No heavy stuff, CrossFits, Intervals or running – just a home ballet bar, a straight back, and extended feet. I have 7 ballet exercises that will make you slimmer and more graceful after the very first class.

The ballet has long gone beyond theatrical scenes and rehearsal halls – a stunning physical form, stretch, and posture of a ballerina made fitness instructors around the world include ballet exercises used by professional dancers in their programs.

1. Hundred

First of all, stretch your knees one by one for two minutes. After that, lie on your back, straighten your knees, raise your head and shoulders, press your chin against your chest.

Lift the upper body from the floor and the legs – up to the ceiling or diagonally (this is more difficult). Pull your hands along the body and raise them up and down 4 times, then do twisting twice. Repeat the series of exercises 10 times.

2. Push-Ups

Stand in front of the barre, put your hands on it and step back. The palms are a little wider than shoulders; the back is straight and buttocks are tense. Start push-ups. Try to touch the barre’s with your chest and then return to the initial position. Repeat this 15 times.

You can then make it more difficult: make the push-ups only halfway, do 15 “momentums” (light ups and downs) in this position, and then return to the initial position.

3. Reverse Push-Ups

Sit on the floor, knees bent, feet shoulder width apart, hands behind your back (under the shoulders), the palms faced forward. Lift your hips off the floor and shift the entire body weight on your hands. Do reverse push-ups (bending and straightening your elbows) 20 times, with full feet on the ground. After that, repeat the same thing, but on your heels.

Make the exercise more difficult: stand on your heels, take a few steps forward (the weight of the body remains on your hands) and do 20 reverse push-ups again.

4. Foot Exercise

Stand with your back to the barre. The distance between you and the barre should be the palm of your hand. Feet waist width apart, knees slightly bent. Move your hands behind your back to the sides and grab the barre. Raise your right foot up and straighten it (toes must look up), turn your foot to the right as if “revealing” your leg muscles. In this position, perform each of the following exercises for 30 seconds: lift and lower your foot a bit (a few centimeters), make small rotational movements (as if drawing a circle with a heel in the air).

Then repeat the rotation in the other direction, stretch out your foot, lift and lower your leg several times. Return to the initial position and repeat the same thing with your right foot.

5. Another Foot Exercise

Take the initial position from the previous exercise: stand with your back to the barre, put your hands behind your back to the sides and grab the barre. Raise your right foot up and straighten it in your knee (toes looking up), turn your foot to the right as if “revealing” your leg muscles. Make 15-20 shallow amplitude squats, and then change your legs.

6. Plie and Releve

Stand in the starting position – one hand on the barre, the other – on your waist. Widely spread your legs, turn your feet (toes should look in opposite directions), knees slightly bend. Then descend so that your hips were at the same level as your knees.

In this position, start to descend a little deeper for 30 seconds, and then ascend a little higher.

Next, do the same thing, but by going up and down on your tips.

7. Swinging Backwards

Turn the left side of your body to the ballet barre, knees slightly bent, heels in, toes out. Put your left hand on the barre, bend the right one and put it on your waist. Pull the right leg back a little so that it stands on the tip. Perform the following movements within 30 seconds: make small swings (10 cm from the ground) with your right foot to the back; make a circular movement during one of the swings and try to make a small circle in the air with your tip.

Alternate a few swings and rotations (do them both clockwise and counterclockwise) for 1 minute. Then repeat the same thing with your right foot. If you feel this exercise is easy, do it for 2 minutes for each leg.

A lake for just being a body of water is the most versatile, liveliest place around. Certainly more than H2O is involved with hints of glee, peace, and excitement, or why else would we migrate there every summer?

The many elements that create a lake casts a variety show of personalities and behaviors. One patron may be a do-gooder in a custom homemade wooden kayak while 20 feet away on the shore may sit two scantily camouflaged individuals savoring inexpensive beer. Then a little ways above them you have your vigilant birder who voices taxonomy. All across from a family barbecue consisting of several borderline feral children. And the glorious lake provides the setting for it all.

Laying out our map of the Portland area, we can pinpoint a lake to go to. While not drifting too far, we can discern a lake following Highway 8, past Forest Grove, called Henry Hagg Lake. A suitably sized, undeveloped, and accessible lake within 40 miles.

The first idea of a lake is how to enjoy the water. Be it on a boat, swimming, paddle boarding or fishing, Hagg delivers. With two boat ramps and 1,153 acres of surface water, the lake will float you along in any which way, and if you don’t have a watercraft, a local business caters to such a loss and provides one for rent.

A splashing Hail Mary plunge may be done in numberless spots around the lake. Plus Washington County asserts that they test the water quality once a week in three locations, and tote a butterfly stroke safe water—in case you ever wanted to try such a thing.

The fishin’ is favorable. As a matter of fact, the fishing is record setting with the Oregon smallmouth bass record being reeled in from Hagg at 8 pounds. Along with trout being stocked twice a year, the lake shacks up with a healthy number of fish including, as local vernacular suggests, “Frakenfish,” which are two foot steelhead (compliments of the fish hatcheries).

The masterwork which ties everything together is the 13 mile trail that encompasses Hagg Lake. Now the aquatic activities are a piece of a worthier whole because mountain biking, hiking, and running are accompanied by swimming. Heat up then cool down—makes perfect sense. The trail attracts the attention of mountain bikers though the paved road, that as well loops the lake, is available for road biking. Additionally, disc golf has nudged in there with a 18-hole course on the western shore.

The Hagg Lake Trail even has the zeal to support sporting events such as the Hagg Lake Mud Run, which races a 25k and 50k run in the Oregon Trail Series. The event also earns attention in Runner’s World.

In the end, a lake is a destination that represents many things. What you decide to add to that medley is entirely up to you, and Henry Hagg, the once renowned dairy farmer, has a lake named after him for you to do so.