast for someone who hasn’t run much) and my legs have been pretty whiny since. They survived Saturday morning’s ballet class and pre-pointe class (in slippers) no problem, other than the fact they felt weak and quite sore. My ballet teacher recommended more ballet classes (which is the plan, I just need to motivate myself) and not as much running.

I’ve always struggled to find a good balance between running and ballet. Often, weeks will go by where I’m completely gung-ho about ballet and then I’ll be all about one the next month. If I had a dollar for every time someone recommended I quit one or the other because of my injuries, I’d be rich.

I toyed with the idea of giving up running completely this weekend, since I wanted to blame it for all my injuries and pain. Then someone on Twitter gave me a little advice.

If you follow me on Twitter, you may have realized that I’ve tweeted a lot of my older posts lately. I’ve got a handy little WordPress plugin that does it automatically for me. Over the weekend, it tweeted my “Should dancers run?” post and one of my fellow adult ballerinas tweeted that she does (and I know more of you do, too).

We chatted for a little about the topic and she reminded me to do what makes ME happy, not anyone else.

So that’s what I’m going to do.

Take ballet when it makes me happy (which is a lot of the time) and run when that makes me happy. And of course, take care of my body and listen to it when it tells me I shouldn’t be doing either.

Do what makes YOU happy.

Filed Under: Ballet, Blog, Running Tagged With: ballet, Dance, running, stress fractures Leave a Comment

Helen Mao March 17, 2014

Middle-Age American Grand Prix (MAGP) Exhibition

My daughter’s ensemble performed well enough at Youth America Grand Prix’s Semi-Finals in Providence, Rhode Island to advance to the Finals in New York City. After countless rehearsals, one dancer’s father was asked if he had knew the music by now. “Know the music?” he chuckled, “Ha! I know not just the music … I know the steps now!”

The parents all murmured assent – we have listened to the dance’s contemporary piano piece so many times that we can’t help but have memorized the choreography.

“I have a great idea,” I joked. “How about a we start a Middle-Age American Grand Prix (MAGP instead of YAGP) Exhibition where the parents of all the dancers perform their kids’ pieces? Our performances would give the competitors a break and make them all look good! Instead of First Position, we could be the subject of the documentary Fifth (or Third) Position!”

Of course we all laughed at this hypothetical event but the more I thought about this idea, the more I realized that nearly every ensemble member has a parent who is (or was) a dancer. Five of us have performed in Olney Ballet Theatre’s Nutcracker productions for the past few years: one person as Clara’s mother Frau Silberhaus as well as three fathers and me as Party Scene parents … plus one father who also dances with Mother Gigogne/Ginger in the second act.

Outside of The Nutcracker, our collective dance experience includes:

five mothers who currently study or previous studied ballet (a couple of us through pointe)
three mothers who have studied tap
at least one mother studied who jazz seriously
and one father was a national competitor in both tango ballroom dancing and aerobic dance.

As an added bonus, one mother and two fathers (non-dancers) who are professional musicians – and have contributed their talents to past Olney Ballet Theatre productions — could play piano, violin and trombone for our MAGP performance! Yes, I could feel our MAGP performance coming together, at least as comic relief during this high-pressure competition. Now if we only could coordinate rehearsal times between our kids’ rehearsal times …

Filed Under: Ballet Tagged With: ballet, first position, Nutcracker, olney ballet theatre, Youth America Grand Prix Leave a Comment

Kristen Gillette March 14, 2014

Would You Rather: Ballet Edition #1

Welcome to the first ballet edition of “Would you Rather!”

I’m going to keep it short this time with five questions. I’ve you’ve got your own blog, you can answer the survey questions on their and join the link-up. If you don’t want to or don’t have a blog, feel free to answer them in the comments, too!

#1 Would you rather incredibly naturally flexible or have endless stamina?–By Kyla

I think I’d rather be incredibly flexible, since it seems to be so difficult to attain now.

#2 Would you rather take an early morning class (6am) or a late evening class (9pm)?

Early morning. While I’m not the biggest fan of the morning, I perform so much better in the morning than at night. I’d probably fall asleep in a super late night class.

#3 Would you rather do 32 changements or 32 fouettés?–By Beth

I could probably actually never do that many of either, but if I could do fouettes, I’d pick fouettes. I hate jumping.

#4 Would you rather do a développé with proper techinque or a higher développé suspecting your instructor doesn´t see you cheat?–By FGH

Proper technique! There’s no reason to cheat it. Although if nobody could tell…

#5 Would you rather have beautifully arched feet or perfect legs?–By Kyla

Perfect legs. While I have far from neither, I feel like I’d rather have super strong legs!

Filed Under: Ballet Tagged With: ballet, Would You Rather Leave a Comment

Kristen Gillette March 12, 2014