Life is the dancer and you are the dance

[Prudence Warner]

Prudence walked into the dance studio, she was wearing an olive leotard, grey knit shorts, a pink wrap front sweater and pink leg warmers along with her pink ballet pointe shoes. She was normally dressed in the same uniform that she asked her students to arrive in, but had decided to shake things up a little today, and she preferred to wear pointe shoes over slippers, but didn't give her students the choice, they were only allowed to wear slippers in dance class. She turned the music on and took her time warming up her own muscles so that she was stretched and ready for when the class arrived.

She was excited that the class number had grown quite a bit, and that a few of them were male nonetheless. She had sent a note to all of her new students telling them of the uniform that they were expected to wear to her classes: girls needed to be in a black leotard and pink tights, and the boys had a choice of wearing white or black leotard or shirt, with black tights or a black unitard. All students however, needed to arrive with ballet slippers, any who came with only pointe shoes would, today, dance in bare feet, the next time they would observe the lesson from the benches.

She had only just finished when the students began entering the studio and when she was sure they were all accounted for she smiled warmly. "Welcome one and all." She said. "For those that don't know me, I am Ms Warner. I ask that you all find yourselves a spot at the barre and we will begin." She waited for them to position themselves at the bar. She walked over to the stereo and pushed play. "Starting in first position with demi-pliés.. grand pliés.. on to slow tendu.. now tendus in fifth, which are a little faster with degages... On to piqués and we will finish with a balance at the barre.. then onto ron de jambe with these, I would like you to include some lunges and port a bras and finish with a balance in arabesque to stretch out the back muscles... Next we do frappe... on to grand ronds de jambe... Take some time to do Barre stretch... And we'll finish with grand battements..."

Once the class had finished the warm up, Prue smiled around her students. There was only one new face this year, and the girl hadn't missed a step, so she obviously had a bit of ballet in her background. "As you're at the barre, let's continue our lesson there. One demi-plié, two grand-pliés, one relevé (on half toe) in first, second, fourth and fifth. Two battlement tendus in demi-plié; front, side, back, and side. Half turn toward the barre and repeat. Battlement tendu jettés: three to the front, and again. Seven to the side. Three to the back, and repeat. Seven to the other side. Well done class." As they had been going through the movements, Prue had been walking down the line of dancers, fixing the odd posture here and there, tweaking how the head was sitting, how a hand was positioned, the arch of the back, the angle of the leg; things that were often forgotten whilst the dancer was thinking about her next move.

---

Present:
Athena Achilles
@running7
Elizabeth Toman
Gretchen Holmes
@kate
@jacobs

Absent:
@brookem
@sergei

---

This is the warm-up

[Athena Achilles]

Athena drew in a shuddering breath as she got dressed for dance class. Dance always made her uneasy, as it was the one class where she actually had to reveal a little of herself to the other dancers, as dancing was all about communicating without the use of words. Grabbing her dance bag, she left her room and headed around to the gymnasium. She walked down and spotting a student walking through one of the doors, she followed and discovered that it was indeed the studio that she was looking for. Entering the dance studio, she put her dance bag down on the bench and swapped her tennis shoes for her ballet slippers. Part of her still wished that she were putting her pointe shoes on, but at least her flats were well broken in.

She jumped when the teacher's voice rang through the room, instructing them to head to the barre. Finding herself a spot where she felt comfortable, she placed her hand on the barre and began to follow the woman's directions as she led them through simple barre exercises... well, she guessed that they wouldn't have been that simple if someone had never done ballet before.

As they moved from the barre exercises to proper barre work, she lost herself to the music as she performed the movements that were called by Ms Warner, and when the woman came up behind her and touched the small of her back, the poor girl leapt into the air, and then berated herself for not paying more attention to her surroundings. She felt her cheeks heat up as she ducked her head. She then pulled herself together, moved her feet into fifth position and carried on with the next movement that the teacher called out.

[Elizabeth Toman]

Elizabeth pulled on her pink tights and then stepped into her black leotard. She still couldn't believe that they has to wear a uniform for the dance class, but there again she had a uniform for gymnastics. Though she would represent the Academy in that uniform at meets, in dance, she was just in class!

With her hair up in a bun, she made her way to the gymnasium and then through to the dance studio. Dropping her bag on the bench, she kicked her shoes off and slipped the slippers on. Then at the woman's instructions, followed the other girls over to the barre. She followed the instructions as she worked her way through the exercises.

She had done ballet in the past, as it helped with her gymnastics, but she'd never done it in a way to completely devote her life to the style, as she'd also done jazz and hip hop - again for gymnastics. As the lesson moved on, she began to falter, and nodded her thanks when Ms Warner helped adjust her arm and foot. She had dismissed any thoughts of private lessons as she no longer cared about being at the same level of the other baller-losers, and she was just in this class to help with her gymnastics... well, that and the fact that there weren't any other electives where she would attend the course and not have to remember anything or do any actual work. Dancing was a form of playing around for her.

[Gretchen Holmes]

Pink tights and a black leotard were not new to Gretchen. At the dance studio back at home they'd been required to wear the same thing, so it was nice to be putting the familiar things on. She looked at herself in the mirror and sighed, she was a little short to be a dancer, but was certainly lean enough. She quickly tied her hair up in a messy bun before rummaging around for her ballet slippers. Those, she hadn't worn in a long time, not since getting her Pointe shoes. In fact, she was baffled as to why she even thought to pack them! It was lucky she had though.

