As with most new year’s resolutions, the one we made to blog more appears to have been forgotten about until April. But there is something fresh-feeling about Spring and at least this way we have plenty to update you all with!
Following on from our last post, the Mrs Midnight’s ceilidh in February was a roaring success – particularly as it was the debut performance for 3 of this year’s new dancers! Shyron, Claire and Evie morris reeled with the rest of us and it was fantastic to be able to have so many of us up at once! We were almost lacking room in the hall! (an unusual feat for Glory!)
Speaking of new dancers, we’ve been so lucky to have 5 new dancers join our ranks (and we have kept hold of 2 from the past 2 years!) – our practices this season have therefore been focused on teaching existing dances from scratch, which in turn has helped those of us who have been dancing longer to focus on the individual components of the dance and how they go together.
These new dancers are not just dancers of course – they are new friends, and we have loved having some of them join us for our non-Morris dancing activities (we do do other things occasionally!)..
March saw our annual weekend takeover of a Youth Hostel – this year’s venue was the beautiful Coverack. We arrived on the Friday evening and it was lovely as always to greet old friends who we may not get to see on a weekly basis at practice.
We were very fortunate with the weather and as usual we were largely split into two parties for the Saturday – the ‘ambitious’ walkers who walked West along the coast path and back, and the ‘leisurely’ walkers (of which I was one!) who went on a beautiful 8ish-mile circuit, taking in a quarry, a pub lunch and an ice cream farm along the way. The hostel was a welcome retreat and our feast of baked potatoes and various homemade treats was hungrily devoured. The evening was nicely rounded out with a disco and a music and song session.
Sunday saw a few of us head to a local sculpture park (and I believe some of the ‘ambitious’ walkers completed the walk the ‘leisurely’ walkers had done the day before), and then it was leftovers for lunch, a quick tidy up and fond farewells. Photos will follow when I get around to adding them! We have already booked the Youth Hostel at Portland, Dorset for next year and are already looking forward to it.
We had our second all-day practice two Sundays ago at Alphington Village Hall – this was very useful and intensive, and some very organised lesson-planning from our Foreperson Steph went a long way – thank you Steph!
We are now looking forward to our dance-out season – tonight is our penultimate practice! You can see us at the Bovey Tracey Green Man Festival on Sunday 27th April. The 1st of May falls on a Wednesday this year so while we won’t be dancing at dawn on Dartmoor (although other local sides most certainly will be!), we’ll be welcoming in the May-O at The Ley Arms, Kenn in the evening with Great Western Morris Men and hope to see you there!
We’ll be posting up our dance-out schedule here shortly, so keep an eye on this and our Facebook page for where you can find us during the summer!
Glory xxx
*this blog title in no way references a mills-and-boon-esque book involving star-crossed morris dancing lovers from opposite sides of the tracks (in which he is in a Ring side and she is (gasp!) a woman!) that we may or may not have passed around the side to read in turn…. [link here for interested parties ;)]