Thanks, everyone! This is great. I'll print all these out before we go.

I haven't homeschooled in several years, but I still think of the WTM boards when I need information. I logged in today to ask for travel tips for Vancouver, and I remembered this thread. It was great to read up on what your dancers are doing. The last time I posted, my dd had made prelim champ was doing well at that level. She needed two firsts to move up to open champ. She placed first in Atlanta in November - competition is pretty stiff at that feis, so it was a sweet win. She got another win last weekend at the Raleigh feis, so she's an open champ. She went to Oireachtas (Regionals) in December, her first Major comp since her surgery. She recalled (top 50% recalls and dance a third dance) and she placed 44th out of 95 in her age group. She's an assistant teacher at the studio now and loves it. The little girls are so cute and really look up to her. It seems like just "the other day" when she was one of the younger kids and hoped she'd someday dance as well as the teenagers... and now she one of the "big kids." Her dance teacher is hoping she'll stay here for college and keep dancing. That's a possibility, but it depends on what she decides for her major. She's still tossed up between a couple of choices.

It looks like there's so much to do there! We'll be staying at the Sheraton in the middle of downtown, and dd will be dancing at the convention center. We were looking at the Suspension Bridge park today. How is the hiking there? Do you have to hike far to get to the bridge? We probably won't be able to do any strenuous hiking because my dancer won't want to overdo it before the competition, and she'll be worn out afterwards. She's competing two days with practices the evenings before, so it's a lot of dancing. We were looking at the Museums too. It sounds like the Museum of Anthropology should be on our list. Thanks for the suggestions!

We will be visiting Vancouver in July for a dance competition and have not been there before. We are adding a few days to sightsee. Any suggestions on best things to see and do? Is public transportation great or should we rent a car? Thanks!

I just saw this thread and realized I never updated! DD needed a hard shoe first to move up to prelim champ. She got a second that day, and one of her classmates got the first. But at her next feis in March, she got the first she needed and moved up. She's doing well in prelim - I think she's only not recalled twice, and she's placed as high as second. Her goal is to move up to open champ this fall, before regionals the first weekend in December. She needs two firsts to make open. Her toe has bothered her off and on. We visited her surgeon earlier this year to make sure it wasn't broken again. There were no new breaks, but he did say the inflammation caused from repetitive stamping can weaken the bone and eventually cause another break. He raised the possibility of retiring, but she's not there yet. She's getting a new dress in time for regionals - it is in the design process now and sewing will begin in September. I'll try to remember to post a picture of it when it arrives in November.

Thank you! Good luck to your daughter in her spring performance!

Thank you! I enjoyed reading the update about your son.

Thank you. Sounds like your daughter is having a busy and fun senior year. Your description of the video project made me laugh. :-)

I thought about reviving the old thread, but since it hasn't been posted on in over a year, I decided to make a new post. Can I get some good thoughts for my dd16 (an Irish dancer) this weekend? It's been 2 years since she competed in solo dances because of injuries. She continued dancing on teams through Nationals in the summer of 2016. At that point, she took a long break, but her broken toe refused to heal, so she had it surgically repaired in February 2017. Her orthopedist didn't rush us to surgery, because the break was in an area of the toe that has poor blood flow, so it sometimes doesn't heal well. Fortunately, dd's toe has healed great. She planned to return to dance in August 2017, but was delayed until November due to issues with low blood pressure. So, this weekend is her first competition since she's been back. She's nervous and excited, and truth be told, I am too. Anyone else want to share what your dancers are doing now?

Katie did trad set last year, but this was her first year doing solos. Our choreo team is going to nationals, but I don't think they'll go to worlds because it's so much expense for just teams with only one of the team members doing solos. If the dance teacher thinks otherwise, I'm sure we'll be getting an email in the next few days. :-) Our school is amazing. Our senior ceili 8-hand was the last team to dance, so they had to run upstairs for their choreo hair and costume change and make-up touch up. Our parents and other students had 4 flat irons going, a few people doing the hair style, people holding bobby pins, clear pony tail holders and hair spray for them; and people unzipping ceili dresses and pulling on the choreo leotards and skirts. It was a sight to behold.

