MONROE, La. — March is International Women’s Month, and to celebrate, we will be sharing the stories of remarkable women throughout the Arklamiss.
The Louisiana LunaChicks made their debut during the 2020 Krewe De Riviere Parade, a group of dancing ladies that started as 10 friends but later exploded to more than 60 members.
“We learn routines. We learn dances. I mean people learn that they actually don’t have two left feet like they thought,” says Stacy Gibson, creator of the LunaChicks. “Some have two left feet but it’s watching them try and continuingly trying and when they nail that move, it’s just like ‘Oh I got it’ and so, that’s what fun about it.”
The meaning behind the group goes deeper than the crazy costumes and dance moves.
“I said wow, we could really be doing more than just dance,” says Gibson.
Stacy Gibson created the Louisiana LunaChicks in September of 2019 after she saw a need for a sisterhood that supports and encourages each other.
Gibson believes when just one person shows joy, it can spread positivity like a wildfire across North Louisiana.
“You take all that encouragement inside the group and you push it outside, it has a domino effect. Because you got positive going home from practice, positive goes to church, positive goes to school, positives. So we are trying to instill all the positivity and push it outward,” says Gibson.
Gibson says the group isn’t just impacting the community but even the women who call themselves a “LunaChick.”
“This gives them something to come to, laugh, we socialize a lot, we eat out together, we party together, we do a lot of things together. It’s made a lot of people come out of their shell,” says Gibson.
For one dancer, it changed her life.
“I chose to start fresh. I wanted to instill different values in myself than what I had,” says Lynn Twilbeck-Delgado. “Trying to work on the self esteem levels and all the things you tend to put to the wayside as you get older. I also wanted to give back to the community.”
With a global pandemic consuming the year 2020– the LunaChicks still used dancing as a way to spread joy through the community in nursing homes.
Twilbeck-Dalgado says, “That happy feeling last forever. Knowing that I’m going to be showing people what I can do and bringing joy to peoples life and that’s the important part is that you’re giving back.”
2020 was a hard year but the Louisiana LunaChicks showed the community to look on the bright side.
“One thing I always remembered is smile and the world smiles back. Frown, and you frown alone,” says Gibson.
