So many things! Kickstarter! Promo photos! Website!

Hey everyone!

We are really ramping things up here. In addition to our usual workouts we've been adding dance practices with different choreographers (shout out to Amanda Butterfield and Cortney DeAngelo for their awesome work!) into the mix, as well as additional cheer practice.

We're several weeks into acting rehearsals and have 12 days until we're all supposed to be off-book (no scripts in hand for rehearsals).


We recently launched a Kickstarter fundraising campaign to raise $5,500 worth of starter funds. Our Kickstarter has tons of great backer rewards, and you can even pre-buy tickets to the show via your donation! Please help us reach our goal!

We also have a brand new website: http://www.austincheershow.com 
And Facebook page: https://www.facebook.com/austincheershow

You might notice that we're looking a little snazzier lately. That's thanks to Jon Bolden, local photographer and designer who took our promotional photos for us last Saturday morning.

Here is a small sampling of his photos, and you can see a lot more on the website and Facebook page!

New Uniforms! Two months to go!

Working on my splits in my kitchen!

Kaci here!

We've been training for over 6 months now. I know, it's a little hard to believe. For me, the time has flown by. We started out slowly getting into things, learning terminology and basic stretching and conditioning exercises...and now we're in the middle of working on choreography for the dance portion of the cheer routine and continuing our path to jump excellence (which is a much more difficult form of jumping than the kind you do when you're scared by a cockroach).

I still personally feel like I could be stronger and more flexible. I start to get in my head about it, and then I remember that I'm NOT actually a cheerleader and I'm not exactly expected to be awesome at this. Still, it's been exciting to get better at something that seems so impossible at first glance.

Kaci, Halyn, Karen, and Kayla (Courtney not pictured)

This past Saturday at 8:30am we got to try on the athletic, super sparkly cheer uniforms that we will be wearing in the show to match the boys and girls in Austin Cheer Factory. We went ahead and bought our own from the same supplier, and boy, they were NOT cheap (but still worth it!). Speaking of which, we're going to be launching a Kickstarter soon to help us with some starter funds for the production. Don't worry, we'll have lots of fun goodies as rewards for donors, and some inside sneak peaks as the show develops.

As far as the play portion of the show goes (which is honestly a very, very important component I haven't mentioned here much) things are moving along well! All the ducks are in a row! All the shoes are on the mat! All the girls are...in a pyramid formation?

We've got most of our design and technical crew on board for the show including a stage manager, sound tech/designer, scenic designer, several choreographers, stage hands, and more. The working script for the Blood, Sweat, and Cheers (written by myself and the very talented Amy Gentry) is finished and we're having a live reading tonight with all of the actors. We used improv to help develop the characters and script and we'll continue to use improv throughout the process to keep things lively and fresh! So far the feedback on the script has been very, very positive to I feel good going into crunch time.

We've got about 2 months and 5 days until the show opens on Thursday May 30th at The Salvage Vanguard Theater on Manor Rd here in Austin, TX. Now the real countdown begins! We've got acting rehearsals, dance/cheer practices, and more on our calendar to keep us busy. I'm personally planning to ramp up my fitness goals as well to strengthen my endurance as much as I can.

This shit is happening. Damn!

My Cheer History, Installment 1: 1995-1998

For those of you who don’t know, my name is Halyn Erickson. I did competitive cheerleading for 13 years. I won 73 national titles, multiple grand champion awards, I was the overall champion for individuals when I was 12, captain on many teams, the first Hall of Famer at Austin Cheer Factory and I was the flyer on the first stunt team to compete a kick double at a Cheer Power competition. I play a character named Kennedy who is very intense and harsh. She’s basically who I was as a cheerleader times 10. My other role in the show is helping these lovely ladies jump like cheerleaders, dance like cheerleaders and speak like them too. I have a long, strange journey to share, and I’m happy to do so. I’ll be doing in in installments, and this is the first one. Here’s my story.

5, 6, 7, 8

It all started when I was about 4, around 1995. My mom, Rhonda, was asked to help out on the Leander Cedar Park cheer team. She was a world class soccer player, and they thought she was a good fit as she was a woman athlete. She took it up as she thought it might be a good influence on me. I destroyed her dreams of ever becoming a soccer player, as I danced on the field most of the time and punched a kid once, then took the ball off the field with my hands. She had literally no idea what she was doing at first. She scouted the talent, watched videos (she would order vhs tapes), and learned the rules. She pushed the girls as hard as she could, and taught them everything she knew. I would go to the games and practices, and to this day I still remember some of the routines. They usually featured a heavy disco influence, as my mom LOVES disco. 

