…planning to go out dancing tonight… hope to have photos online soon!

While our camera equipment was packed away, we had two great guest photographers help us out and take photos Saturday night. Special thanks goes out to Dave Welch and Tex McIntosh! Be sure to drop by the gallery and check out the Dave collection and the Tex collection. Geat job guys!

Saturday, October 27th: Our annual Halloween dance returns! There will be lots of candy, decorations, and a not-to-be-missed costume contest! You don’t have to dress up to come out and dance, but if you do, you are eligible to win some great prizes. The contest has awards for the top three places with the grand prize being an iPod Shuffle! Creativity is the key, so start thinking of some unique costume ideas. Keep in mind, it is a family friendly event, so your costume must completely cover all your bits and pieces. As always, there will be lots of great music and dancing. Click here for more information on the dance.

Dancing can sometimes be hard on the feet. The more you get “hooked” on dancing, the more time you are spending on your feet. As with any activity where you are on your feet a lot, you eventually start to feel the effects at the end of the day (or night). You may experience tired or sore feet. These effects can be amplified if you have a high or low arch like Dawn and I do. This can result in any number of aches and pains. The good news is, much of this is easily fixable.

If you are going to dance a lot, we always recommend getting a good pair of dance shoes. Comfortable shoes are going to make a big difference in how your feet feel at the end of the night. For most, the right shoes will work wonders. If you lean towards a high or low arch, new shoes maintain a good structure that will help. However, as the shoes break in, they will loose their ability to maintain the arch and you’ll start to feel the effects again even though you have nice comfy shoes. It’s not realistic to get new shoes every few months, so in this case, it’s best to get some kind of insert.

Inserts can work wonders! While they aren’t a cure-all, they are pretty darn close for most people. The best way to see if this will work for you is to go to the local store and get a pair of Dr. Scholl’s inserts. Dance in them for a while and see if you notice an improvement. You might want to try a few different kinds to see what works. The good news is Dr. Scholl’s are pretty cheap so it allows you to experiment. You may want to stay away from the gel kind as they won’t offer much support and may make your feet hot while dancing. Keep in mind that inexpensive inserts like this don’t last long and wear out fast. Also, they take a one-size-fits-all approach and may not be ideal for everyone. In my case, I had to modify the inserts to build up the arch and even then, they didn’t last long.

The ultimate is getting a orthotic (insert) that is customized for you and is built to last and take abuse. A few years ago, Dawn and I went to Good Feet (there is a store in Orlando off Sandlake Rd.). The staff there gives you personalized help and fits an insert just for you. While it takes a bit to get use to a more aggressive kind of insert, both Dawn and I have found them to work wonders. Sure, we still get tired after a number of hours on our feet dancing and teaching, but the effects are minimal and there are no aches and pains. Best of all, the inserts last. We’ve had ours for years and each pair work like they day we got them. I will warn you; they are expensive! However, if I factor in the number of Dr. Scholl’s I would have bought over the years, I’ve by far come out ahead by getting the Good Feet inserts. If you are looking to save, focus on the “Maintainer” family of inserts since they are the best for dancing and exercise. While their plan of different inserts for different activities is nice, let’s face it, it’s the more active activities you need inserts for.

This Sunday afternoon (Sept. 16th), we will be the guest instructors at the Dance Club of Central Florida. We’ll be teaching two lessons. The first one will cover basic Balboa and the second one will be 30’s style Charleston and how to work it into your swing dancing. We really hope to reach out to different kinds of dancers and expand their knowledge of vintage swing dances. Drop by if you are free!

Update (9/17/2007): We want to thank the Dance Club for having us out as guest instructors and for such a warm welcome from all of the dancers! It was a lot of fun teaching there. The Sunday dances are such a welcoming and friendly environment with a great crowd of people. For anyone looking to get a start with ballroom dancing, this is certainly the place to start.

Saturday, October 20th: We’ll be teaching a Lindy Hop workshop for Syncopated Rhythm in Jacksonville. The four hour workshop will cover the foundations and all the essential moves and variations. There will be a heavy focus on technique and connection to give you a solid foundation in the dance. In addition to the workshop, there will be dances on Friday and Saturday night. Check out syncopated-rhythm.com for more info.

Okay, so I thought I would tackle a really common and a really difficult question we get asked a lot by the ladies. How do you get your husband or boyfriend to learn to dance with you? I thought it would be best for me to take on this big question instead of Dawn since, at one time, I was in your husband/boyfriend’s shoes. That’s right, there was a time when I had no interest in learning to dance. So what magic did Dawn work on me? Well, she wanted to learn to dance for our wedding and decided to bring up the idea of taking lessons right at the point where she was most stressed out with the wedding planning. Needless to say, the potential outcome of saying “no” didn’t seem too appealing so I humored her and went along with it. As we’ve said since, she drug me out to the first lesson and I drug her back.

So having been in the “I don’t want to dance” mode, what advice can I give to you to help you convince your husband or boyfriend to dance?

