All roads lead to pole dance (Or my belated HFY Challenge post for the week)

Well they at least do in my life. People tend to laugh when I talk about pole dancing, but I learned alot from those girls way back yonder.

I found plethora of ideas and some very sound advice on fitness while investigating pole dance in cyber land something which I've tried to follow up in the real world by reading books and magazines devoted to fitness.

Thanks to pole dancers I discovered that there were things known as Kettlebells, it gave me reason to give Pilates some serious thought and it prompted me to go back and relook over belly dance. For which I am hugely grateful for I love Mari Winsor's pilates and belly dance seemed to have undergone a revolution and it now had styles like Tribal Fusion, Dark Fusion and Gothic.

These women did so much more than just pole dance, they were all involved in other fitness activitys, various dance forms, different martial arts, hooping, burlesque and all kinds of fitness classes. This was even where I first really heard about parkour!

Jamilla one of my favourite Australian pole dancers also does aerial tissu (aerial silks) and another Suzy Q does the circle.
When I was little I loved the circus, I loved the girl in the sparkly costume up there on the circle or the trapeeze, or riding round the ring on the back of a pony doing handstands!

Probably had I done gymnastics or ballet when I was growing up I'd probably be less preoccupied with dance, leaping, twisting and twirling now. But I loved dress-up as a child, my nanna had the best box of clothes for dress-ups, somewhere I have a picture of me wearing a cotton embroided blouse and a jaunty purple beret over my normal outfit.
And, well, I still love dress-up now...only now it involves false eyelashes that have long feathery ends and green lipstick. Maybe I'd still be obsessed with twirling and twisting?

In my living room I am a legend, no I mightn't actually be any good at anything I like to jump in and try but since it's just me it dosen't really matter. The latest addition to my repertoire has been Samba - think Rio carnivale style not Dancing with Stars.
It has a completly different feel to it than my prefered syles of belly dance, however I have seen a belly dance fusion with Indian dance influence that has me going hmmmmm...

With all this creative passion, I love dance, cooking and my knitting and they all have to some element of fun to them as well. However I have left music well alone, I am not one of life's muscians by any stretch of the imagination. Although it hasn't stopped me from looking at a class for a women's drumming class for health and harmony and wondering what if????

Tonight I am making Nigella's Chocolate Raspberry Pudding Cake, to be eagerly devoured while I watch Notorius C.H.O - I saw this years ago on tv and it was my first introduction to Margaret Cho and where I first fell in love with her.
I also have the latest Family Circle to visually devour crammed full of chocolate and knitting, just what you need on a cold, dark night to inspire you.