Back to the Barre

"I feel that every Dance Moms episode from this point forwards should just be called like Abby Hates Us or Abby Screws Us Over." says Christi as Abby begins to push her luck by asking the moms to start promoting online to find replacements FOR THEMSELVES on Season 4's "Abby Strikes Back".The first open auditions for the ALDC are this week and Abby has not been making it easy for anyone, except for the Ziegler family of course as Abby states Maddy is the only child not up for replacement. Abby requests that the moms start promoting the auditions on twitter, which Holly calls out for being callous since who would want to help ensure their own demise? But even though only Holly said it out loud, it's clear to all the moms that things have gotten quite bad and are only getting worse. Jill consequently gets hung up on the previous week's competition order snafu, arguing Christi intentionally sabotaged the situation for her daughter's benefit. As we noted in the last episode this simply wasn't true and all it serves to do is pit the moms against one another instead of Abby.The Orlando auditions get underway with the Zieglers attending to help scout talent, however no other family agreed to do this for the same reason they wouldn't promote it. But Abby begins antagonizing some of the moms who get snippy with her, going as far to start singling out their children for ridicule and blaming their parents. Amongst the crowd are many future ALDC members, but was it really the first time Abby was meeting these girls? Or was there some off-screen shenanigans informing who got a leg up? Tune-in to find out!Quotes“I cried every time we had to walk into Studio A. Like Nnnoooooo! Noooo! I don't like it. It's terrible Studio A is where dreams are crushed and souls are smooshed." (30:53-31:03 | Christi)“We're not tweeting to replace our own daughters are we? Cause that's a little awkward. I agree Holly and yes we are." (36:39-36:45 | Kelly)“I mean I get that you need to learn how to use a mic, but not during a bathing suit dance. " (40:49-40:55 | Kelly)“Fallon has this whole TikTok about how this was a set-up. Oh really!? Yes because she said that she met Abby when she was 8 which was like 3 years before. She was always doing Abby's mater classes in Orlando." (58:56-59:11 | Christi & Kelly)LinksSubscribe to us on YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UC50aSBAYXH_9yU2YkKyXZ0w Subscribe to our Patreon: www.patreon.com/backtothebarreThank you to Ashley Jana for allowing us to use Electricity!! Follow her on IG HERE: https://instagram.com/ashleyjanamusic?igshid=YmMyMTA2M2Y=Download Electricity HERE: https://music.apple.com/us/album/electricity/1497482509?i=1497482510Follow Christi on IG: www.instagram.com/christilukasiakFollow Kelly on IG: www.instagram.com/kellylhyland

"Abby says to Chloe that she has the dancer's body. She has the look. Your technique shines through, you can nail it no matter what. listen to that positive shit! Hu huh. I'm willing to bet you Kelly that that's what she said to Maddie and they edited it so she says it to Chloe. She would never say that to Chloe," admits Christi reluctantly. Even when the show is seemingly throwing our beloved bitches a bone it's never that easy. Not helping the matter is Abby is using Chloe as a pawn in her little game on the Pyramid for "Two Can Play This Game".Even though Kendall led the trio that took first in last week's competition, she is placed lower than Chloe on the Pyramid. The only reasoning seems to be that it'll make Jill upset with Christi and set-up a solo face off between Chloe and Kendall at this week's competition. But these mind games take second place to Abby's primary focus, the return of Cathy and her Candy Apples.Cathy is determined to take back the limelight after loosing to Abby at nationals, but Cathy's team has had more time to prep since they don't have to film a TV show. So Abby dedicates extra days for the girls to learn the group dance, and threatens that if they can't beat Candy Apples then she might as well replaces the whole team!Quotes“You said you're going to be Miss Piggy [for Halloween], I'm being a dumpster fire. I think that's going to be the most appropriate thing I can be. You can be a dumpster picker like me!” (1:43-1:50 | Christ & Kelly)“It was really cute because the girl who was