Yes, it was. Her senior choreo team got 1st and their whip and nae nae generated some twitter chatter ranging from, "If I'd known that, I would have stayed another night" to "It's a sad day in the world of Irish dancing." LOL. Her teacher has a world championship in choreo and danced with both Celtic Tiger and Riverdance, so I trust his judgment on these things. Choreo is the right place for some originality and creativity. One of the twitter comments was from Ciara Sexton, the current lead female in Riverdance! Her other teams got 3rd, 5th and 7th. Our other teams also did great. We had 8 teams in the top 3 with 2 of those being 1st. She didn't recall for solos, so she was very disappointed. But she danced beautifully and did her best, so it's all good. She knows what she needs to work on for next year. Most of our dancers recalled, most of those qualified for Natls and some for worlds. Our school started off small with our TCRG and former owner retired to FL and flying in once a month so we could qualify to compete. We've only had a full time TCRG for 3.5 years, and each year we've done better in the major comps. Our second TCRG will be here as soon as his visa is approved. It's exciting to see the growth both as a school and in our individual dancers.

She is one of the best dancers in the novice/prizewinner classes, but on Saturdays they practice with the champs. In her private lessons, she and her teacher dance together, but we can only afford two privates/month. I'm not sure how to improve turnout. I know it has to come from the hip to prevent knee and ankle injuries. DD used to get a lot of comments on turnout, but not so much any more. Can you believe hotel rooms opened for Nationals before any Oireachtas? It's normal that they open up before Southern Region Oireachtas since ours is the last one, but it's really early this year. I told dh I made the reservations and gave him the dates to put on the calendar. He said, Now that's what I call planning ahead! I ordered new ghillies today. Her current ones aren't that old, but the foam padding is pushed forward and broken in front so it can't be repaired. We're switching from Pacelli to Hullachan and I'm hoping the Hullachans might hold up a little better. We found out today that our favorite Irish pub is closing. DD's school has danced there about once a month for years, so everyone is really bummed. None of the other pubs in the area has a decent stage.

I was reading the posts about the tall, gangly kids. My dd has btdt. She is about 5'7" and very thin, but she has developed grace and elegance. That said, in the Irish dance hard shoe steps, rhythm is the biggest factor, and she's struggling with that. Any suggestions? I know she needs to listen to dance music more than she does. An instrument would be good, but I don't know how we'd fit it in since she has dance class 4 days a week plus competitions and performances. I think it would be too overwhelming. She has done a therapy called Interactive Metronome in the past, so I am looking into doing a refresher using the IM-at-home program (cheaper and less driving than doing it in office). But the therapist she had before left and they are still working on getting another therapist certified for the at-home program. Any other ideas that we might be overlooking?

Same here, I'm 51 and the school was always evacuated immediately and police dogs brought in if there was any bomb threat whatsoever.

Based on that logic, when are they going to ban computers, smartphones, tablets, and watches?

But they knew very quickly that it wasn't a bomb; otherwise, they would have evacuated the school. So they accomplished nothing except making themselves look stupid.

Maybe because he knew they would overreact.

It's fine to check things out to be sure, but the arrest and suspension were over the top. Kids used to make these kinds of things in school, but now they're arrested for possessing them? No wonder we have to import cheap crap from China and our industrial infrastructure is dead.

I text, but texting is the one thing I hate more than talking on the phone. It's just too dang time consuming unless it's something very brief. Facebook messaging isn't quite as bad because I can do that on the laptop instead of the phone if I'm at home.

One of my nephews had it. He had to take an entire season off from soccer and lacrosse.

We live just outside of Raleigh. I was shocked by the humidity when we moved here. I lived in the FL panhandle for awhile and in Okinawa, and the humidity here is just as bad as FL and worse than Okinawa (an island). It's a great place to live and it's easy to homeschool, but if you have a child who doesn't do well with humidity health-wise, I wouldn't move here. I hear a lot of people say that their allergies or asthma are worse here than wherever they've lived previously.

No, I don't think it's an automatic assumption, at least not as part of the Whole 30 philosophy. Whole 30 is an elimination diet, but after the Whole 30, people try adding back all sorts of things - dairy, legumes, gluten, grains, etc. to test the effect on their body. When one feels crappy, but is eating all those things at once, it is difficult to tease out whether any of them is the culprit, but by eliminating all of them and adding them back one at a time, it's easier to discern. It's the same concept used by many migraine sufferers.

Dairy causes bloating and congestion in a lot of people. After doing a whole 30, a lot of people will add dairy back to see how it affects them, and if they have no ill effects, they add it back permanently.

Go to the doctor! Whether it's RA or something else, you will do better with an early diagnosis.

I don't know about ADHD meds. But I know there is a fairly large and loud group of oncologists who learned that their hospitals are getting kickbacks for the cancer meds they prescribe, and they are pushing for the pharma companies to lower prices and stop paying kickbacks. Of course, they don't call them kickbacks.