improving

Earlier this morning I was browsing through the photos I took when I was on holiday, and they included a set of photos my mum took of me on the beach. What was I doing in those photos? Dancing. If there's one thing you have to do on the beach, it is to dance, whether you have nice weather or not. Especially when there are at least half a dozen people wondering what on earth you're doing.

Anyway, we took some shots of leaps, attempted scorpion leaps and and arabesques.

The photo on the left was taken at the end of August last year, and the one on the right was taken last Thursday. Oh how miserable the weather has been this year! But I really wanted to make this comparison, as I've seen improvements in class, and now I can see even more clearly here.

I'm happy with the amount that I've improved. Really happy. I think what I need to work on now is strengthening my back and really trying to get it more flexible, because my lines aren't all that pretty. I've been doing the cobra stretch a bit recently, and I can definitely feel it the following day, so I'd like to think it's working. Anyway, I shall continue with that.

Also, if you look at this photo of me back in March at our production of Cats the Musical, you can see my arabesque from five months ago.

I've improved a little since then, although the progress isn't as clear. I had a lot of work to do for this show. I mean, I didn't have my flat splits before I performed, and I was working right up until the show nights trying to get them as flat as I could. Typically, on the one night my family watched the show, I wobbled like heck in the arabesque. At least it wasn't our first or last night!

Since the show, I have slacked off a lot, in terms of splits. I spent some time before our summer break trying (and succeeding!) to get them, although I dread to think what they look like now after a month off from dance!

Anyway, enjoy the rest of your day! I'm off to go do a performance in our local park for charity, bye!

Think Happy...27/52...

Hey! I'm on Easter break now for two weeks, so I should get round to posting a whole lot more! This post is, yet again, a day late but I have some pretty photos to show you guys. Be prepared for a post that is more photos than writing!


1. On Friday night I went on an expedition to the end of my estate. I took my little brother along with his bicycle so he could get some exercise, I felt similar to 'walking a dog'! But the main focus on the walk was to get some photographs of the gorgeous blossom tree at the school I used to go to. It's actually planted inside the school grounds but most of it overhangs the road, so I wasn't trespassing.

And of course, I'd timed our walk so that we got to the tree as the sun was setting, so these shots just seemed to happen too.

At this point, my brother's two friends were outside with their bikes as well, so I took this opportunity to have a mini photoshoot.

As I was walking my brother home, the sun had almost set, and this is what I saw from the other end of the estate by my house.

2. On Tuesday I had a meal out with the cast of Cats at the local Italian restaurant. I had such a good time with everyone - the whole cast was there except James and Shane. We ended up taking a lot of photos, chatting and just catching up, although it had only been little over a week since most of us had seen each other!

I wore a cute dress and wedge heels, unfortunately I didn't get a proper photo of my whole outfit though.

Nasty lighting and blurriness, but myself, Imogen and Imogen :)

3. We had two super rehearsals for London this weekend! Oh my gosh, it looks so good now! Next Sunday before we leave for London, we are going to be performing at a memorial for Joel, a boy we danced for last year and many of us knew. I can't wait to perform, both there and at Sadler's Wells, it really will be such an experience!


Thank you for reading this far, and for browsing the photos! I hope you have a good week, mine will consist only of revision and dance!

Think Happy...25/52...

Hello! Oh how much I've missed you guys this week! But I'm back now, my performances are all over (as much as I refuse to believe it!) and I'm now only rehearsing for two performances!

How's your week been whilst I've been gone? Feel free to leave a link to your blog, I'd be more than happy to read it!

Cats The Musical! This is definitely the single most exciting thing that has happened to me in a long time, and I'm so empty and lost now that it's over. I will try to write up a post about my experience with it over this next week, but for now I'll leave you with this wonderful picture that was put on Facebook.

Myself as Victoria, with Old Deuteronomy (Freddie), The Rum Tum Tugger (James) and Munkustrap (Shane) in the background. I really love this photograph!

Oh, and my mum bought me the most beautiful flowers as a congratulations!

One last thing, and this is a super sneaky thing! It's my friend's birthday in a couple of days and the best present I could possibly get him is more subscribers on his Youtube channel. Please click here and subscribe to him? He would be overjoyed if he had as many subscribers as possible, so please share it around!

I'm sorry I can't stay for longer this week, but yet again time is my enemy and I must go, so I'll talk again soon. Until then!

Think Happy...24/52...

So I don't have the time to write a full post tonight, but I would like to say that this week has been so good, and I hope yours has been too!


1. I was playing with butterflies...

2. Spring is finally here!

3. It was a year since My Chemical Romance ended their career. This is not a good thing, but I'm pleases with how I dealt with yesterday. True, I didn't have time to even stop and think, but it was still pretty well.


4. Dance classes have gone so well, and we were getting all of our costumes for our big show!


5. Cats rehearsals have been amazing; it's 4 days until the show! And we were in the newspaper (and online version) and on the radio, it's so exciting!


So I hope your week has been as good as mine, I'll see you again next Sunday, for sure!

Update...

I'm just dropping by to say hi today, I'm going to be dancing for 10 hours today, 5 tomorrow, and after school every day during the week! I'll try to get a Think Happy post out tomorrow morning, but I'm not promising anything.

I have my performances on Thursday, Friday and Saturday, wish me luck! Have a good week in case I don't post in between!

Think Happy...23/52...