My parents always knew I was a performer. I wasn’t particularly funny, or emotional- I just loved to dance, sing, and do tricks. I was never shy if I was performing, I was only shy in real life. My mom asked me over and over if I wanted to do cheerleading and I always said no. I had a knack for remembering dances, and I started to stretch the way my mom taught the girls, just for fun. Still, for a long time I refused.

So my mom also loves sports, mostly football. She used to listen to this radio show that just talked about sports all the time, which I found horribly boring. One day, when I was about 7, she called in and answered a trivia question, winning her “audience” passes on the set of Varsity Blues. I think we went to the Georgetown stadium, actually. I was terribly bored. My mom had friends there, and I remember playing on a friend’s gameboy because I was so bored. We were in the stands, and when people told us to we had to cheer wildly. Mostly it was a lot of standing around.

And then I saw them- they threw girls in the air, and the people cheered.  The girls smiled and waved. The mascot danced. People laughed. People pointed. They took pictures. The girls jumped. The guys held the girls while the girls held their legs over their heads. I turned to my mom and said, “I want to do that.” She told me to run down and ask if I could. I shot down the bleachers and said, “Can I go up?” The guys pulled me over, and the audience clapped. The boys put me up in a partner stunt, and the guy under me told me to do “longhorn hands”, the girls below showed me what to do and I did. The crowed roared and the girls smiled at me. I was twiggy, scrawny, probably had a messy blonde ponytail and ugly clothes-but I was in the air and so who cared? The guy holding me told me to smile, and the crowd laughed- I can’t imagine how terrified I looked.

This is my first cheer memory. It means so much to me. Whenever I think about it I cry. This was the first crowd I ever heard that cheered for me. This was my first time doing something scary, and loving it. I came down and the cheerleaders took to me right away. They thought I was so funny and they had a million questions. My mom was down at the bottom at this point, talking to one of the guys. The girls put the mascot head on me, and I’ll never forget that. We just laughed and they made me do stuff with my arms and legs. Finally, I ran back to the stands, and the boys lifted me up and over the railing. My mom told me on the ride home that someone named Jason told me to take classes. He told my mom I had a natural ability and to start my training now.

My mom enrolled me at a tumbling gym in Georgetown called something like “Flipz” or something, I can’t remember. But I spent hours there in a leotard and shorts, desperately trying to learn a back handspring. They would put me in a harness attached to the ceiling and I would try to do stuff. On the wall I remember there were tons of hand-prints in red, green and blue with girl’s names on them. The gym was very loose, and fun- it was pretty much daycare with equipment.

My mom recorded a special that Discovery Channel did on cheerleading, that we watched for years and years to come. The competition was NCA, and it was the nationals. It featured Cheer Athletics, Top Gun Allstars, Gymtyme and World Cup. Here’s a link where you can watch what NCA feels like, and what I watched and idolized as a young girl: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DGlmnvDClCQ I watched this video so much that I ruined the tape. I wanted so badly to be like these girls, they were my idols.

It was around this time my mom started coaching in Georgetown, for the Georgetown Eagles. She was the head coach, along with a woman named Sonya, and another woman named Laura. For a short while we just did that team. We practiced outside of the Georgetown rec center, when there used to be a bit of field in the back. Bugs biting, the sun blazing, we worked hard to be the best. We went to competitions we weren’t competing at just to see what we wanted to be. We sat on trailers in local parades, had sleepovers, and I was so young that I can barely remember other stuff. I was only 8. I didn’t have any tumbling skills, I was just a great flyer. I was fearless. I couldn’t dance, I couldn’t cheer very loud, my jumps were okay though. I really wasn’t a good cheerleader in the beginning, it took a while to overcome a lot of my natural awkwardness. 

Quick sneak peek about my life- I had a full by 11. (this is a full: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4EetfR6dH1w) A full is an elite level tumbling pass, so I came really far in 3 years. But that all comes later!

Then there was the split. There was a dispute over a few girls having to miss practice for family issues. One girl’s father was out of jail, and visiting for a little while so a girl wanted to go see her father in another state. Another girl’s grandmother was dying, and she wanted to go spend time with her before she passed away. The other coaches thought it unfair to the girls who were staying and practicing, and thought they should be kicked off. My mom refused, and the coaches went outside of the gym we had rented out, and fought extremely hard and loud. They came back in, practiced ended, and so Cheer Authority was born- my mom’s legendary rec cheer team.

I am second in from the right on the second row, bending over holding our knees. I have long blond hair, and my face is so washed it out from being so white. This was my mom’s cheer team, and this the end of the first bit of my story.

You want me to do what with my leg?!?

Karen Jane here! I can't believe it's already been four months since we started conditioning for "Blood, Sweat, and Cheers." It seems like just yesterday that we watched on in amazement as our cheer coach and co-star Halyn did back flips, thinking it would never be possible to reach that level of flexibility and agility.

