2025 Oregon MidWinter Festival

I was born in Cairns, Queensland in 1997 however have spent most of my life in Melbourne, Victoria. Square dancing has long been a part of my life, the first dance I attended I was only 6 weeks old. After several years of watching I learned to square dance at Golden Squares in 2004 and was soon out and about dancing at several clubs. ​

After years of admiring top callers I decided to have a go at calling, my first call was at an Amateur Callers Night in February 2006. In October 2006 I visited Frank Kennedy's Newport club, and with great encouragement from Frank I quickly started improving and before long I began to be asked to call at several dances.

In early 2008 I became an official trainee under Frank and started calling hoedowns while working hard on improving singing calls. In late 2008 Frank encouraged me to try round dance cueing and soon enough I was also cueing a couple of rounds a night at Frank’s club. Over the next few years I continued to develop and began calling at many different clubs and events.

In late 2011 I decided to open my own club and in April 2012 'Australiana Dancers' was formed. Once again Frank was crucial in getting the club up and running. In September 2012 I took over calling at Early Birds Mornington, due to their club caller retiring and I call weekly for this club also.

​I call from Basic/Mainstream through to A2 and cue rounds up to PH IV. Adelaide will be the 6th convention I’ve attended and the 3rd I have been programmed for. I am a member of the Victorian Callers Association, Australian Callers Federation and Callerlab.

Gert-Jan and Susie started round dancing in 1984 and cueing and teaching in 1986. They have a Carousels Club in Holland and they are also in demand for numerous festivals throughout Europe. They have had the opportunity to teach in England, Denmark, Sweden, Germany, The Czech Republic, Austria, Belgium as well as in the States. They have taught at different week-long events in Europe and they are the organizers of Europe's biggest, longest-running Square and Round Dance week where they have continuous dance classes in 3 halls all day, and dancing in 3 halls each evening.

​ They held the position of European RD Coordinator for 12 years; they decided not to run for the position any more since they will be spending more time in the States. When first acting in that position they established the European criteria for the accreditation program for cuers and teachers. At the request of the cuers from the British Association they helped establish the same type of system in England. They have organized and held teacher's schools in different European countries, and also organized the RD portion of ECTA's yearly education-seminar convention, where they gave seminars. They have been involved with ECTA's Education Program (EEP) and have written over 100 examination questions for EEP.

​ They are members of their European organization, ECTA, their local organization, NVSD, as well as ROUNDALAB, CALLERLAB (Gert-Jan has also been a caller), and ICBDA. They have served on the URDC-TAC committee and for RAL they have worked on the Classic Cues Standardization Committee and they have also worked with RAL to help develop a standard cue sheet template. They are now serving on the RAL Phase IV Committee.

​ Susie & Gert-Jan presently have the opportunity of spending about 1/2 the year in Holland, and 1/2 the year in the States. When in Holland, as well as getting to see their family and friends over there, they teach in various parts of Europe and run their own Carousels Club, #236. While in the States, they get to see their daughters & grandchildren. And they teach and cue at the Carousels club #69 in the Atlanta area, as well as travel, cue and teach throughout the States. !

I´m a Clogging Instructor from Germany and have been dancing since I was 8 years old.

​ I love to meet new cloggers from around the world and to travel for clogging.

​ For my clogging videos follow this link.