Boots 'n' Buckles Dance Club

Christopher was introduced to country bar line dancing in 2009 at Kodiak Jack's in Petaluma, CA and discovered the wide world of event line dancing in Fall 2015 through Line Magic Dance Event in San Bernardino, CA and Vegas Dance Explosion in Las Vegas, NV.

He currently teaches and DJs at Rohnert Park Senior Center, Sonoma State University, Poppy Bank Epicenter, and Hopmonk Tavern: Novato.

Howdy! My name is Ruthie and I am thrilled to be this rotation's Vice President for Boots 'n' Buckles. I was first introduced to line dancing in the summer of 2022 at 'The Grad' in San Luis Obispo near Cal Poly. I was immediately intrigued and began researching. I soon found a country line dance bar near my hometown and started attending weekly. While enrolled at Sonoma State University, I had the honor and privilege of furthering my line dance knowledge from our very own Christopher Gonzalez where I later revived and became the president of the SSU Line Dance Club! Today, I line dance multiple times a week and have begun instructing on Thursdays at Westwood in San Francisco. I mainly enjoy line dancing but have been practicing and improving in Country Swing Dancing regularly. 

I have been dancing for quite a bit of my life. I did dance in elementary school and then did musical theater and show choir, both of which involved dancing. I learned about line dancing from a friend of mine. She wanted to check out Sundance Saloon in San Francisco and I went with her and had a great time. I really learned a lot more line dances and started getting into it when I started at Sonoma State in 2022 and joined the SSU Line Dancing Club.

I started line dancing ten years ago when my cousin convinced me to celebrate my birthday. After falling in love with line dancing, one night turned into as many as possible. I joined a local line dance team and preformed at the local fair. After learning that there were more dance venues, I ended up leaving the team and joining Christopher Gonzalez for many adventures, including Line Dance Podcast, for which we have won Three Crystal Boots Awards while being a part of Move Radio and Linedancer Radio. In 2016, I attended my first events -- WWLA and Vegas Dance Explosion -- where I immediately decided that this would be my life. In 2017, I began instructing and co-choreographed my first World Championship Dance "Can't Walk Away" with Christopher Gonzalez. In 2018, I began competing in solo line dancing in UCWDC and discovered yet another means of sharing my passion when I was hired for the first time as a  DJ for a line dance event. In 2021, I had the privilege of joining the Dancing Dragons competition team, of which I am still a proud member , that year I also competed for the first time in the teams division at Florida's World Dance Masters. In 2023, I won my second World Championship Choreography title with "Glad You Exist". I continue to be honored by being invited to instruct and DJ at many different events all across the US. At home, I host three local nights where I teach everything from absolute beginner to advance dances. This will be my third year serving on the Board of Directors of Boots 'n' Buckles. 

 I first started dancing when I joined a Zumba class in Petaluma when I was 17. I danced every night of the week and loved it so much that I eventually got my instructor's license and started leading classes. My early college years kept me focused on schoolwork, so I did less and less dancing. In 2016, I attended a beginning line dance class with Dolly of Wine Country Line Dance and noticed the many similarities between line dancing and Zumba. I stuck with it and eventually joined Sonoma State Line Dance Club with Chris and Megan. I've loved line dancing ever since and I've loved learning increasingly harder dances! 

I started dancing in 2014 at the Dance Center in Santa Rosa. I began with Hip Hop, but slowly went into a variety of styles like Contemporary, Jazz, and Ballet throughout the years. I didn’t get into line dancing until April 2023 when I started going to Stoney's. I had been introduced to Stoney's a couple times before then, but became invested in the dancing scene after that time frame.