Actually, it was just yesterday. Halyn does back flips a lot. And none of the rest of us can do back flips yet. And holy cow, Halyn can kick her leg up high!

So, can we do it? Can four adult women learn in 8 short months what Halyn started learning at the tender, jelly-like age of seven?

During the process of learning the cheer components, there have definitely been moments of panic (You want me to do what with my leg?!?) and whining (I'm so sore!) and self-doubt (Man, I suck at dancing!). Even the simple parts of cheer are a challenge for me. Getting those movements sharp (or jabby, as I like to say), sticking to the counts (and 1 and 2 and 3 and..), and using my upper body to get more air on the jumps (counter-intuitive, right?) have not come easily, but they have come.

It never fails. Halyn will show us some new double-triple-spread-eagle-something-or-other and on the inside I'm flailing and screaming, "Good Lord, I'll never be able to do that!" But on the outside I'm like, "Yeah! Let's go! I'm unstoppable! Rah! Rah!" Still, on the inside I'm screaming, "What do you think you're doing?! You're too old for this!" BUT I KNOW BETTER THAN TO LISTEN TO THAT VOICE.

I try it. I fail miserably. I try it again. Hey, it looks better. I keep trying it. Usually within the next week something magical happens and BOOM! The seemingly impossible was made possible!

Cue inspirational music!

When we started cheer practice four months ago, I couldn't stretch as far, I couldn't do all the intense ab workouts we do, and I sure as heck could not do a toe touch while soaring majestically like an eagle through the air. Well, I'm still working on the majestic part... and the soaring part... and the toe touching part... but I'm so close!

We have four more months of training ahead of us, and while it's unlikely that I'll achieve the level of flexibility and agility as our pink-haired ringleader, I will nevertheless continue to loudly proclaim, "Yes, I can! And I will!" Because I want to know just how high I can jump. I want to know just how far I can stretch. I want to know just how many dance moves I can memorize. And no inner voice of doubt is going to keep me from finding out.

We can do it!

Do I sound like a cheer leader yet? :)

Handstands

I’ve started practicing yoga as part of my own quest for mindfulness, but also to gain the strength and flexibility for cheerleading.

Drawing a connection between yoga and mindfulness isn’t too far of a stretch. (Oh, pun definitely intended.) But mindfulness and cheerleading? Before training for “Blood, Sweat and Cheers”, I thought that cheerleading was an impersonal, rigid discipline that required perfection and precision above all. Not very zen. But although the routines aim to be sharp and homogenous, cheerleading hinges on the same mindfulness practice found in more conventionally “enlightened” activities.

Through my training, I’ve learned to be aware of the places my body holds tension. I can feel my creeping anxiety in my shoulders. Or my existential crisis du jour in my hips. I’ve learned that a feeling is literally felt, more than just an emotion that I ruminate on, theorize about and react to.

And most recently, I’ve learned that how I respond to physical challenges is the same way I react to challenges in my life.

Last week, we worked on toe-touch jumps and handstands. Every time, I would get halfway up in the air and then flail my legs and halt abruptly.  Although I was safe and supported, I would panic and stop myself from pushing further. I was convinced I wasn’t “ready” yet; I was too afraid to leave the ground. I kept kick-and-flailing long after all the other ladies stopped for a break. I felt stuck. 

Like a hurdler to the side of the head, I realized I was letting fear — not physical limitation — get the better of me. With this realization, I became mindful of the roadblock. And now it didn’t loom so large.

Today, I can’t do a headstand. Tomorrow, I likely won’t be able to do one either. But I’m not going to learn to strengthen my abs and kick my feet to the ceiling by reading about it or talking about it or trying and pulling out of it. I can’t just say I’m “not ready yet”. The skills and strength to do a handstand are learned by doing a handstand. Commiting 100% to trying it as though I already can. I’ll fail and I’ll fall. But I’ll be closer than every time I prepped and prepared only to pull myself down. 

Fear masquerades as self-sabotage, or a list of rational reasons why not, or the fateful word “someday”. Something deep within us whispers that failure has dire consequences, but failure is seldom more destructive than falling out of a handstand. We get dusty; We get back up. We recover and try again.  When pursuing our goals, fear hisses deceit. It promises we’ll make it eventually, but only if we train to perfection before we dare to do it. But in cheerleading, in yoga — and in life — the doing is the training.

HEY! LISTEN TO THIS AWESOME SONG ABOUT HANDSTANDS!

(...Not actually about handstands.)

It's Just You Against You

Okay. My first blog post for "Blood, Sweat and Cheers". And I am going to be completely honest:  I find training for this show really intimidating!  

