03 February, 2014

Our End to 2013


So this post is a little bit later than planned. Unfortunately it took a little longer to find time to write it than expected. First off, happy New Year and we hope that you all had a wonderful Christmas.

The last few months of 2013 were fairly busy for us and were a lot of fun J

Kicking it off was the Wanganui festival of cultures. 7.30 am on the 5th of October the first of us started to gather to get in to costumes and get creative with face paint. By everyone was in the car and off to Wanganui.

What a fantastical day. We had great weather, great people, a great crowd, and a wonderful time. We had a voodoo man with a diabolo and card tricks, a punk rock hooper, Peter pan and Tinkerbell doing adagio (aka people stacking), a mime, a ninja, a pink cat on stilts, an ice fairy with a contact ball, a guard with a staff, and warrior demon with a staff (which sound scarier than it was). We also had to wonderfully formally dressed ladies who came down to burn with us on stage.

Everyone’s costumes were amazing and everyone did a wonderful job on the day despite a few hiccups with the performance.

 

The next event we had was Manawatu Harvest Festival on the 19th of October. The Harvest Festival is an event by the Sustainable Living Trust to promote the use of sustainable resources and leaving a better planet for future generations (more information about these guys can be found here: http://www.maifarm.org.nz/).

Once again the weather was absolutely brilliant for us which meant everyone had a great time. We had stilts, the rolla bolla, poi, staff, and we also welcomed some new characters to the show, The Flowers who were doing adagio and were definitely a crowd favourite.

This event was a first performance for quite a few of the people who came out with us and they did absolutely fantastically! Thanks to all of our performers the day ran smoothly and everyone loved us and we already have a few plans for next year.

 

Just over a week later we had or next event, ROLLER DERBY!!! Well the after party at least. Eleven of us rocked up to The Royal here in Palmerston North where the after party for the National Roller Derby Tournament was being held. People from all over New Zealand had come to this event making it one of the biggest events we had performed at all year. The theme was circus so of course we with all our crazy fitted in perfectly. We started off with a bit of indoor stuff which included contact juggling, poi, and regular juggling. Then it was time to block of our little area outside and start the fire show. The crowd enjoyed it and our performers and safety crew did an absolutely wonderful job.

Once again everyone made an effort to be in costume. We had all manner of circus from simple crazy face paint to a strong man and woman duo and crazy fluorescent.

 

Every year on the 31st of October we have a regular event with St Albans Church who runs a Come as You Are Mardi Gras as an alternative to Halloween. This event has rides, an impressive amount of bouncy castles, and stalls. Then, once it’s dark, a pretty awesome fireworks display. Every year we rock up and act as filler while they are setting up the fireworks. This group is probably one of the best behaved crowds that we have and is an enjoyable event for all the performers involved.

 

And finally we were out at Rongotea on the 8th of November for the best fireworks display ever! Another regular gig that we have which, once again, it was awesome. We started off slow with bit of crowd work, followed up by a mass free spin which lasted about 20 minutes. Then we all sat down to watch the fireworks, which were absolutely amazing.

 

A big thanks to everyone who made 2013 awesome, whether you were a performer, safety or just came and hung out with us at an event or club night. We have a few things in the works for 2014 including a showcase for the first night of club for the newbies to show off all our toys so keep an eye out for that.

Let’s make 2014 even more awesome and as always, happy twirling!!