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Lizzie MacKenzie

@skizziemack

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🤍Movement Researcher💍Wife🐶Dog Mom Co-Founder & Director of @extensionsdance

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🎃 Treats, Thriller & a dance party with Extensions Dance! 👻

Come see us at Explore Irving Park Chicago’s Trunk or Treat this Sunday, October 25! Grab some treats, learn a few moves from “Thriller,” and watch some of our talented dancers perform. We can’t wait to dance with our neighbors! 🕺🍬

Located right here in the Irving Park neighborhood, Extensions Dance offers classes for ages 2.5–18 in ballet, tap, jazz, hip hop, ballroom, ACRO, contemporary, modern and more!

With exceptional instructors and dancers who shine throughout Chicagoland, our studio celebrates creativity, community and each dancer’s unique potential. Our studio dancers take the stage twice a year: in December for excerpts from The Nutcracker and in June for our year-end Showcase. Our company dancers enjoy even more opportunities to shine, performing in up to nine performances each year! ✨

Come for the candy, stay for the dance party—and discover your place with the Extensions Dance family! 💜

#ExtensionsDance #ExploreIrvingParkChicago #TrunkOrTreat #IrvingPark #ChicagoKids DanceWithUs

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✨ Mark your calendars ✨

$10 open company class starts In December at our beautiful rehearsal home, @extensionsdance 💛

Spiral Body Techniques® is a dance movement framework developed by choreographer Molly Shanahan; The December essential level SBT classes are taught by Lauren Reed, who is among the first cohort of teachers certified in 2023.

We are grateful to share this incredible lineup of classes and teachers with our community in our welcoming environment. Hope to see you there!

#stillinspired #trainwithus #companyclass #dancetraining #chicagodance

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Kalona Supernatural fans are providing all the fall vibes 🍂 Thanks for choosing our small family farms for all your cozy dinners and comfy lattes 🧡🐮

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✨ **A little Dance Divas magic!** ✨

Dance Divas is a beloved, long-running fundraiser that supports the Chicago Dance Health Fund and holds a special place in the Chicago dance community. Bringing together more than 40 professional dancers for an incredible cause, it’s a celebration of dance, community, and a whole lot of fun!

So, when our director Lizzie MacKenzie’s longtime friend and colleague, Jeremy Plummer, called to ask if we had some strong tap dancers who could perform as backup for Cesar Salinas at Dance Divas, the answer was an easy **YES!** 🙌

We are SO proud of our tap program and the incredible work Matt Pospeshil has done to help our tappers refine their skills and find their confidence. What a gift to be invited into this experience and give our dancers a glimpse into the world of professional dance!

And did they ever rise to the occasion! ❤️

Our dancers were in heaven, living their best lives, and soaking up every moment. They danced their hearts out, performing with joy, honesty, and integrity. They remembered their choreography, nailed their lines, and carried themselves with professionalism, kindness, and care every step of the way.

**Dancers, you made us SO proud throughout this entire process. BRAVO!** 👏✨ You showed up, worked hard, supported one another, and reminded us why we love what we do.

Enjoy these snippets of the journey, from their very first rehearsal to tech rehearsal and all three performances! A little behind-the-scenes look at an experience we won’t soon forget. 💃🖤

#ExtensionsDance #DanceDivas #ChicagoDance #ChicagoDanceHealthFund #TapDance ProudDanceMoments EXD

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A glimpse of our company repertoire—and the magic that comes to life onstage after hours and hours of training, exploration, and rehearsal within our walls.

This video features recent repertoire from all four of our youth companies:

✨ Extensions Dance Company
🩰 Chicago City Classical Ballet
🎶 Chicago Youth Tap Ensemble
🔥 Kidz Movin’ Hip Hop Crew

Extensions Dance is a premier youth dance studio in the Chicagoland area, inspiring the next generation through exceptional training, artistry, and community.

Our alumni have continued their training at some of the nation’s top universities and conservatories, including Juilliard, USC, the University of Arizona, Chapman University, NYU Tisch, and more. Many have gone on to perform with professional dance companies around the world.

Serving young artists ages 2.5–18, Extensions Dance welcomes artists and movers of all types. We celebrate each dancer’s individuality, nurture their creativity, and help them build confidence in the studio, onstage, and beyond.

From their very first steps to pursuing a professional future, every dancer has a place to grow, connect, and shine at Extensions.

