South Nova Tai Chi held a successful two day workshop featuring CTCA national instructors Sherri Nettleton and Darren Pryke. It was our largest group to date with 52 attendees including two from northern New Brunswick, Shediac and several from the Cumberland Branch. After assessing the groups abilities, Darren and Sherri felt we had progressed significantly from last year’s workshop (always good to hear!), and by moving down a level (peeling the onion, so to speak) we worked on slightly more subtle components of the movements. We practiced extensively on tor yus emphasizing “loading up the feet”, spiralling forward and back, dropping the elbows to facilitate dropping the hips, turning fully to 45 degrees and squaring the hips like a hinge, not raising the hands but allowing the arms to raise naturally while sinking into the hips. In the afternoon session we emphasized intention in the hands, stretching into and finishing moves, slowing down the moves to complete each aspect and making the moves continuous. We worked on the ways tor yus translate into moves such as “grasp bird’s tail”. I think everyone was left with the understanding that each move has many important parts that often get skipped when doing the set. In the evening session the group had an introduction to different forms such as Hsingi and Baqua as well as Lok Hup. The instructors session on Sunday had over 20 instructors, teaching assistants and corners. In addition to many of the principles covered on Saturday such as stretching fully, spiralling and loading the feet, the group worked on the intricacies of “repulse monkeys” and “parting wild horse’s manes”. As is the case with all our workshops, many volunteers were involved in everything from billeting and entertaining out of town participants, organizing the workshop and venues, registration and many more tasks that result in such a successful event. Many thanks to all of you and to the efforts of our fabulous workshop instructors.