Awesome Neighbor is Awesome

You remember my foil ballerinas? A few of them ended up in arabesque, but let's be honest, I am not that creative so most of them were just doing pirouettes like the five year old in me thinks they should. Another bit of back story: I happen to live next to a person who is associated with a professional dance company.

Well, after Thanksgiving I finished putting up the decorations on the ugly faux ficus tree in the foyer and called it good. A few days ago my husband came home and handed me a few ballerinas that had fallen off the tree. I went back out there to reattach them and it looked like someone (perhaps someone's small and rambunctious dog), had smashed in to the tree, knocking it over and tossing most of the decorations off-kilter. It was standing again, but the garland was a little askew, and a few ballerinas were just hangin' on by whatever the ballet equivalent of a wing and a prayer is. As I was putting things to rights I found this:

GRAND JETÉ! That is just showing off! LOVE. IT.

By the way I finally figured out how to make accented Es on a PC without cutting and pasting:

Hold down the alt key while inputting this code:

0201 = É

0233 = é

0232 = è

Tin Foil Ballerinas

 Did anyone else make tin foil ballerinas for the Christmas tree when they were kids? They are super cheap and easy and you can make them in any size. Big honkin' ones for little hands and teeny tiny ones for grown up hands. I have been making them to decorate the ugly faux ficus tree in my apartment building's communal foyer for the last few years. Since I can't go to class tonight (hurt too much) I am releasing my frustration by distraction, and making this year's crop a bit early.

You just take a square of aluminum foil and cut or tear it along the lines here ---------->
and then squish the foil up until it is roughly human shaped. Then you can pose them. I suppose they could be imps or fairies, but ours were always ballerinas. Arms in high fifth are perfect for hanging them on the tree. When I was little I always posed them as if they were doing pirouettes with their arms in fifth. Because that was what Ballerinas Looked Like, thank you very much! I also made little tutus for them with fabric or scraps of paper cut in to a circle with a hole in the middle to fit around their waist.