Everybody's Irish...

...or everybody can try being Irish with these ideas! Thanks to everyone who posts ideas and patterns. It's about time to add me own! As a competitive Irish step dancer growing up, I have come up with a few fun moves. I don't count out beats or steps for Aqua class. I just do each move until I feel it and move on. I did the following list three times through after a short warm-up and then did a few moves (the second list) in the deep water. Enjoy and Happy St. Patrick's Day to ye! I always cue a good posture, just like an Irish dancer!

• Gaelic football kicks (soccer kick raising up the instep and knee out to the side)
• Hops (two legs come up at the same time to kick yer bum; could also start one leg, then the other and then both)
• Birdies (one foot out straight, toes pointed; the other leg hops up and down; I cue, "lift and kick yer bum!") Don't forget to do the other leg!
• Broadway kicks (alternating kicks, reaching for the toes with opposite hand)
• Leprechaun clicks (like on the Lucky Charms Cereal box: leg out to the side, rise up the other heel to pretend to click them together; can be done moving to one side and then the other)
• Up on toes (whichever foot is in front, that is the direction you move; tight legs, small and quick movements to the side and then back again with the other foot in front; can call them 7's and do seven of them: "jump, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, jump, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7 etc.)
• Swizzlers (jump up and, with tight, pointed toes, move legs quickly back and forth as many times as you can before coming back down to the pool floor)
• Dancer kick (leg out to the side, no bouncing at first but can add later; knee hinges back and forth; tight toes to push water back and forth; I add arm curls because we are "strong dancers!")
• Double points (similar to dancer kicks, but leg is right in front of you hinging back and forth at the knee; again squeeze toes to increase water resistance like you would cup your hand; out of the water, we used to jump and only do 2-3 quick points; in the pool, we just moved back and forth)
• Froggies (they are usually green!)
• Twist opposite elbow to opposite knee (when we danced doing a chain, we always had to keep our arms up and stiff; i tried to imitate that motion and added the leg up for a little ab work)

In deep water:

• Cross country ski (I talked about the flat Midlands even though there usually isn't much snow in Ireland!)
• Bicycle (I cycled the Ring of Kerry a few years ago, so we went "sight seeing" around the Ring of Kerry on our bikes)
• Wide knee jog (we were jogging around on Giant's Causeway in the North of Ireland; hexagonal-shaped rocks formed by lava; some legends say it is a path to Scotland; cue to take big, giant wide steps)

Then we did some ab work and a short cool down. Patrons liked the fact that we went dancing, sightseeing, learned geography and history and had a good time doing it! Hope some or all is useful to you! Happy St. Patrick's Day!

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