Just received our first shipment from Firetoys uk for our north American customers….

Now we will be working hard to photograph and list all 30 new products for the store – but to get your interest growing – here are some of the highlights:

Fire props – pio, fans, palm torches, staff
staff of every kind
balance ladders
Kevlar – and lots of it.
corde
juggling hats

We should have the new info on the site soon. Watch our facebook for updates.

Photo by nattu

Once a week I pick a prop and an idea and go to town. In this way I always keep my practice fresh and exciting.

Today’s challenge is “Foot Hooping” and, dispit almost giving my self a black eye, I had a ton of fun and felt extremely challenged.

Quick Definition

Foot Hooping involves maintaing the rotation of the hoop about the arch and top of your foot.

Foot Hooping Tips

1. Use a slightly smaller, lighter weight hoop. Your won’t get tired out as quickly and you’ll thank me when it inevitably hits you in the face.
2. Avoid practicing on hard, unforgiving surfaces. It’s bad for your back and you’ll feel it in your knees after crawling around after your hoop for hours.
3. Have multiple hoops. I found it useful to have more than one hoop close by, since it allowed me to get up and chase after them half as much when I launched them across the room.
4. Lastly, point your toes. It’s good to get in the habit for your dance practice anyway and it makes foot hooping tricks look far more elegant and graceful.

Hand to foot from behind the Back

Time Code: 1:22
Best Part: Her “I Got It!!” face

Alternative way to start your foot hooping

Time Code: 0:31
Best Part: A BOY HOOPER! Hells yeah!

Passing from one foot to the other

Time Code: 0:05
Best Part: The commentary.

Foot hooping back bend

Time Code: 0:20
Best Part: The frolic into frame.

Hooping handstand

Time Code: 0:20
Best Part: The shameless 80s music.

I think we’ve all caught one or two in the head in our time. Who else has had to lay down for a minute to get their sight back after a well places prop to the noggin?

Although most would attribute the original popularity of hooping to the 1950s craze created by toy company Wham-O there are other important groups we have to thank for the current hoop dance culture. The jam-band The String Cheese Incident was known for having thrown jumbo-sized hoops out into the audience durring their shows.

Audience members would hula hoop and jam to the music and soon the skills and flow began building amongst their fans. Early hoop dance pioner Anah Reichenbach aka Hoopalicious atributes her start to this exact hoop phenomenon at the High Sierra Music Festival in 1997.

Important hoop performers and instructors paved the way for new adopters and are mostly responsible for the slow growth of hoop dancing starting in the early 2000s. We started to see more hooping in both the entertainment industry and with music festivals goers.

Hoop dancing starts to look a lot more like what it does today only a couple years after the creation of Youtube in February 2005. Hoopers from all over the world began to share tricks, tutorials, demos and comments. Setting the bar ever higher, both challenging and supporting each other in their development of new skills and styles. Now a Youtube search for hooping videos yields over 50 000 video results.

When we look back at the history of hooping in 5 or 10 years, I believe it will be the hooping retreats and festivals that are attributed with having pushed the movement past where it stands today. And I think we will all be amazed by how much further it can be pushed.

The Hoop in this Image is a Hoop Gear Aluminum Hoop

Very cool but makes me a little dizzy to watch.

It’s that time of year again!! Time to vote for your favorite hooper in several fun categories. The hoopies are a great way to get exposed to great new tutorials, hooping photos, videos and performers. Make sure to head over to hooping.org and vote for your favorite.

Ps, I can’t be sure but one of the hoops in the “Thriller: Zombie Hoop Dance” look like one of ours, let me know if you can confim that theory

I’m not the only one that has noticed a line blurring between the two arenas of Gymnastic Hoop and Hoop Dance. Looks like it’s time to get flexible hoopers!!!

Ben bought these balls and filmed some footage – he was nice enough to let us use his video work.

Thanks Ben

The MMX ™ is surely our most popular juggling ball. As soft as beanbags, gives a great smooth feeling in your hands, always keeps its perfect round shape in the air, but doesn’t roll on the floor when dropped. At the same time the MMX ™ is as durable as a stage ball and it’s easily washable with water and any kind of soap. You can juggle under the rain or drop them on wet floors but sinking the balls underwater is not recommended! An ideal compromise that makes this ball one of our best sellers. Filled with millet seeds injected with a special machine through a very small hole allowing us to use the same “invisible plug” used on SIL-X and MMXplus balls. UV reactive colours.

Features
Size: 70mm
Weight: 150gr
washable
UV colors