It's not because I'm adverse to hard work. It's not because I don't like physical activity. And it's certainly not because I lack the will or the drive.

For the past 10 years, I've had a complicated relationship with my body. I realize that’s a pretty common thing for anyone, especially a young woman to say. As a child, my body type was consistently in Olive Hoover range, not skinny, not fat, just a little chubby and soft. I was young and I never thought too much about how I looked. However, I can recall the specific moment that I became hyperaware of my body image.

When I was 11 years old, I attended my friend, Taylor's, cheerleading practice. Her mom offered us sodas, but teeny tiny Taylor obliged because she “only drank diet soda because regular soda makes you fat.” When I learned that “fat” was not only something I might be, but something no one wanted to be, I became obsessed with reaching perfection. 

Through my preteen and teenage years, I struggled with various misguided and masochistic attempts at achieving the “perfect” body. During this time, I was also a competitive tennis player who trained 20 hours a week with private coaches and elite teams. I was in the best shape of my life, but I couldn't appreciate it because I loathed what I saw in the mirror.

I feel like I’ve weathered the worst of the body-image storm. As an adult, I can’t fathom going back to the teenage self-loathing. But although I’ve worked through most of these issues, I’ve long avoided anything that remotely resembled a regimen for dieting and exercise for fear of self-discipline devolving into self-destruction.

Because of my experiences, I’ve been an advocate of realistic, healthy body images for women. However, these values often leave me feeling guilty or hypocritical whenever I’ve contemplated wanting to make a change to my exercise routine or improve my eating habits as if "realistic and healthy" left no room for positive change! 

And it's all of these fears of who I used to be and doubts about who I should be that intimidate me as I start to train with my team for this show. 

But in all honesty -- I want to be self-disciplined and train my body for this show. I want to be fit, athletic, and toned. I want to work my ass off, both figuratively and literally. I want to be mindful of what I put into my body. I want to work hard and see the results, just like any other creative or professional pursuit that I commit to. 

I’m confident enough to know now that the decisions I’m making about my body and my fitness no longer come from fear of an outside observer or pursuit of an imagined ideal. They come from me.  ... And it feels awesome!

BRING IT ON.

 

After One Month in Training...

Howdy, Kaci here!

Today is the official first day of having this group blog, but I went and added a post from my personal blog to the original date I wrote it (September 15th, 2012), so people could know what this is about. Go cheer show blog, go!

We've been training for almost A WHOLE MONTH now!

What does training for this look like? Well, so far it's LOTS of stretching, splits-specific stretching, push-ups, sit-ups, running, jump builders, squats, and more. Basically, we need to be very flexible and have an extremely strong body to do the gymnastic-like moves in the cheer routines.

We train on our own individually every day, and then have been getting together as a group on Saturdays to work out together. Soon we'll start learning important cheer poses, moves, terminology, and more. Halyn is heading all of that up, and I'm getting to a place with my training where I'm starting to feel ready!

It's pretty exciting to me, actually, all of this training. As a kid I was asthmatic and a bit uncoordinated, so team sports and exercise always felt like punishments more than anything else. I *did* like to dance, so I did that (but not always very well). As I got into my teens I started exercising more, and when I graduated from college I started doing Jillian Michaels workout DVDs as well as Nia, Yoga, and a good amount of free-form dancing.

But personally, I've never been very strong or super-fit in my life. But I am getting there!
I've been doing the Couch-2-5K program the past 3 weeks, and I've never taking up running before. This alone should be a jaw-dropper for some people who have known me for a long time.

 The first few weeks of training I felt physically great (working out really gives you energy and happy vibes), but I knew I had a loooong way to go with it. Slowly but surely, I've been improving. I can reach further, push harder, and do more with every passing week.

Halyn doing a T-Kick

And today, I had a breakthrough! All of us were working out together at the park pavilion near my house and we had ran around the track, stretched and worked on our splits, did push-ups and sit-ups, and we had moved into the jump building exercises. There is one we've been doing where you put your arms out in a V, with your hands made into fists. Then, you kick your legs up (one at a time) behind your arm. As I was doing this today Kayla exclaimed, "Kaci, wow! You're kicking your leg up so high!"

"Yeah! That looks so good!" Karen agreed.

I looked as I kicked and I couldn't believe it. My foot was up near my face! Never in my life have I had this kind of flexibility. I wanted to cry tears of joy. I just couldn't believe it. Somewhere inside I still feel like that student in the jazz dance class who is put in the back during the shows. The girl who doesn't know how to move her body. The girl who was told she had "two left feet".
But guess what? Bodies change. People change.
I am doing this thing! I am doing it!

WE are doing it.

I love this.