Winter Is For Training

I know you have all been missing the summer where I wrote about circus antics. Well here it is, the triumphant return of circus blogging!! I mentioned in a previous post that our gig frequency decreases in the winter so we often use this time for improving skills and finding new ones. I think it's because no one in our troupe is good at having too much down time, but that is why we do what we do.

The weekend just past we had two workshops, one was on juggling and the other was on circus balancing. I was very excited and ended up having a blast!! Juggling is something I've struggled with for a long time. It was nice to have some help and direction other than "just do it over and over". I mean that is obviously part of it but a part I understood when I started learning. I made some small progress with juggling not a lot but more importantly I understand the mechanics better. I will become a juggler!

The circus balancing though, that was my favorite! We did some rolla bolla which if you've read my blog is kinda my thing in our show. Also we got to play with a walking globe, it looks kinda like a big yoga ball but instead of being squishy and bouncy it's hard and rolly. Getting up was a bit challenging partly because I have short legs and the globe was just a few inches below my hips. Once I was up there I was able to find that sweet spot for balance pretty well. Walking though, walking is what I would need to work on most. Really want a new toy! The slack line surprisingly was my least favorite. Don't get my wrong it was really fun and if I had one I'd play on it, but I think I like tight rope walking better. I did well with it for a first time,  I was able to balance on my own for about 5 seconds and walking wasn't too bad. I even spun around it from a lay back position. Gave me a nasty rope burn though.

So now that the workshop is over theres a few things I am planning to work on this winter.

• Rolla Bolla - jumping on it, balancing with the pipe the other way, turning my body the other way, standing in the middle, one foot, start stacking
• Throwing Knives - just starting this really
• Juggling
• Getting back some of the aerial moves I lost with that rib thing
• Press hand stands

If you were wondering the answer is yes. Yes, I am planning to build on all of those things with even more skills!