helping me, you could tell she knew who I was and she was kind of fan-girling. And I was like, 'Ok listen, I don't know how to check this,' and she was like, 'I know I listen to the podcast.'" (9:03-9:16 | Christi)“I just want to point out that this competition was like invented for Dance Moms, now it's freaking huge! Huge! Oh really? They have like 40 to 70 competitions per year or some crap. Oh my I didn't know that. Yeah, so I just want to say you're welcome." (12:14-12:31 | Christi & Kelly)“This is where [Abby] turned to production and screamed: This is stupid because Kendall has dark hair and should be Katy Perry and Chloe is blond and should be Lady Gaga. This is dumb, dumb, dumb! Whose stupid idea was this?!" (20:10-20:26 | Christi)LinksSubscribe to us on YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UC50aSBAYXH_9yU2YkKyXZ0w Subscribe to our Patreon: www.patreon.com/backtothebarreThank you to Ashley Jana for allowing us to use Electricity!! Follow her on IG HERE: https://instagram.com/ashleyjanamusic?igshid=YmMyMTA2M2Y=Download Electricity HERE: https://music.apple.com/us/album/electricity/1497482509?i=1497482510Follow Christi on IG: www.instagram.com/christilukasiakFollow Kelly on IG: www.instagram.com/kellylhyland

"There's nothing else happening during Pyramid so of course the kids are listening. I don't know, half the time I wasn't listening. I was just standing there pretending. I was thinking about rainbows and lollipops somewhere." As Kelly notes, there is very little you can do when Abby has already prepared to dampen the mood of your day, and on the second half of the Season 4 premiere Kelly has opted to turn on autopilot and wait out Abby's rage. But not everyone is so fortunate as the girls must still face the music at the end of the day.Kendall is assigned to perform in a trio with Chloe and Paige, which Jill has mixed expectations for. On one hand it's an opportunity to stand out, which Jill believes is essential to getting Abby back on their good side and keeping Kendall on the team, but getting paired with the "troublemakers" also implies how little Abby thinks of her already. The joke is on Abby however as the Trio dance turns out to be one of the few bright spots in an otherwise lackluster showing by the ALDC at competition. Abby doesn't take this performance well, lecturing the girls once more about how they're all replaceable. She gets into a small fight with Leslie, whom finally pushes one too many buttons trying to get Payton on the team proper. Abby refers to Payton as a baby and when the girl ends up in tears Abby presses her on the matter and threatens that she needs to grow up or get lost. Quotes“The assistant in the room, like they were elbow deep in my [vagina], and she's like,' Oh my god I'm a big fan!' And I'm like OH MY GOD STOP! I'm like you're not a big fan. At least not at this moment.'” (14:01-14:17 | Christ & Kelly)“I just need everyone to know we were never comfy sitting up top. Not only were we emotionally drained but those stairs were not comfortable and that carpet was the cheapest carpet ever so it was itchy. So we didn't like it." (15:15-15:29 | Christi)“Holly's like Oh my god she clapped! And we're like,' Well, you know what? We all have ice skates cause hell just froze over." (21:44-21:51 | Christi & Kelly)“I'm like can we not use the word "groom" with children in any way shape or form? " (48:01-48:05 | Christi)LinksSubscribe to us on YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UC50aSBAYXH_9yU2YkKyXZ0w Subscribe to our Patreon: www.patreon.com/backtothebarreThank you to Ashley Jana for allowing us to use Electricity!! Follow her on IG HERE: https://instagram.com/ashleyjanamusic?igshid=YmMyMTA2M2Y=Download Electricity HERE: https://music.apple.com/us/album/electricity/1497482509?i=1497482510Follow Christi on IG: www.instagram.com/christilukasiakFollow Kelly on IG: www.instagram.com/kellylhyland

