COEUR d'ALENE - Cindy Taylor dangled from the ceiling of Donna DeVerniero's private studio while soft, calming music played.

She was suspended within the folds of a bright violet silk yoga hammock and hovered upside-down. She pressed her hands together and her spunky pink-blond hair was just inches above the floor as she performed the "Inverted Buddha" pose.

"The whole spine is getting decompressed," DeVerniero said Saturday afternoon, gesturing to Taylor as she hovered. "It's a little pressure on the feet."

"It's a lot easier than it looks," Taylor said with a grin as she shimmied back up the silk. "It looks really tough. It's really impressive-looking."

Taylor, 46, has been DeVerniero's aerial yoga student for only a few months, but she looks like a natural as her mind and body coalesce into the yoga poses.

"'Plank' is much harder," Taylor said, bracing her feet on the floor and leaning into the silk as she performed the pose. "And trust in yourself. You have to trust, so it's not only a good exercise physically, it's a good exercise emotionally because you actually have to trust your own ability."

Aerial yoga is an alternative yoga workout that requires a silk hammock and allows for full-body exercise in 360 degrees. The silk, usually made from a special fabric called Tricot, hangs from overhead beams or eye hooks. The Tricot can generally hold up to about 2,000 pounds and is usually large enough for users to climb inside and create a cocoon meditation space.

"The very first time I tried doing this, I fell in love with it," Taylor said. "I did it twice and I got hooked."

DeVerniero, 62, has been a certified aerial yoga instructor for two years. She has been active with yoga for 40 years and is also a certified personal trainer. She became involved in aerial yoga after her experiences with aerial silks, which came about because of her adventurous nature.

"What drew me to it was I was turning 60 and I needed to do something different," she said. "I have to mark every milestone with something. I was watching 'Dancing with the Stars' and they did a performance on the aerial silk. I just turned to my husband and said, 'That's what I want to do in my 60th year.'"

She searched for any aerial opportunities in the area and found one in Spokane.

"They had just opened," she said. "I signed up and I was there two weeks later."

DeVerniero presently has six students including Taylor. She said aerial yoga can be challenging in many ways, but for those who are open-minded, have a playful spirit and want to try new things, it can be quite relaxing and enjoyable.

"It's fun," DeVerniero said. "You get to go upside-down, things that you get to do as a kid. That was what hooked me the first time, too, was the upside-down, because you stop doing that when you get older. You're not as playful, but you get to be more playful in this."

Taylor likes aerial yoga so much she installed a silk hammock in her own home, where she and her family use it. She said she was feeling "wonderful" after her session with DeVerniero.

"In yoga, when you do inversions of any sort, it's really good for your endocrine system, digestion, it's good for all sorts of things, it's not just that it's good for your muscles," Taylor said. "It's good for your mind as well."

DeVerniero said she offers newcomers a free first session and she is flexible with prices. Her sessions are a half-hour or an hour and she provides single classes or month-long classes. She is just hoping to introduce the community to this new alternative yoga, which is becoming popular across the country.

"There's a lot of novelty about it that just makes it a little more fun than what's out there," she said.

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