The disclaimer: Keep in mind that there isn’t a silver bullet approach. If your husband or boyfriend really doesn’t want to dance, he won’t. You can’t force him. The best you can do is to encourage him to try out dancing to see for himself if he really likes it or not. Given this, there are several things you can do to help the process along.

What he means: Most of the time, there is more to “I don’t want to dance” than face value. For the typical American male, he is expressing that he is extremely uncomfortable with the idea of learning to dance. Let’s face it, our society is geared towards encouraging men in sports and not in the arts. To many, the thought of dancing might not be that bad, but the initial steps to learning to dance is intimidating to say the least. This is what you have to overcome. It’s your job to be encouraging and make him feel comfortable.

The odds: The odds are actually in your favor. The biggest hurdle is just getting guys out dancing for the first time or two. Once they discover that it is fun, they usually want to come back for more. This was true in my case, and we see it time and time again in our classes and at our dances. More often than not, beginner classes have more ladies than guys. However, the more advanced the class gets, the offset tends to go the other way. You start to end up with more guys than girls. Why is this? Well, there are many reasons, but one of them is that guys tend to stick with dancing longer than women. Women tend to view dancing as a fun and casual hobby. However, for guys, once they get hooked on dancing they tend to become die-hards. Besides the fact that dancing is a confidence booster, once guys start to master a skill like dancing, they tend to stick with it.

So what can you do?

Encourage and discuss. Whatever you do, don’t push or force him into dancing. That won’t make a pleasant experience for either of you. Instead, discuss with him that you would like to learn to dance together. The together part is important. So many couples today have different careers and different hobbies. Spending time together is becoming a rarity. Dancing is a hobby that you can share together and use to spend evenings out together. In addition, it’s an activity that strengthens your relationship and forces you to work together as a team. This is an excellent point to bring up to encourage him to try it out. Also mention that he won’t look silly or out of place and that you’ll be right there in the same boat the whole time. You can also bring up things like the exercise aspects of dancing, how social it is, and how much fun dancing is. The romantic aspects of dancing don’t tend to have big appeal with guys and you might want to spend less time on these.

Find the right place. Once your significant other has decided to give dancing a try, you need to select the right place to start. This can make all the difference in the world and spell success or failure for your dancing future. Look for classes or lessons that are cost effective for you. That way he can’t say “it’s too expensive”. Watch out for studios that offer attractive intro rates but drastically increase their rates after the introduction period is over. Also, be sure to interview your potential instructor. Find out how friendly and encouraging they are. Ask how many other beginner couples they have worked with and what they do to make them feel at ease. Make sure their personality will blend well with yours and your boyfriend/husband’s. This is the biggest factor in success. The only reason I returned after my very first lesson is because my instructor made it fun.

Find the right dance. This is something people often forget about. Ladies might be interested in the grace of waltz and the romance of tango and prefer to learn ballroom dancing. However, this may not appeal to guys. Men may be more interested in street dances such as salsa or swing. Be sure to discuss this with your husband or boyfriend. You may want to focus on a form of music he likes and learn a dance works best with that. Granted, I am bias, but swing tends to offer the most universal appeal for guys. It’s sort of a “safe dance”. It’s fun and energetic and doesn’t tend to have many traits that the American male would label as “feminine”. It doesn’t require you to move your hips like in a Latin dance and can be applied to a wide variety of music styles (probably one of which your S.O. likes). While ballroom dance shows boomed on TV recently, we’ve actually seen many couples turn to swing dancing because it is a form of music and dancing that both enjoys.

Lost in a crowd (or not). Some guys react better to group classes and some better to private lessons. This is something to bring up and discuss. Group classes are more cost effective plus it tends to show guys that they are not the only person in the learning process. However, some guys may react better to a few private lessons to start out with. The one-on-one attention may be more encouraging. Ether way you go, be sure you go out and dance. You won’t become good dancers by lessons alone. You have to apply what you learn. In this case, it’s often good to go out to a more crowded dance night for the first few times. Guys tend to fear being put in the spotlight. There is no better way to overcome this than being lost in a crowd.

Maybe a trade? Relationships involve give and take. Is it really fair that he tries something you want to do, but you don’t do the same in return? Offer to return the favor. Maybe offer to take some golf lessons with him or whatever he is interested in. We’ve seen this work for several couples. Not only do they end up with one hobby they enjoy together, but they get two!

Most of the time, the hardest part is getting guys over their initial fear of learning to dance. For many, it’s the fist time they have been exposed to such a thing and can lead to being very apprehensive. The best you can do is be encouraging and reassuring. Nine times out of ten, guys discover that dancing is a lot of fun and is a great activity that you can do together.

Interesting things to note: Single guys are usually very open to learning to dance since it’s a great way to meet other single people. Guys in new relationships are usually fairly open as well as it’s fun to find new activities you can do as a couple. However, the longer guys have been in a relationship, the harder it is to convince them to try dancing. This doesn’t mean it’s impossible. We just get set in our ways and sometimes it takes some encouragement to try something new.

Does it ever work the other way around? Yes. While it tends to be the rare case, we have seen some guys that have a hard time getting their wives/girlfriends to dance.