“I felt bad for Brooke, I felt bad for Chloe…I felt bad. I really did. You can just tell that it’s an ugly, ugly, ugly time,” laments Christi as the ALDC returns for another season of Dance Moms. While the girls visibly seem to be older, Abby is still the same old Abby. That’s maybe not quite true, she does seem quite a bit meaner!Abby reveals that she’s holding open auditions this season and states that everyone is replaceable. Everyone except Maddie of course, which Abby makes explicitly clear. Though it's clear this was meant to tee up Kelly's eventual exit from the show, Abby isn't content to just stir up the usual drama with only Kelly and Christi. At Pyramid Kendall is placed second, only moments late does Abby reveal her ruse that Nia is actually second and scolds Kendall for missing Booty Camp for vacation. Jill doesn't take kindly to this but Holly starts to feel as though Jill is attacking Nia over the situation. Meanwhile Brooke is late for practice as she instead befriends country singer Jana Kramer, which Abby attempts to take credit for setting up.Quotes“Dance Moms starts to go down [in ratings] and I think it started to go down after you leave and it just gets dark. And then I think, and this is not me just me saying this because I’m trying to be important, but I think it starts to really go down after I leave. Because the whole dynamic changes after you and I are gone.” (16:22-16:39 | Christ)“Booty camp is mandatory and team members knew about six months ahead of time. Correction, that is not true. We knew there was a booty camp, w e did not have dates.  " (31:04-31:12 | Christi & Kelly)“Leslie acts like we weren’t really friends. We were friends! I’ve been to her house. I used to go to her restaurant with her. Me and Abby went to her restaurant together! Like I was friends with Leslie. I don’t know what happened." (41:23-41:42 | Christi & Kelly)“Giana comes into Studio A with a cake that says “Congratulations Maddie - 2013 National Title Winner”. Did you notice at the bottom of the cake it says “And the rest of the ALDC”? Did it? I didn’t read it, it was in microscopic letters. It’s like Maddie!!!!….and the rest of you guys.”" (43:13-43:34 | Christi)LinksSubscribe to us on YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UC50aSBAYXH_9yU2YkKyXZ0w Subscribe to our Patreon: www.patreon.com/backtothebarreThank you to Ashley Jana for allowing us to use Electricity!! Follow her on IG HERE: https://instagram.com/ashleyjanamusic?igshid=YmMyMTA2M2Y=Download Electricity HERE: https://music.apple.com/us/album/electricity/1497482509?i=1497482510Follow Christi on IG: www.instagram.com/christilukasiakFollow Kelly on IG: www.instagram.com/kellylhyland

"The show is not getting any better for you and I at this point. The only thing that's going to get better is we're going to leave." says Christi, to which Kelly readily celebrates. But until that time comes our Bitches are still stuck in the middle of the "Hurricane Abby" reunion.Abby storms out over her conversation with Kelly and the rest of the moms are brought in. Much is made about the pact the moms made to one another to not let their daughters perform for Abby's Ultimate Dance Competition and Melissa's breaking of said pact. Melissa claims she shouldn't have to be held to some agreement they made if it would provide better options for her kids. The only problem is no one forced her to agree to the pact at all and instead of simply making her intentions known she chose to lie instead. The discussion is not helped by Leslie and Kristie Ray who side with Melissa despite being out of the loop for the entire pact.Jeff continues to jump around maddeningly from topic to topic. Kristie Ray and Jill fight? Sure! Holly vs Leslie on parenting? Why not! As a last ditch effort to liven the proceedings Jeff asks Kelly to leave so Abby will return to the stage. The kicker is that Kelly is being asked to leave just as Brooke is coming onstage to make her national singing debut. In fairness as long as Kelly doesn't have to share room space with Abby then a win is a win.Quotes“I can't stand when they always ask other moms to jump in because these other moms never know the whole "thing".” (22:18-22:23 | Christ)“We are so used. Yes we are the sex workers of the Dance Moms community." (32:48-32:56 | Christi & Kelly)“[Abby] said that for the last 25 out of 33 years she put her personal life on the back-burner and set her aspirations aside for the benifit of other people's children. That's her job! Everybody has to put stuff aside to do their job!" (42:58-43:11 | Christi & Kelly)“I felt like we had other [group dances] that were better. But honestly we did so many damn reunions, pre-reunions, post reunions that maybe we were running short on group dances that everyone was in." (48:54-49:05 | Christi)LinksSubscribe to us on YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UC50aSBAYXH_9yU2YkKyXZ0w Subscribe to our Patreon: www.patreon.com/backtothebarreThank you to Ashley Jana for allowing us to use Electricity!! Follow her on IG HERE: https://instagram.com/ashleyjanamusic?igshid=YmMyMTA2M2Y=Download Electricity HERE: https://music.apple.com/us/album/electricity/1497482509?i=1497482510Follow Christi on IG: www.instagram.com/christilukasiakFollow Kelly on IG: www.instagram.com/kellylhyland

