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I love traveling— truly, I do. If it weren’t for the studio, Big Blue, our 2005 Chevy Suburban, would be my second home.

Thank God for the studio.

My classes resumed on Friday. It was so good to see Miss Bethanny and my sisters. Eleven days tends to feel more like 11 years when they aren’t around. I was also able to see Miss Sara, as she subbed for Miss Mimi in pointe. We ended up combining beginning and intermediate, which is always a blast, especially with all of the fabulous new students. Go girls!

I returned to FYB on Saturday morning, wherein, after company class, an information meeting ensued. Parents tossed around fundraising ideas for Christmas, which was so exciting. I can’t wait for the holiday season (It’s snowing….)!

After the meeting, we had an all-cast run-through of The Firebird. At this point, the opening number, most [if not all] of the variations are completed, Act I has closed, and we have moved on to Act II. It’s a lot to take in, but there is nothing that I would rather be doing than dancing among such an amazing crew.

Also on Saturday, we had an hour-long rehearsal for DDD (Dance, Dessert, and Dreams), which will take place on Sunday. We will be bringing last year’s modern piece, which has been altered to fit our current needs, to the show. It’s going to be great!

Yesterday, I was given plenty of time to grumble about my five different marley burns from partnering/modern/cardio and my bruises from pointe/modern. Battle scars, people. It’s all about the battle scars.

Today, in Training 3, Miss Mia began our Christmas dance! We will be bringing it to nursing homes, as well as three separate performances and the usual parental show. You know me– getting all of my Christmas songs mixed up…. I’ll get back to you on that bit of information.

The modern Christmas piece, begun just before I left, has been added on to, so I will have to catch up on Wednesday. We’ll be bringing “The Little Drummer Boy” by Pentatonics to the nursing homes as well.

I imagine that our intermediate pointe piece will start on Friday, but you never know! Life is an adventure like that. You gotta love it.

Some weeks, I have to wonder how I’m still going, not necessarily because it’s a bad week, but because it’s been long.

There are 168 hours in a week. I spend 25 of those hours on schoolwork and up to 16 of those hours at dance. Ideally, 84 of those hours are spent sleeping, which never happens, of course, but one can imagine. That leaves 43 hours for the garage door to croak, the electricity to fail, the wifi to crash, the hot water to stop running, the dishwasher to scream like a fire engine, the washing machine to magically quit in the middle of a load and enough phone calls to fix every last one.

Up until this week, I took a whole lot of things for granted, it seems.

But it also leaves time for writing, reading, and thanking God for the many blessings in my life.

Fall Break starts a week from today, when my family will be heading out for the annual East Coast tour.

Lovely dancers: I’m heading to the Jersey Shore.

We’ll also be hitting Pennsylvania and our “far-off vacationing spot.”

So, in the words of Nick Fury: “Until such time as the world ends, [I] will act as though it intends to spin on.” Make-up classes have added themselves to my Thursday routine. By the end of this week, I will have completed four out of five. Phew.

At this point, I would like to say a HUGE CONGRATULATIONS to all of the new pointe girls out there, especially you, Adysen. You all have worked so hard for this, and I couldn’t be happier for you!

Also on Friday, Miss Mimi had us yelping for joy at the prospect of platter tutus for our Intermediate Pointe 1 recital piece— ah!

While we’re on the topic, Miss Mia recommended that the soloists of Firebird purchase a practice tutu for rehearsals. That was a dangerous request, apparently, since I would be happy to wear mine all day long. Pictures coming soon!

That brings us to our final tale, which is Saturday, of course. Miss Mimi taught our first company class on pointe, and I’m proud to say that things went relatively smoothly. After class, I went out to lunch with my mom and little brother (Chick-fil-a woot!), and after lunch, it was on to rehearsal.

Yesterday’s rehearsal consisted of the robins, Bluebird, White Swan, Prince of Darkness and myself. The robin piece is amazing– kudos to you girls! Both Bluebird’s and White Swan’s lovely variations are completed, and mine is to be finished next week. On pointe, it’s an even greater challenge, but challenges are good for us, yeah?

The partnering section looked infinitely better yesterday than it did last week. If I hadn’t so busy laughing, I would have been able to act sad, but I was laughing, so that didn’t work out. Miss Bethanny had been at the studio for six hours, with two more to go. And… yep. We were all laughing. She’s the best.

My parents forgot to pick me up–whoops, “thought rehearsal ended at five”–so I started mentally choreographing a dance to Greek Fire’s, “Top of the World” in the lobby.

Just kidding. They really did think rehearsal ended at five, and they know that I don’t mind staying late.

And that song is going to make an incredible dance one day.

I know it: I am child. Let’s try not to rub it in.