She walked to class and arrived just a few minutes before it started. Quickly, she pulled on her slippers before following the teacher's instructions and finding herself a spot on the bar. The warm up was slightly challenging, as it had been a little while since Gretchen had danced and the teacher was moving a little fast, but she felt satisfied with herself by the time the warm up had finished, and confident she could keep by the rest of class.

As the teacher called out the positions and movements Gretchen followed them to the best of her ability. Technically they were correct, however she knew her dancing currently was sloppy at best and felt slightly embarrassed when the teacher had to fix her posture and position more than once.   

[Deleted]

Leanne's face when she saw the uniform she had to wear went from a smile to a burst of laughter, she shrugged and pulled on the pink tights and her leotard she then complained to herself as she was in a bad mood anyway. "Well, this isn't too bad. Not what I expected but YOLO." She then looked towards her teacher and smiled, as she started doing the exercises her teacher was saying she was beginning to like dance more than she thought she would. She also never thought she would be doing this style of dance like ever in her life, she was more of a sloppy/showy street-dance kind of girl.

Her dancing past was nothing like this, her dancing was more messy and everywhere. After all she was a Street-Dancer at heart, well she was brought up the way that told her that street-dance was the dance to express your emotions. She was good at that, she expressed any mood she could through street-dance. Now she had to try and do the same with this kind of thing but with Ballet. She smiled and looked towards her teacher and said as kindly as she could "Hello, I'm Leanne Jacobs. I'm new here."

[Deleted]

    Kate's patience with her dance class was on and off, mostly because she was always wishing that she could dance on pointe in class, and that the rest of her classmates were trained in ballet. However, more trained ballet dancers had come to the academy recently, and now that she had a bit of a threat, she was always in the mood to assert her being the best. A pointe class would be ideal, now that there were enough students, but there was no promise of that. The previous year, only she and another girl, Cara, had danced en pointe, but Kate had thought that she'd be the only one once the other girl graduated. However, she'd been replaced with multiple other more strictly dancers, and Kate could only hope that this would increase the demand for a pointe class.

    Upon arriving at the dance studio, she took her usual spot on the bench to shed her street clothes and slide on her ballet slippers before finding a spot at the barre. Her posture, as usual, exuded complete confidence, and her chin was tilted slightly up, so that despite her unimpressive height, she gave the impression that she was peering down her nose at everyone around her. Gone was the enthusiastically social girl that one would see anywhere else on campus, while a haughty little creature replaced her, intent on proving her worth and skill that resulted from years of strict training in a ballet academy. 

    She moved through the warm-up with ease, trying to avoid glancing back at the other dancers around her, and instead focusing on keeping her own movements precise. At least the class had taken a focus on ballet, as she'd feared that it may take another turn, which she absolutely could not handle. Moving into their next order of business at the barre, Kate let her thoughts wander slightly, thinking of how she would need to up her morning training sessions if she wanted to be sure that none of these dancers would be a threat to her. She was not expecting, then, for Ms. Warner to correct her, and her face flushed in embarrassment. She'd been to stiff, her worry translating to her motions, and she'd lost the flow of the dance to her competitive nature. 
    

[Deleted]

Caroline had a past of dancing, she was never big into it, but it gave her another release. Somewhere where she could go and just dance, she got dressed quickly and made her way over to the dance studio. The redhead walked into the studio to see five other girls already there. She listened to the teacher who she know had a name of, Ms. Warner asked the students to find a place at the barre, she did as she was told.

Caroline placed her hand on the barre and went through the exercises that she had done a million times before. Finishing out the first set of warm-ups with a balance in fifth and then got ready for the next set of directions. After they got to the end of warm-up she did some barre stretches and Caroline could feel the stretch. Doing the last instructed move she defiantly felt as if she was ready for class.

It had been awhile since she had been at the barre or even in a studio, but that wasn’t going to stop here from going all out in class. Ms. Warner called out what they would be doing in class today. Going through the pliés as if they were nothing, she kept up the pace that the rest of the class was with the relevé in first, second, fourth, and fifth. Caroline got into what she was doing, almost losing herself in the movements. Soon enough she heard the, Well done ladies, from Ms. Warner.

[Deleted]

Tori had been looking forwards to the dance class for a while now and entered the classroom just in time to hear their teacher's speech. He had recieved the notification about what to wear and had had to make a super fast trip into town to get the proper stuff, but now he entered the dance studio with a smile on his face and an eager look in his eyes. His hair was pulled back into a high bun and he quickly took his place at the barre.

Tori focused only on his own movements as the woman instructed the class, ignoring the other students expertly. He performed the movements flawlessly, having done them all before, and let a small smile play on his lips as the began finishing the warmup. He cound feel his muscles stretching and let the feeling wash over him. Tori had always loved working until his muscles burned, it meant, to him, that he was pushing his limits, and limits were meants to be pushed and broken, in his opinion. Finishing up finally, he didn't lose the smile on his face as he awaited the next instructions from the woman who taught them, Ms. Warner.