"Lucky we're recapping a really shitty episode today!" You know it's a bad one when Christi can't even start the recap without mentioning how bad it's going to be. Are any of you bitchettes surprised, it is a reunion episode after all! By far "Hurricane Abby" has got to be one of the roughest reunions yet as both Christi and Kelly are singled out without much support to fall back on.This episode marks Christi's return to the studio after her big fight with Leslie in New Orleans and Jeff isn't about to let her live it down. Despite Christi's sincere attempts at an apology by owning up to her mistakes, Leslie is unwilling to acknowledge her own part in the conflict and paints Christi as a troublemaker who is trying to avoid owning up for her faults despite literally having just done so. Abby takes Leslie's side and claims Christi has yet to apology to the rest of the ALDC and even her own daughter,. This is just completely false, but because Abby is "the star" she can set the narrative, leaving Christi little room to plead her case.Up next is Kelly who gets an earful from Abby about blocking the seats at the last competition. Kelly finds it ironic that the rules Abby holds up to Christi aren't ones she'd follow herself and Abby refuses to take responsibility for the incident. The conversation shifts to the time Kelly "snuck back in" to the the ALDC without Kelly being allowed to acknowledge that she only returned because she was under contract. Consequently Kelly is forced to be the bad guy once more. Will these moms ever get a fair shake?Quotes“I knew I was going to be the first one on. Which you never wanted to be the first one on the scene. I was watching and I was thinking like what bullshit that you had to go out then I had to go out... then Melissa, Holly and Jill got to go out together. Like it's so much easier when you're in a group." (12:21-12:45 | Christi & Kelly)“Leslie says the other moms are afraid to stand up to me. Um, I don't know if that's true. I feel like everybody stands up to eevrybody pretty well” (30:09-30:16 | Christ)“Brooke is an incredible dancer. Yeah, you're ruining it by being such a bitch!" (37:38-37:43 | Christi & Kelly)“If you don't want to go to competitions then don't be in charge of a competition team." (43:33-43:39 | Kelly)LinksSubscribe to us on YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UC50aSBAYXH_9yU2YkKyXZ0w Subscribe to our Patreon: www.patreon.com/backtothebarreThank you to Ashley Jana for allowing us to use Electricity!! Follow her on IG HERE: https://instagram.com/ashleyjanamusic?igshid=YmMyMTA2M2Y=Download Electricity HERE: https://music.apple.com/us/album/electricity/1497482509?i=1497482510Follow Christi on IG: www.instagram.com/christilukasiakFollow Kelly on IG: www.instagram.com/kellylhyland

"An interview chair is fun for five minutes, but for twelve hours? Like being in the room with Abby having to interview her, a solid 40% of the time being on her phone with her lawyer because she doesn't want to answer one of the questions I'm asking? Telling me that I should have spent 15 more minutes doing my hair and make-up or listening to the stupid people in my ear? It's just like constant berating AND I was hungover. So it was a little bit of a disaster on Tuesdays." It's a special day at Back to the Barre as Christi and Kelly welcome Dance Moms Producer Annie Leonard to sit down and answer some questions and to set some records straight. Annie also offers a frank reality check that while she's friendly with our lovely Bitches, it was ostensibly her job to ruin their lives when possible since you can't make good TV without some conflict!What does the Producer's job look like day to day? What was the most difficult aspect of producing Dance Moms and how did it compare to other reality shows? Which moms were the