Free Belly Dance Class and New Class Series

• • When

    Monday, January 9, 2012
  • Time

    6:00pm until 9:00pm

• Where

  TRUST ARTS EDUCATION CENTER, , 805/807 Liberty Avenue, Downtown, Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania

• Description

  WINTER DANCE CLASS KICK OFF ART OF DANCE OPEN HOUSE January 9th 6-9pm 6-7pm STILETTO FIT (formerly Club Dance), beginners with Instructor, Jame Elis 7-8pm STILETTO (formerly Club Dance), intermediate/advanced with Instructor Jame Elis 8-9pm BELLY DANCE all levels with Instructor Narah Kimberley Arrington Minardi Join us for an evening of free classes, refreshments, and fun. R.S.V.P. required. Enjoy a free Soul Ice to cool you off after class. REGISTER AT TRUSTARTS.ORG/EDUCATON OR 412-471-6079 WINTER CLASSES SCHEDULE Art of Dance Classes for Adults, ages 18-up STILETTO FIT/Pump Pulse (formerly called Club Dance Workout) Instructor-Jame ElisMondays: 6p-7p beginners 7:15p-8:15p inter/advanced6 weeks for $50 or $10 for drop-ins. For the every woman looking for a sizzling hot dance class. Dance to the hottest music while sculpting and toning your entire body. Excellent lower body workout, non-stop calorie burning strength class. Great stretching component, and high energy dance session. Heels preferred, not mandatory (comfortable shoes allowed). This is closest to being Beyonce that you will ever get! BELLY DANCE Instructor-Narah Kimberly Arrington Minardi Thursdays 7:00-8:00pm. 6 weeks for $50 or $10 for drop-ins. Learn the ancient art of belly dance! A dance of pure joy and celebration that will tone your whole body and increase flexibility and endurance. This transformative dance builds confidence and body awareness. All the while, you are having so much fun, you will think you are "cheating"! This class, suitable for beginners as well as those with experience belly dancing will begin with a yoga warm up, move into belly dance technique, continue with combinations or a mini-choreography and end with a cool down. If you'd like to join us, let us know on the Facebook event!  See you then! Happy New Year!!

Christmas Ornaments Handmade and Sentimental

A and I made several new ornaments for the tree this year.  This one I made with a 1 1/2" hole punch, a round inchie image (from Digitalcollagesheets.com maybe?), a vintage letter, vintage buttons and Distress Stickles.

This one was cut from the Art Chix card stock  holiday tags.  A cut some of them and I cut some.  He glitter glued some and so did I.  A hole punch, a hook and it's done.  

A loves his engines, and so they must adorn the tree! :)

This one is from the Animal Rescue Site.  A great place to buy since proceeds go to helping feed animals in shelters or global programs.

Another from the Animal Rescue Site.  Love me, Love my Dog! :)

And another.  I customized it to look even more like Dana.  :)


Enjoy your holidays!  Be safe and relax!  

Almost Winter Solstice

That post about holiday countdown calendars got me excited to make our own.  Here's how you can make one like ours (I'll reference this next year so you can count down for more than 4 days if you like, but don't let the short time stop you. :) )
1. Lightly sand 24 playing cards (optional)
2. Punch 24 small, 24 medium and 24 large circles out of patterned scrap paper using paper punches.  Alternately, cut them out.  You can use lids as templates or free-hand.
3. Ink the edges to distress (optional) and draw about 2 circles around the edges.  Mine are messy are artsy, just the way I like it.  I used a sharpie fine-tipped pen.  I also used it to hand write the numbers.
4. Glue the stacked circles together and then staple to the sanded cards.
5. Sew across the top of the sanded cards.
6. Stack the sanded cards on top of 24 other cards and sew on 3 sides to make pockets for tags.
7. Cut tags (smaller than your sewn area) using an electric cutter (I used my Cricut).  You can also use a paper punch or cut by hand and punch a small hole or staple the string/cord.
8. Use jute to string the tags.
9. Write special activities or special treats on the tags.  We wrote "popcorn and a movie", "go see Christmas Trees at Museum", "Read a big stack of books" (really big- Mommy and Daddy took turns with each book), (and others below).
10. Wrap jute around a batting and velvet covered (stapled) board and clip cards onto jute with mini clothes pins.

My rock drill he'd really been wanting to use.

The 2 thin shells we managed to drill through.

Paper snowflakes have continued to be a huge hit.  The Trader Joe's sales flyer  made some great ones.


Now, I'm back to sewing (set up a temporary kitchen station for more progress) and the rest of the day.

Happy almost Winter Solstice!!!

Holiday Hafla Tonight!

Enta Omri, probably my favorite song Ishtar plays, is my song for tonight!! And a little bit of sparkle in my costume for the festive holiday theme.  If you are in the area, come join us!  It's a lovely way to celebrate!

Some Art Links for Kids and Grown Ups

This one uses a CD to make a cool looking mosaic tiled frame.  Also from the Art for Kids blog- a bit about the Strathmore ATC's for Kids kit. The blog author, Kathy Barbro wrote the projects for the kit!

Traci Bautista is teaching a free online workshop starting January 1st!  I've posted about Traci's book, "Collage Unleashed", and a couple of her videos here.  She has a new book, "Doodles Unleashed", coming out February 1st.  Today on her blog, she has some great recycled materials holiday projects!

oh, and I put another ornament up on Etsy.

Some Really Inspiring Links

White Hot Truth Danielle LaPorte  Just too many posts I've read today to tell you what I found enlightening.  Just start with the "most popular" ones listed to the right and get sucked into all the related posts.

Christine Kane Vision boards! Yes!!!

Kelly Rae Roberts on letting something go that's really good to make room for something better.

Links for Holiday Countdown Calendar and Mercury in Retrograde

Free Victorian clipart found here.

DH and I decided there was no need to buy for each other for Christmas again this year. But, if we hadn't, I might suggest this course by Misty Mawn for myself. Her work is very inspiring and so is her book, Unfurling.  Perhaps there is an artist on your list?  Perhaps you should add yourself to your list? :)

If you want to make an advent/holiday countdown calendar, there are a couple posts out there I found interesting:

Maya*Made has one here.  And here. She also has an adorable house version that could be made into an ornament as well.  Threaded Basil wrote about her Maya*Made advent calendar here.  Her idea of cleaning up the playroom before diving into the treat is excellent!

Amy Karol, a.k.a. Angry Chicken has a post on one she made here.

If you want to make this, but are fretting because we are already 5 days into December, might I suggest being an "anti-perfectionist" and doing it anyway?  You could start tomorrow or even 5 days from now and it would still be exciting and fun.  A 20 or 15 day countdown is still a long countdown, don't you think?  A has been asking if it is Christmas (our tree is up), so maybe we will add this to our project list.  It would be a great lesson in DIY, re-using, counting forward and backwards, creative expression and valuing time together.  I adore Maya's idea of using "time tickets" in the pockets ... things like "hot cocoa date with Mommy" or "ice skating date with Daddy".

In other news, if you have also been experiencing miscommunications, wrong thinking, past issues resurfacing, and faulty information (via people or with phones, computers, cars, trains, etc.) it is due to Mercury being in retrograde.  A LOT of people I am in contact with have been complaining about just these things and with good reason.  This one's a doozy!  Why do I know?  I looked it up for my own sake.  Woah.  Glad I re-ordered my Hyland's Nerve tonic before now.  Looks like things should settle down on January 1st.

Maybe A and I will get on that countdown calendar today.  Making stuff is always good for the soul. :)