Tag: Ballet Shoes

Hey daydreamers! Random question: how early is to early to listen to Christmas music? Usually I strictly ban it until after Thanksgiving, but the Jonas Brothers just came out with a new Christmas song and okay, I admit I’ve listened to it about 15 times since it came out…

Anyway, I know I just did a “what’s in my dance bag” in like August, but my dance bag has changed a LOT since then. First of all, volleyball season ended, I got pointe shoes, new leotards, I’m now at the dance studio 24/7…and oh, yeah, I got a new bag. So yeah, I think that justifies a new tour! If you want to check out the first one, click here.

Let’s just dive headfirst into the post, since I can’t wait to get started!

First, we have the actual bag! I got it for my birthday, and it’s this really cute duffel bag from Rebok. I love the blush pink color! (Pretty much everything I got for my birthday is blush pink…) There’s a mesh pocket on the side, another side pocket with a zipper, and a front pocket with velcro. There’s one main strap that goes over your shoulder, and two smaller straps that velcro together to hold stuff on top of the bag – I use it to hold my pointe shoe bag in place!

In the mesh side pocket, I keep my ballet shoes! I normally just stuff them there after class. That way they can air out after getting all sweaty from dancing (ew). My ballet shoes are leather split-soles from SoDanca, but I’ve been thinking about switching to canvas ballet shoes so I can point my foot more easily.

And next, my pointe shoe bag! I keep my shoes in a blue mesh bag that I stick in the outside pocket. Like my ballet shoes, that gives them a chance to air out after getting sweaty, so they won’t break down as easily!

In my pointe bag, I have my toe pads, toe tape, and of course, pointe shoes! I wear Pillows For Pointe Gellows toe pads, and I love them because they’re reversible! I really like the gel side on my toes – for the first few releves, it’s actually comfortable because the gel feels really soothing. (After that, well…not so comfortable.) I also use Gaynor Minden Microfoam toe tape, which I don’t use super often since I haven’t gotten any blisters yet (thankfully!).

Then, of course, my pointe shoes! Like I said in my pointe fitting vlog, I wear Bloch European Balance, size 4, No X. Translation for non dancers: the number of “X” you have determines the width of your shoe – so if you had XXXX, you’d have really wide feet, and No X means your feet are so narrow that they’re not even wide enough to have one X. Like me. 😂

Here are some gorgeous pictures of my feet. 😂 These involved me tying them, standing on top of my desk, bending down and desperately grabbing the wall while I tried to balance on one foot in the left picture. You’re welcome. 😜

The side pocket contains a very dirty-looking Ziploc bag that contains a travel hairbrush and used to have bobby pins and hair ties in it, but I don’t know where those ended up…and also my red Theraband, which looks really cool in front of my desk lamp, lol!

Finally, let’s look INSIDE the bag!

First, I have another mesh bag containing all my shoes that aren’t actually ballet-related. I’ve had this in my closet since like fourth grade, and I just decided to use it to keep all my shoes together. It’s really cheap and flimsy, but it works!

Inside my purple mesh bag, (how many times have I said the word “mesh” in this post??) I have my jazz and contemporary shoes! When Payless had this huge closing sale I got these tan jazz shoes for only $4 or $5. I think I got the contemporary/lyrical shoes off of Amazon?

Some more slightly weird looking pictures of my feet that also involved standing on top of my desk! In the right one, you can see how the contemporary/lyrical shoes fit over your foot. I actually don’t use these very much; I’d rather go barefoot. The other day in contemporary class, I tried to wear them, and I actually got annoyed that they were slipping off my feet and took them off! I just keep them in my bag anyway.

Then I have my pink leg warmers I got from Target in my birthday shopping haul post that I love! I wear them all the time, especially in my early-morning weekend classes to help me warm up.

Then I also keep this warm grey sweatshirt in my backpack to wear in between rehearsals and on the way to class! It’s really cozy and now that the weather is FINALLY cooling down here in southeast Texas (😂), I wear it all the time.

I love how the filter made my dirty desk look like a clean white background, lol! I also keep these black Spandex shorts that I wore under my uniform during volleyball season in my bag, but now that volleyball is over, I always wear them over my leotard and tights during class! I also keep blackish-navy biker shorts in there too in case I don’t have my Spandex for some reason.

My level color is royal blue, so I have two leotards in that color! The first leotard has spaghetti straps, a lower neck, and V-cut back. The only problem is the straps are a little loose, but otherwise it’s really pretty and comfortable!

My other one is like the opposite of the first leotard: it has a very high neck, thick straps, and back that’s higher than the top. Both are really cute and comfy, though! I also have a black leotard, but when I was taking the pictures for this post I was actually wearing it since I had just gotten back from class. 😂

And, of course, I have tights. I always wear convertible tights, because it’s so much easier to put on toe pads and go barefoot for contemporary class! Once again, I have another pair, but I was wearing them at the time…

I also have a random hairbrush and spray bottle that I use to do my hair for class and rehearsal on the go. There’s not actually thickening spray in the misting bottle – it’s actually just a totally random bottle that I’ve had since the beginning of time, and it’s full of water.

I also, quite randomly, have a pinkish-red fox Squishmallow in my dance bag! Isn’t it cute? For pre-pointe class, we would do releve exercises in parallel, and we’d have to keep a small stuffed animal in between our heels without dropping it. We’d also have to do bourres with them in between our thighs to keep your legs together! Now that I’m on pointe we don’t really use this that much, but I still keep it in my bag in case we do.

(Okay, but the picture on the right actually looks really pretty?) I also keep Spenco 2nd Skin™ Squares in my bag. They’re like little jelly squares with blue backings on them. You stick the square on your blister and peel off the blue backing, and finally attach it with toe tape, and it completely covers up your blisters and keeps them from rubbing! Once again, I haven’t had to use these a lot because I haven’t gotten a blister yet (YAY).

Finally, I have a bag with all of my pointe sewing stuff in it! (Not sure why there’s an empty band-aid box?) The bag is actually the baggie my pointe shoes came in! Inside is scissors, some ribbon and elastic scraps, stretch ribbon that I don’t use but came with my Bloch stitch kit that has some thread and a seam ripper plus some ribbed elastic, a Bunheads stitch kit that has thread and needles, and some measuring tape.

And that’s it! Wow, that ended up being way longer than I expected, and I even left out some stuff. Applause if you made it to the end! 😂

Also, don’t forget: There’s still time to ask questions for the Q&A next week! All you have to do is simply comment down below, and I’m going to be answering all of your questions this Saturday!

I hope you enjoyed looking at what’s in my dance bag, and happy Saturday! *waves*

How early is too early for Christmas music? Do you dance? What’s in your dance or sports bag? How do you organize everything? Any questions for the Q&A?

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