#ExtensionsDance #ExtensionsDanceCompany #ChicagoDance #YouthDance #ChicagoCityClassicalBallet ChicagoYouthTapEnsemble KidzMovinHipHopCrew

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✨$10 open company class is back! ✨

Classes begin in December, 2026. Visit our website for the full schedule! We hope to see you there. Let’s go! 💛

#danceclass #chicagodance #dancetraining #opencompanyclass #chicagodanceclasses

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Summer, you were good to us. ☀️💕 Next stop… FALL! 🍂🤎

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Branch out beyond the ordinary 🌳✨

#C5CreateWithNoLimits #LivingArt #CorporateEntertainment #EventEntertainment #liveperformance

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This past weekend, we kicked off our 2026/27 EXD Company season with an incredible night of celebration, connection, and SO much fun! ✨
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We laughed, we danced, we ate, we played games, and most importantly, we bonded together as a company and community. From new friends to old, the energy was electric and the excitement for the year ahead was contagious!
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Our Bigs & Littles were revealed, our parents showed off their dance knowledge, and we were reminded just how special this community truly is. 💗
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We are SO grateful to have such a positive, energetic, supportive, and loving community surrounding our dancers at Extensions. Here’s to an incredible season filled with growth, friendship, memories, and a whole lot of MAGIC. ✨
We cannot wait to see what this year has in store!
Extensions Dance Company• Chicago City Classical Ballet • Kidz Movin Hip Hop Crews • Chicago Youth Tap Ensemble
#exdfamily

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Gosh y’all, words cannot express how much I love to work with the dancers at Extensions Dance @extensionsdance ! Truly such an exceptional space of incredible young artists empowered to move within their own voice.

Thank you for having me this week for The Intensive 2026 and guest choreography for this upcoming dance season. Always a highlight of my day getting to work with you all.

Lizzie @skizziemack (and Jackie @jackie_nowicki !) what you have and continue to grow at Extensions is so special. I HIGHLY recommend this studio to all young artists looking for their studio home.

Enjoy this clip from my phrasework taught in Advanced Contemporary at The Intensive 2026! You know what made this combo extra fun and hard?! It was in a 10. Yup! Talk about challenging musicality and these artists nailed it.

Chor: Me
Dancers: @meli.lawler .lawler @madelinedouglas317
Studio: @extensionsdance
Studio Director: @skizziemack

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40! 🥳🙋🏼‍♀️💖 I honestly don’t know if I’ll ever be able to accurately put my Birthday weekend into words, but I’m going to try…

Almost a month later, and I have had some time to let everything sink in… It was truly the most amazing, fun, thoughtful, hilarious, love-filled 40th birthday weekend made possible by the best family and friends a girl could ask for. Bringing so many of the people who have shaped different chapters of my life together in one place felt surreal … and truly, completely magical 🥹

From pre-planning a lakeside cottage for my friends and me (thank you, Candace & Scotty ❤️), to the decorations, the food, the Jackie-palooza hats 😂, the most perfect presents, unlimited belly laughs, happy tears, dancing, karaoke, games, late nights, rain walks, and everything in between… I couldn’t have dreamt a better way to celebrate 40 years of living!

Life isn’t exactly how I imagined it would be at 40….But standing there that weekend, looking around at all of the love in my life, I realized something…
In so many ways, it is SO much better than I ever could have expected.
Every twist, turn, high, low, friendship, family member, experience, mistake, triumph, heartbreak, laugh, and beautiful moment has made me who I am today.

There will never be enough thank-yous to express how much I love and appreciate each of you. I feel unbelievably lucky to have “My People” …. the ones who show up, make me laugh until my stomach hurts, hold me when I cry, celebrate the good stuff, and remind me just how lucky I am to be alive and surrounded by so much love.
Mom, Dad, Scotty, Candace, George, Mack, Rachel, Aunt Jan, Uncle Dean, Kally, Jaime, Lizzie, Miranda, Tony, and all the Turtle-lakers who came out to celebrate… thank you from the absolute bottom of my heart. ❤️

Here’s to 40 years of living fully, loving fiercely, laughing endlessly, and embracing every unexpected twist along the way.
And here’s to SO many more years of adventures, belly laughs, happy tears, dancing, karaoke, tiny beers 😂, memories, and time with My People. 🥂💖
I love you all more than you’ll ever know. Thank you.
#JackiePalooza

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