Tips for dancers and costumers who love belly dancing and want to get some new insights into how to do it better.
Wednesday, August 15, 2007
Dance a little every day.
Consistancy reaps big benefits. Figure out how to squeeze at least 10 minutes of yoga, dancing, stretching, etc into each and every day. Your muscles and mind and spirit will really appreciate it.
Wednesday, August 01, 2007
Pirate Belly Dance
As soon as I get the hang of these hair falls, I'm going to make some to go with my pirate garb. Seashells belong on pirate costumes. And so do some of these neat carved bone items I've been accumulating. I have a pirate belly dance tribe over on tribe net. It will be nice to have something new to add to it.
http://piratebellydance.tribe.net
http://piratebellydance.tribe.net
Cowrie hair falls for tribal belly dancing
Today I sat myself down and decided to teach myself to make cowry hair falls for belly dancing. First I took inventory of things I already had in my bead box and in my jewelry box. At first I was going to make a matching pair but I scrapped that idea because I don't have enough cowry shells. With any luck I'll be able to make 2 solos instead of one pair.
I started with a 9 yard strand of black yarn and a 9 yard strand of fuzzy variegated white and blue yarn. I laid them together, evened up the ends, folded them in half and tied a 2" loop in the center. That gave me four working strands. I looped it over a nail so I could keep tension on it while doing the knotwork. Now I'm in the process of stringing and knotting various items. I'm hoping to make a fall 3 feet long. Right now I'm about 1 foot into it. But hope springs eternal. Some of the cowry shells have holes that are too small so I'll have to make the holes bigger...either with my needlenose pliers or the dremel or something. I'll keep you posted.
Update: I ended up using cowry shells, brass bells, pre-made tassels, bone beads, and a bone charm, and a cross section of seashell.
A bead reamer came in very handy for making the pre-drilled cowrie shell holes bigger. I made a needle threader out of wire and used it to pull the yarn through the holes. If you need to know anything else just ask. See the photos in the later post. Basically I used macrame' knots between everything. I didn't use any braiding because I'm working with four strands, not three and I didn't want to relearn four strand braiding when macrame' works perfectly well.
I started with a 9 yard strand of black yarn and a 9 yard strand of fuzzy variegated white and blue yarn. I laid them together, evened up the ends, folded them in half and tied a 2" loop in the center. That gave me four working strands. I looped it over a nail so I could keep tension on it while doing the knotwork. Now I'm in the process of stringing and knotting various items. I'm hoping to make a fall 3 feet long. Right now I'm about 1 foot into it. But hope springs eternal. Some of the cowry shells have holes that are too small so I'll have to make the holes bigger...either with my needlenose pliers or the dremel or something. I'll keep you posted.
Update: I ended up using cowry shells, brass bells, pre-made tassels, bone beads, and a bone charm, and a cross section of seashell.
A bead reamer came in very handy for making the pre-drilled cowrie shell holes bigger. I made a needle threader out of wire and used it to pull the yarn through the holes. If you need to know anything else just ask. See the photos in the later post. Basically I used macrame' knots between everything. I didn't use any braiding because I'm working with four strands, not three and I didn't want to relearn four strand braiding when macrame' works perfectly well.
Sunday, May 27, 2007
Belly Dance Videos at your fingertips
Yesterday I set up a pageflake to host a number of belly dancing videos. It self-refreshes as new videos from Youtube or Metacafe are added. Check it out here: http://www.pageflakes.com/iffymail
That way every day I can see some dancing to inspire me.
That way every day I can see some dancing to inspire me.
Tuesday, May 22, 2007
Getting more Readers
For some reason, of all the blogs I write, blogger gets the least hits. So to remedy the situation, I've added Technorati to some of my blogs.
Technorati Profile
Technorati Profile
Work on your Stamina
On days when you can't dance, make sure you get some sort of cardiovascular exercise in. For me, it's a daily walk. Maybe for you it's swimming, bike riding, stair climbing or a treadmill.
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