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Do you remember the games you used to play as a kid? No matter how old you are, there’s a certain nostalgia that comes when those memories resurface. But what if time didn’t matter and, even as you got older, play never stopped?
For 55-year-old Tanya Phillips, a newer member of the 40+ Double Dutch Club, it hasn’t.
“This is like recess for grownups, that’s what it is,” she said. “It’s such a great feeling. I look forward to it every single week.”
These weekly gatherings bring women aged 40 and over together to jump rope and connect.
“These ladies, they are so encouraging,” Phillips added. “They show you how to jump if you don’t know how to jump. … You don’t have to jump. They really encourage you just to get moving. It’s more than just jump rope. You can do Hula-Hoop, you can do hopscotch.”
The Milwaukee chapter has grown to include those options after starting in May 2024. Its captain, Angela Scott, was inspired by the first club in Chicago and its founder, Pamela Robinson, who had no idea that asking her friend to jump 10 years ago would turn into a national movement.
That’s how Angela, who’s 54, found them. She was on Facebook while battling breast cancer and, after finishing treatment, drove to Chicago to join them. “The voice inside my spirit guide said, ‘Go play,’ Scott recalled. “And I walked into a gym of women that I felt like I knew my whole entire life.”
Double Dutch is a twist on traditional jump rope, where participants stand on opposite sides holding two long cords and turn them simultaneously in opposite directions. The jumper is outside the ropes, listening for the rhythm and waiting for the right time to get in.
Scott started jumping when she was 8 years old, trying to emulate her aunts and the girls she saw on TV. “We envisioned being on the McDonalds commercial,” she said. “We tried the tricks, jumping over each other’s head in the rope and things like that. It’s something I think was lost but now it’s found again, and a whole new generation is going to experience it.”
Member Shirley Tomlinson was the very first member of the Milwaukee chapter and, at 75 years of age, is the oldest. She’s also Angela Scott’s mom, and the club’s photographer, who everyone calls “Mama Shirley.”
“When we’re at events … like the Juneteenth parade, you should’ve seen the little girls that wanted to get in those ropes and jump and got in there and jumped. We can teach anybody to jump,” Tomlinson said.
“We want women to be proud of their age and not be ashamed. Why should you be ashamed? These are some beautiful senior citizens — because, let’s face it, they’re senior citizens. People would not believe these women are the ages they are, jumping like they jump.”
Pat Riley turns 66 this year, and when she jumps, she’s in her own world.
“We’ve always got something in our life that’s going to keep us busy, and you find out that you don’t have a lot of time for yourself,” she said. “That’s one of the things I told myself: ‘Wednesday is my day.’”
It’s a day for fun, exercise and no stress. It’s a day when — for Riley and all the women in the 40+ Double Dutch Club — age is just a number, and sisterhood has no limits.
“I found out that I can still have fun, that you are as old as you feel,” she said. “And sometimes I feel like I’m 22, 23 years old when I’m in them ropes.”