easiest to work with and which ones made a producer's job difficult? The answer to that last one may surprise you, so tune-in to find out the answers to the se questions and more!Quotes“There were a lot of things that we used to do in reality TV that you could get canceled for now. A lot of things on Dance Moms that you could get canceled for now. That's Dance Moms, every episode we did something we shouldn't have done." (04:49-05:01 | Kelly & Annie)“The EP gave this speech about not fraternizing with you guys and vice verca. I think there was some of that the season before and they were trying to curtail that or something? I think the fraternization was Kelly and I. Hehe, we were bad.” (13:26-13:40 | Christi, Kelly & Annie)“I felt like most of the time I was prepping Kelly she wasn't really listening to me. Ha, because I hated all of you!" (18:41-18:46 | Kelly & Annie)“[Cameraman] Eddie you could also tell he was a little bit of a partier. But he was holding his camera in the viewing room one day and one of our PAs was feeding him Top Ramen while he was filming. Which they loved." (26:30-26:44 | Annie)LinksSubscribe to us on YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UC50aSBAYXH_9yU2YkKyXZ0w Subscribe to our Patreon: www.patreon.com/backtothebarreThank you to Ashley Jana for allowing us to use Electricity!! Follow her on IG HERE: https://instagram.com/ashleyjanamusic?igshid=YmMyMTA2M2Y=Download Electricity HERE: https://music.apple.com/us/album/electricity/1497482509?i=1497482510Follow Christi on IG: www.instagram.com/christilukasiakFollow Kelly on IG: www.instagram.com/kellylhylandFollow Annie on IG: www.instagram.com/annebreiter

"I'm a horrible human being. Well no you aren't you have cancer so you have a pass right? Isn't that the way it goes? Yeah, and this is the cancer episode!" Well now that Kelly has an excuse and Christi is still AWOL on the second half of the Dance Moms Cares Special, it should be smooth sailing from here with no more infighting. Right? Abby even has to step out to care for her mother, thereby giving the moms some Abby free time, things have to be smoothing sailing from here. Well it never is as easy as one would hope, this is Dance Moms after all!The day of the competition arrives and the moms find themselves waiting in a gymnasium for a change, leading to some reminiscing about their days as cheerleaders. But the happy times are short lived as Leslie continues her stand-off with Kelly, whom she sees as an obstacle in Payton's path onto the team. The moms are still confused by Leslie's insistence that Payton be included, as she's clearly out of place with the rest of the girls in both height and age, but Leslie doesn't back down. The moms also point out that it isn't a fair match between Chloe and Payton since Payton has had months to prep her dance compared to Chloe's few days, but once again nothing will sway Leslie from getting her daughter the spot she feels she deserves.Quotes“People ask all the time: Were these fans real or did production set them up? It's both. I think they came to see us but they gathered them all together so they were all in one spot when we arrived." (12:04-12:16 | Christi & Kelly)“Holly says this is a wonderful opportunity for the girls to express themselves using dance, give back to the community and hopefully find a cure for breast cancer. Which kid is looking for the cure? I don't know but one of you need to find it.” (14:38-14:51 | Christi & Kelly)“It was astounding when those kids won as much as they did because you are literally dancing against people who do nothing but the same dance over and over and over and over and over and over..." (23:29-23:43 | Christi)“Maddie gets first place for her solo...Maddie. Maddie gets Maddie, Maddie and Maddie gets Maddie in the first place for the Maddie category." (34:06-34:13 | Christi)LinksSubscribe to us on YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UC50aSBAYXH_9yU2YkKyXZ0w Subscribe to our Patreon: www.patreon.com/backtothebarreThank you to Ashley Jana for allowing us to use Electricity!! Follow her on IG HERE: https://instagram.com/ashleyjanamusic?igshid=YmMyMTA2M2Y=Download Electricity HERE: https://music.apple.com/us/album/electricity/1497482509?i=1497482510Follow Christi on IG: www.instagram.com/christilukasiakFollow Kelly on IG: www.instagram.com/kellylhyland