By Alara Plaskon
It was an explosion of fun, interactivity and energy on a thick carpet of grass in the hot evening sun this past Tuesday at Rancho San Rafael Regional Park for YogaPalooza. The Studio’s Dominique Lamiel led the event on stage wearing her red tights.
Xylophone music rang out in the carnival-like atmosphere with kids carrying squishy play dough and colorful balloons that popped. More than 100 adults watched and 50 kids were running around wildly doing yoga poses and dancing.
Kids are usually shy and hard to interview, but I tried anyway.
I asked one of them which pose was their favorite. One little girl didn’t reply at first, but when I asked her about the “butterfly pose” she immediately freaked out and her eyes looked like they were going to pop out of her skull. She flung her arms around so wildly, I was surprised they stayed attached to her body. I quickly made my escape, not sure how I felt about this reaction but I assumed that it was her favorite yoga pose.
Some of the other poses included “bat” and “mountain.”
Doing yoga in public like this can be hard, even “embarrassing to do yoga!” said 12-year-old Imani. “There are too many people and my mom did it too!” she said. It was clearly fun for parents. Nearby, a mom and her daughter were dancing together so I talked to them too.
“It helps with movement and a connection with your body, as well as connection with your child,” mother Kayla Jacobs said. “I love to do yoga! I think the parents enjoy it more than the kids,” she said.
Part of the fun is dressing up. The clothes she was wearing weren’t your typical clothes. It was like she had been attacked by a rainbow. Jacobs described her clothes as “magical.” She and her daughter were playing dress up, the mother pretending to be Sesame Street character Abby Ka Dabby and her daughter Ella dressing up as Elsa from Frozen.
The music was something like you would hear on PBS Kids or some sort of young kids show. Every once in a while the kids’ music was interrupted by balloons popping loudly on the grass.
The balloons, play dough and bubbles came from Bobos Street Team. Bobos owner Mary Weneta has sponsored the Family Series at Artown for years. She said she wanted to give the kids something to play with while they are at these events.
“Whatever I think the kids will like,” Weneta said. “They are so cute and innocent,” she added, especially when they come up to ask if they can have balloons.
The next YogaPalooza will take place in conjunction with the Family Series: Broadway in Concert on July 20.