You were never going to watch these, Moriah, unless I stepped in (a.k.a. put up this post for all the world to see). I know you’re reading this, so don’t even try to ignore how absolutely adorable this movie looks. (They all have the huge Tangled eyes… I mean, come on.)

Translation: The Firebird

Language: French

Analysis: I have an amazing grandfather who teaches me something new every time we talk. A miniature French lesson always makes my day. Merci, grand-pere.

So, yesterday. Yesterday was great.

While the rest of my family was remodeling the kitchen, I was dancing. Not that remodeling the kitchen doesn’t sound absolutely enthralling, of course, but dance was beckoning me.

Miss Mimi taught company class, in which I successfully completed my best pirouettes of the month. Now, if I can just carry those over to pointe…

The soloists had a three-hour break between class and rehearsal, so I went home to check out the kitchen and watch Pirates of the Caribbean. The kitchen was (and is) looking beautiful, thanks to my awesome parents. What I saw of the movie (I was so exhausted, I fell asleep.) was highly entertaining. I vote finishing it once I have informed you of…

Rehearsal came in a flash and was gone just as quickly. We ran through the opening piece several times and began working on variations.

The Firebird variation is unnervingly fast.

There I was, thinking that we were around 30 seconds through the piece, and I had only learned 20 seconds. Ten seconds, let alone over a minute, doesn’t seem like much until you’re dancing to such a demanding classical song.

I love it, though, and I love to watch the other soloists perform. Bluebird and White Swan are so lovely, and Sun Queen starts her variation next week, which will be gorgeous. Everything is coming together so quickly!

The afternoon’s final dance was a dramatic scene involving the Prince of Darkness, Bluebird and me and a relatively new experience for all of us. Miss Mia declared, “You’re going to be red and bruised, but welcome to partnering!”

Red and bruised– yes, but not my ribs. No. It’s my knees. Because apparently, being stage-shoved to the floor is much harder than it looks! By the looks of my knees, I’m going to need to practice falling gracefully.

But, as Miss Bethanny so kindly pointed out on Friday evening, “Let’s be real: They put dancers in a big, empty room where we can’t hit anything, but as soon as we start walking along the sidewalk, we trip over a pebble or an ant.”

She was laughing when she said that, and so were we. That is to say, I hope that YOU are laughing now. 😉

Dancing, reading, writing and music.

I am so thankful that I belong to a studio that claps just as hard when you fall down as it does when you succeed. I’m thankful for believers– for the fact that we can do anything that we set our minds to. And yes, I’m thankful for the success.

Faith has not only stoked my passion for ballet– it has brought me closer to the crazy-amazing group of people who I’m proud to call my adopted family. Everyone is so unique, and yet we’re all the same. We’re all fueled by a God so good, He brought us all together to share our love of dance with the rest of the world.

FYB, by means of a kick-off party, was officially launched today. We all sat around and stuffed our faces with cupcakes and brownies, whilst getting to know everyone a little better. Our parents joined us, too, so now we’re ALL caught up. It was fabulous.

Time really knows how to fly. It’s already been a full week since fall semester began. If this is in any way preparing me for the rest of the year, it’s going to be a tremendously short nine months.

Yesterday was exhausting, in the best possible way. Miss Mia began Training 3 with devotional time, and momentarily, as if to answer our prayers for a great season, we did core.

Miss Mia’s core workout consists of planking in three increments, each one minute long. It involved a lot of shaking and breath holding (I don’t recommend that one…) and counting down of seconds, but we’re all the better for it.

After that, we moved toward the barre. Miss Mia’s warm-up combinations require an uncanny ability to change directions, which is something that I, for one, am going to need to practice. One of these days, Training 3 WILL be able to change directions. Just like Breathe two years ago. Just like Primavera. We’ll rise to the occasion.

We were given two minutes to stretch and three minutes to hold both our right and left splits. That exact ratio is rather new; I’m fairly certain that I’m not the only one who’s sore today.

Grand battements brought us back to the barre. We tried our best. That’s all that can be expected of anyone, yeah?

Our petite allegro was a sight, I know. I wish that I could go back and fix those echappes. But I can’t. So, I’ll make them better next week!

Thankfully, I was able to redeem myself going across-the-floor. I actually felt good about that part of class. I can only pray that it looked good, too.

Last came 32 pirouettes from fifth. I could feel my heart trying to escape through my throat. Thankfully, it didn’t.

All in all, that was one of the most difficult hours of my entire life. The great thing is: I’m proud to have made it through. I’m proud of ALL of us. I’m proud of us for accepting the challenges as they came. Most of all, I’m grateful to Miss Mia for providing said challenges. It is definitely going to be a great season.