First things first, yet more apologies for this post being late, and last week's Tunesday post non-existent. My Cats show is coming up and I've had an unbelievable amount of rehearsals and exams. But anyway, shall we start?

1. Noticing all of the blossom growing on the trees! The weather, especially yesterday (Sunday) was just perfect; it's really starting to feel like spring now!


2. Hannah started her very own blog! Read it here, trust me, she's amazing!


3. Dance rehearsals have gone well, 5 weeks until I dance in London!


4. Cats rehearsals yesterday went so unbelievably well! I got my (unfinished) costume, we recorded for the radio and took photos for the newspaper!

Some funny instances: I almost fell off a wall in the cemetery (outside where we rehearse) so Shane caught me; everyone's reactions to the costumes; dancing around and posing for photos; singing for the radio and only hearing one or two people in the recording! Aha it was so much fun! Then I had to rush off to another two-hour dance class, after already dancing for four hours!


I hope everyone's week was amazing! Just a note: if I don't post my regular posts for the next 12 or so days, you'll know that I'm at rehearsals! Wish me luck!

Think Happy...22/52...

Hello my lovelies, how's your week been? Mine's actually gone okay, apart from a couple of minor things. I'm really enjoying writing these posts, it gives me something positive to look to!


1. Spring is finally here! I don't mean to jinx the weather or anything, but the past couple of days have been super hot and sunny (for spring , anyway) and all of the flowers have been out.

2. My dance classes have been good on the whole this week, apart from a stressed out class at the start of the week. But it's all coming together now, and Cats is in less than three weeks now! Eeeek!


3. My mum bought her ticket for our London performance, it's going to come in the post soon!


I think that's the highlights from this week done actually, but how was your week? Bye for now ♥

Think Happy...21/52...

Hello! How's everyone's week been? Mine has been pretty tiring!


1. The flowers are coming out and our chicken is so pretty!

2. Dancing this week has been hard work, which was pretty fun. We had to rehearse our Jabawockeez with our masks on, and did a lot of hard work in all of our other classes.


3. Isabella drew me the cutest picture ever!

 

4. School hasn't been too bad either. I'm friends with a pair of twins, and one of them has had to have another operation during the school holidays, so she wasn't in school last week and won't be for a couple more weeks to come. I hope you get better soon Megan!


5. Cats today was really fun! We were only rehearsing for three hours today, but it felt like half an hour. We set the walk down (our bows and curtseys) and ran through the whole of act two. This time in 28 day it will all be over!


6. Last weekend I bought a game on Steam called Ace of Spades, and I love it so much! It's kind of hard to play without a proper mouse (I don't have one for my laptop), but I did pretty well, although Hannah is an expert.

I can't think of anything else specific that happened, but it's just felt so good! I hope you have a good week!

Think Happy...20/52...

I'm so sad that the holidays are over, I wish I had another week off school! But anyway, a lot of good things happened this week, and I can't wait to share them with you all!

1. My new beauty post! Check it out here if you haven't already seen it :)

2. The Cats arts and crafts day! Post about it is right here!

3. I went to Hannah's house after Cats on Wednesday, and we spent the whole time watching our friends' Youtube videos here and here!

4. I had a two-hour long contemporary class on Tuesday night to learn a whole new section of one of our dances, and although I nearly broke my knees (long story!), it was so much fun! My friend Harry (from school and Cats) will hopefully join after our Cats show!

5. Four and a half hour long Cats rehearsal today! Wow, it was so much hard work - a couple of hours of general rehearsal learning new numbers with our new cast member (hi James!), followed by a full run-through of the show which took almost two hours!

I'm really loving these couple of hours a week I spend with this different group of people, I've made a couple of new friends (Shane, Harry, Katie, Abi, Megan, Ariane, Tia, and the rest!) and met a whole load more! It's definitely helped build my confidence levels, since I can now sing and dance on my own in front of about thirty other people, whereas before I struggled to speak in front of my class at school!

In other news, Abi sprained her thumb today doing a cartwheel! She's more than slightly annoyed, and let's pray that it heals in time for her National Cheerleading Competition in two weeks!

Anyway, that's about all the good news from this week, other than having heart-to-heart conversations with one or two of my friends!

I hope you all have had a lovely week!

Painting the Moon!...

Yes, you read correctly! Yesterday, I spent three and a half hours with the Cats crew making the set and props. We only got about halfway through all of it, but it's all looking so good!

I chose to paint the Jellicle Moon alongside some other girls, and it turned out great!

We painted it with a couple of coats of white paint, then added in some black to make darker sections. We also added silver glitter paint, which I loved the most!

This is what the room looked like while we were collecting all the rubbish together, and then mid-tidy-up. It took about half an hour to clean up!

We made a whole bunch of rubbish-collages to decorate the sides of the stage...

And we made mice masks for the kittens to wear in Gumbie Cat!

We made so much more of the set and costumes...

We papier-mâchéd some cutlery, and Miss Catty is going to paint them today, I think!

I also escaped for a while and came up with some choreography and 'poses' for Mr Mistofelees...

Overall, we had a lot of fun yesterday!! Here are some of the in-progress and extra pictures!

All of these wonderful girls are sisters, except the one in the lower lefthand corner, that's me!

If you were there, I hope you had a great time, but if you weren't, I hope you enjoyed seeing our progress! Until next time :)