Living Vicariously?

Emily had another gymnastics meet yesterday and because of the location she didn't have any space or time to warm up. She ended up taking 5th place which was kind of a bummer but I guess that happens when you don't practice. She was really disappointed because she felt she had done better than the other girls but after looking at the video we saw some places where she had messed up. Even though she was bummed she wants to compete again and try to do better so we were happy with that decision.

Just an hour before that she had a basketball game in which I am her coach. We hadn't won a game yet and have only scored 2 or 3 baskets the whole season but we ended up winning that game 12-2!! Emily only took one shot and just barely missed.

Lindsey is working on passing off her next three sets of sight words which will put her at 325 so far. They are required to pass off 100 to move on to 1st grade. Lindsey wants to be like her big sister and pass off 1000 words before the end of the year.

We've been watching the Olympics every night for the last two weeks and I'm feeling this very competitive feeling taking over in me. I want my kids to be champions sooooo bad. I don't want to be "one of those parents" but I think it's starting to overtake me and I have to remember to take some deep breaths, they are just little kids. Is it just me or does anybody else out there have those same feelings?

Spelling Bee

Last Friday, the qualifying 2nd and 3rd graders had a practice spelling bee to get ready for the
spelling bees they hold in 4th, 5th and 6th grade. Em qualified along with 30 other kids so grandma, Josie and I went to watch. It was held in one of the classrooms and the room was packed wall-to-wall with teachers, kids and parents. Because it was a practice they had double elimination so it took awhile to whittle it down the contestants. After about an hour there were about 6 kids left and Emily was one of them along with her long time rival J.B. Emily had gotten all her words right up to that point and then missed "chemical". That was one of the words we hadn't practiced. At that point, they had run out of words from the list we had studied so they brought in the 7th grade word list. Em's next word was "postmortem". She had no idea what that even meant but she did her best but missed it. She was eliminated along with a 3rd grade boy.

There were only two boys left...a 3rd grader and "JB". These two were in a spell off for about 30 minutes and the kids, who had been sitting on the floor in a hot, crowded classroom for over an hour, were going nuts but these two kept going and going. Finally, the 3rd grader cracked and JB won the spelling bee. We thought we were done and could go home but they called Emily back in to have a spell-off for 3rd and 4th place with the boy who had been eliminated in the same round. I was really nervous! They let everyone go so there were just the teachers, Emily and her competition, and gma and I. They went back and forth for several minutes both misspelling their words so then the other person gets a chance to spell the word and then their own word and so on. Finally, the boy misspelled "mildew" and Emily got a big grin on her face. She nailed it and had to spell "celebration". That was a word that we had practiced and Emily nailed it to take 3rd place!!! Yeah Emily! We are so proud of her.

If she ever gets her certificate, I'll post a picture.

Boarder Chicks

The girls have a long weekend so we decided to take them snowboarding at Brighton Friday. No other schools were out except for theirs so it wasn't crowded at all. The whole weekend was supposed to be sunny and clear so we thought it would be a perfect day. I haven't skied in probably 5 or 6 years and Mark only snowboards once a year so I was a little nervous that I wouldn't remember how or I would hurt myself...fall on my knee or something.

Down in the valley the skies were clear but looking up at the mountains we noticed this huge dark snow cloud stuck right on top. I thought, "Oh great, here we go. It's going to be cold and snowing at the girls are going to last 20 minutes and be done." When we got to the resort, the snowplow flags were whipping in the wind. The sun was completely obscured and snow was blowing off the cabins and lodge in huge swirls.

We went up to the rental shop and got our gear. How cute are those snowboards!!! How cute are those boarder babes! By the time we got out on the slopes the wind had mellowed a bit and the temp wasn't too bad. The plan was to have Mark teach them how to board. Now, when Mark and I were dating I attempted to snowboard. Mark said he would "teach" me and it went something like this: When we got off the lift for the first run of the morning he said, "Okay, see you at the bottom." We must have already been married because I would have dumped him then and there if we had just been dating. After an entire day of falling on my butt and knees over and over and over again, I was in so much pain I could hardly walk. And it didn't go away after a good nights sleep. I have never been so sore in all of my life and it lasted the entire week. Needless to say, I haven't been on a snowboard since. When the pain/fun ratio is too high, there is no point in doing it.

So, I reminded Mark that he actually had to teach them how to snowboard. We made our way down to the ski lift and there was an instructor off to the side teaching a 5 year old how to board before she got on the lift. I told Mark, "Do what she's doing. Just copy what she is telling that kid." So, that is how we taught them how to board. We copied what the instructors were doing with their students.

THEY DID SO AWESOME!!! I don't even know how to snowboard but I have to say that Mark and I did a pretty good job teaching them. We spent the morning on the bunny hill. After a yummy lunch in the lodge, we headed back out and joined up with Craig and Luka. We did a couple more runs and then headed to the Majestic lift to take the girls to a more challenging run. They did sooooo good! The first part of the run was a blue and they pushed their way down that part. The rest of the run was green but wide and long and they both went the whole rest of the way without falling. They got into their rhythm and just cruised, switching from right foot to left foot smoothly. We did that run two more times and then it was time to go. We are definitely going again before the season is over.

Today, I'm so sore and my knee hurts but the fun factor was much higher than the pain factor this time.

Gymnastics

Emily is in gymnastics and went to her first competition in tumbling late last month. She did really well. She placed 4th out of ten girls and she's not even in tumbling! Apparently gymnastics and tumbling are two different things. I'm just learning this. I have video but it's not uploading. I'll try to post it again later.

We spent the weekend at our friend's cabin in Scofield and had a really good time. This is Josie and I heading down the hill on a toboggan. There were 12 adults and 18 kids under the age of 11. It was a little crazy at times but we all fit. We went snowmobiling, sledding, tubing, snowboarding and played games inside the cabin when we were cold and wet from being outside.

Okay, it finally downloaded. This is her first pass. Each girl had to do the same routine and the judges scored them on how well they did. Check it out, she's so cute!!

This is Em's second pass. It cracks me up when she bounces at the end.