Post of the Day! 3/22/12

Hey everyone its post of the day time!

So staying hydrate is SO important for maintaining energy during a long day of rehearsals (or just laying around doing nothing; HYDRATION IS ALWAYS IMPORTANT!). This will be even more important as summer roles around and you start to, you know, sweat.
A key part of hydration is getting enough electrolytes (without electrolytes your body can’t do anything with the water your giving it). So plain water is important, but when your really working hard adding electrolytes can really boost your energy and performance.
However, drinks such as Gatorade and Vitamin Water are loaded with sugar, which might feel good now, but will be taxing on your body later. So for sustained energy try a multivitamin in the morning such as Emergen-C or Airborne and for staying hydrated during the day I recommend putting a tablespoon of chia seeds in your water bottle (and a squirt of lemon just because it tastes good and will encourage you to drink more often).
Chia seeds are a tiny black and white speckled seed with TONS of nutrients and they dissolve into a kind of gel after ten minutes (if the texture bothers you get ground chia and they will dissolve into nothing).
Why I eat/drink them: 
Antioxidants
Electrolytes 
Fiber
Protein
Minerals 
and packed with Omega-3 and Omega-6 fatty acids (if you don’t know what those are please look them up they are very good for you)
I highly recommend them because you can put them into pretty much anything your eating or drinking, they don’t have much of a flavor and they are very good for you. Finally something that makes being healthy easy.
For more info try going to  http://www.livestrong.com/article/72936-nutritional-information-ground-chia-seeds/  or doing a google search

Coming Soon: Hotpant challenge featuring first - Body Wrappers ripstop pant

Here is my plan: I want to do a side by side comparison of a few brands of “hot pant” (so far I have only found a few) to determine which would be most effective for each of the activities that dancers are likely to partake in namely yoga, pilates, ballet technique, jazz and modern.

I will wear each pair for 2 1/2 weeks and give a full report with detailed information (including accurate measurements so you can order the right size the first time) explaining the pro’s and con’s of each product (and ultimately chose a winner that is the best all around). The winner will be the “Highlight of the Month”.

For those of you who don’t know what hotpants are they are the whole range of products designed to make you sweat…or just warm up your joints exceptionally fast and keep you warm between classes or back stage. I feel like they are a necessary staple for every dance bag especially if you are performing in a super air conditioned theater, coming back from an injury or just don’t sweat much naturally and are trying to flush out some toxins.

Tip of the Day! 3/21/12

So muffin top in tights…not cool. But sadly the majority of us (even the very thin of us) have been there. Its just the way tights are designed…so

If you are wearing tights that are a little too tight in that respect just cut a slit in the elastic waist band down a half of an inch over each hip and problem solved. (be careful not to cut down to the stocking material as it will run).

Tip of the Day!

So if you are like me and are not quite at home in a mid-drift top but need to wear one for a performance, competition, or audition…or you just want to look good at the beach…

Before you go out:

Do a set of crunches with a neutral spine (this means not pressing your back against the floor but holding it in the neutral position with a small gap between your mid-back and floor) focusing on your lower abs.

Do the same with your legs in the frog (otherwise known as butterfly) position.

Followed by sit ups with a torso twist to activate your obliques (you can also do the bicycle touching your elbow to the opposite knee if you find a full torso twist too difficult). 

It takes five minutes and tightens your abs for an hour or two afterwards.

Lots of times all you need for good posture and a pulled in tightened stomach without thinking about it constantly is to activate the muscles.

Enjoy!

Coming Soon: How to take your measurements

This is something that every dancer should know how to do for themselves. You never know when you’ll get the call to fill in for blankity blank and they need your measurements now to have the costume ready by the time you arrive. Not to mention it will make shopping online SSSOOOOO much easier (though most companies sizing charts are not accurate…that’s where I come in to tell you what the size actually is). 

So I will post pictures and a written description for easy reference.

Shopping: The five steps to give you a fighting chance

I pride myself on having an extremely low level of brand bias. I am one of those optimists that says “hey if they are tenacious enough to build themselves into a company they must have at least one thing that’s good!” Despite that outlook on life I am not going to go out of my way searching. Here is how I shop…

Step 1) I figure out what I actually need. (Not want…NEED)

Step 2) I make a list of all of the features that my ideal product should have to make it EXACTLY what I need.

Step 3) I start researching to find that ideal product that meets all of my specifications.

Step 4) Read up on what people are saying about it.

Step 5) And after all that I usually breakdown and just try my best option.

While this does a great job at weeding out absolute duds, many times there are multiple options that appear to fulfill my needs, and even after reading reviews I may still be left with quite a few options

And with all of the bad reviews on the web it can be darn near impossible to find the right size. So here is what I’m out to do… Every product that I review will be measured accurately (I work in a costume shop so I actually know how to take measurements) and those actual measurements will be given in addition to the companies size chart measurements so that you can actually find your perfect fit…the first time.*

*that is assuming that the company has good quality control and makes an effort to keep their sizing accurately. If possible I will get access to measurements of multiples of the same product to ensure that they are close in size to each other.

So if you would like to make the five steps above a little more efficient I think I can  help you out.

What's it all about?

So I was tired of going spending hours on the web reading reviews on dance info, diet, exercise you name it that were from completely unreliable or unhelpful sources. I wanted more than “this product fits me perfectly” to base my online purchases off of. What does that even mean? What are your measurements? How will I know if it will it me perfectly? I want a single place that I can go to to receive reliable and descriptive information on the product, diets and exercises that I am most interested in. I’m done quietly whining about it to (well no one I don’t have roommates) I’m ready to do something about it and I hope you find my effort helpful.  

This is me taking the first step towards that movement info utopia and I hope with your help and all of the expertise you can bring to the table we can make that dream a reality.

It is my hope that blog will be a well spring of reliable and helpful information for dancers, bunheads, athletes what ever you call yourself. This is a site for the pursuit of fulfillment through movement and all the things we buy (or buy into) on our road to glory.