Artist profile: Monica Casey

I am standing in Monica Casey's living room with a red-, white- and purple-striped hula hoop in my hands. It is larger than the ones I remember as a kid, and I feel its weight as I lean it against my hips. Casey quickly instructs me how to get it started and keep it going and, for just a minute, I am not convinced I can hula hoop at all, but, like pulling off a Band-Aid, Casey has thrust me into the situation before my inhibitions have had time to take over.

As I try to get the hoop started a couple of times, she reminds me, "Speed is your friend," and tells me to focus on my abs. Suddenly, it makes sense, and the weight of this unusual hula hoop begins to work with my rhythm. "Woohoo!" Casey whoops, and claps her hands. "Look at her go, Claire!" Casey says to her 2-year-old daughter, and Claire giggles and claps along with her mother as her twin sister, Katie, runs circles around me. "It's just a matter of finding that rhythm," Casey says, "and the more you do it, the easier it gets, and then you don't even have to think about it after a while."

The simple joy of hula-hooping, which seems one of many joyful activities in the Casey household, has brought a surprising new business opportunity to Casey, and an unexpected form of exercise to the Winston-Salem community. What started 13 years ago as a hobby to enliven bluegrass festivals, family reunions and parties, turned into a business in May 2009 when Casey started making her own hula hoops out of sturdy, plastic tubing, reflective tape, and other shiny and furry materials. (Furry hoops have become popular at bachelorette parties.)

Cut from 100-foot rolls of tubing stacked throughout Casey's garage, the hula hoops work better than your average store-bought hoop because they weigh about 2 pounds. "They are a lot easier because they're heavier," Casey says. "It's just enough to give you some resistance while you're working out."

After she had sold some of her brightly colored hoops at festivals in downtown Winston-Salem and instructed customers in the art of hula-hooping, fans kept suggesting that Casey teach classes. Thus began Hoopdio, a cardio hula-hooping class that Casey created herself after becoming a certified fitness instructor. Casey teaches at the Robinhood YMCA, the William G. White YMCA, Gold's Gym on Reynolda Road, Salem College, Women's Wellness and Fitness and the Yoga Gallery on Trade Street.

"Right now, my goal is to get these hoops into as many schools as I can, for an alternative type of exercise for kids," Casey says. "All ages can do it as just a fun, quirky alternative exercise."

Casey never pictured herself in the hula-hoop business. After spending years as a radio personality for 94.5 and 100.3 FM, hula-hoop making and teaching came along as a great opportunity to pursue while being a stay-at-home mom. However, Casey sees many similarities between her two types of jobs.

"My whole background in radio has been a tremendous help, because I know how to promote myself, I know how to be out on-site with people, which is a big part of what I do with my festivals," Casey says. "And just talking to people is very natural to me.

"I didn't think twice about being in front of those big classes. It has just been a total natural progression for me, and I cannot be happier and more thankful."

Motherhood has also been a source of inspiration. "After I became a mom, I started thinking about other things I could do with the hoops. I have birthday parties where the kids actually get to make their own hoop.

"They get to design them, then afterwards we do games and tricks, and they don't realize that they're exercising, but that's part of my goal to get them up and moving and exercising."

Adults have also found it a surprising way to get a workout.

"People hear about it, and it's something new," Casey says. "It's not the boring old routine that we're all used to for our cardio workout.

"I love to see the adults when they say they can't do it, and then they put it on and away they go, and they're so happy and surprised."

I couldn't hide my own surprise and happiness that day in Casey's living room, and I have been working on perfecting my hula-hooping technique since. Now if only I can take a Hoopdio class and learn how to hula hoop while jogging in place.