Jump Rope Team!

Complete with their team t-shirts, the Rockets performed this morning to show off all the diligent work they've done since December. I'm not going to upload the freestyle video because it's so large, but there were some really impressive single jumpers and some duos that were spectacular. Below you'll find some video of the teams that performed. Again, so impressive. The thing that amazes me is that they all look so placid. I know I'd be huffing, puffing and tripping all over the place!

They are the only team in the city (or surrounding cities). How lucky we are to participate!

And to think May started the year as a "non-jumper!" These shows are a real hoot to attend with Sariah because rope or no rope, she stands up and jumps her heart out to the music. She's planning to join the team when she gets to third grade just four years from now!












I can't fail to mention Mrs. Lorraine Ware, Miss Carroll and Mrs. Grooms who have taken so much of their own time to coach these wonderful kids. Thank you!

Shadows!

I was blog hopping the other day and came across a picture of the long shadows of a family in the late afternoon. It was really cool, so I want to take one too. Yesterday, on a whim I stayed outside after picking the kids up from school rather than rushing in to make dinner and we had some shadow fun.

Brigham--loves to go outside with Elijah. Elijah leads Brigham around the yard and the near neighborhood with a jumprope.




Sariah--alien head




Elijah--has taken up jump rope sport recently and in his own words, "I'm really good at jump roping!"




May--has a jump rope club show coming up this weekend, so she's practicing





Nathan--swinging the golf club



I'm glad I took a minute to just be outside with the kids. It seems Brigham has gotten a taste of the outdoors, though, and it's going to be interesting keeping him couped up inside for the rest of the "winter."

Wiggle!

Nathan's Level 4 (city) swim teacher had a nickname for him. Wiggle! He can't swim a straight line, but he loves to swim and he's good at it. We recently switched Nathan over to the YMCA because the city wasn't offering Level 5/6 this winter. It's turned out to be a really good thing because the kids get more one-on-one time with a teacher, Val, that Nathan really likes. We're planning on putting him in a couple of private sessions soon to polish some of his strokes.

It's a nice winter activity, sitting in a 75-80 degree room on a lounge chair, watching your kid swim!

Family Goals

On New Year's Day 2008 ,we made three family goals to try to accomplish:

1) Read stories from our ancestor's lives.

2) Make it to sacrament meeting every week (and on time so we don' t miss the sacrament).

3) Exercise as a family once a week.

Nathan's school genealogy project gave us a good start on reading family histories. We have yet to actually sit down and read a story, but we've been talking about it.

We've been trying hard to meet goal number two. Having church at 11:00 am instead of 9:00 am has helped. Not as much as you might think though!

Today was our first family exercise session. We went to the YMCA where Nathan was having his swimming lesson. We reserved a racquetball court and brought our jump ropes. I've checked some books about jumping rope and we are all hyped up to practice and try out some of those tricks we've been seeing lately. Jump rope is a tough sport! We're planning on doing swimming, jump rope, and basketball during the cold weather months.

Basketball

Photo copyrighted

Photo copyrighted

Elijah just finished a basketball clinic for Kindergarten through First grade. It was so fun to watch these youngsters dribbling up and down the court, shooting, stealing balls etc. Elijah loves to play basketball and with continued practice, I believe he will be quite good. Go Elijah!

Jump!

Last night we were fortunate to have viewed a new-ish film at the Children's Film Festival, called "Jump!"

I was disappointed at first because the way it was billed led me to believe that we were going to view the actual jump rope show. But, as another patron pointed out, "it is a film festival." We were privileged to have Chris Brown present, who is competitive jumper. Even considering May's participation in her school's jump rope team, I never would have imagined the incredible sport that I saw for the first time last night.

Chris Brown (college age) and his younger companion (from the team he coaches in Brighton, MI) did demonstrate some of what they do, before the film started. I took videos with my outdated digital camera, so they aren't the best quality, but are still fun to watch.

The "Jump!" film we watched after their demonstration was put together well and was extremely motivating. It will come out on DVD sometime soon. I definitely want to see it again.

Here's the website, if you want to look it up:

http://www.jumpmovie.com

Here are the videos I took:






Here's a YouTube video of a team speed dance:



And another of a single freestyler:



Another inspiring film you might enjoy, which is in the same vein as "Jump!", is called "Mad, Hot Ballroom." It's about middle schoolers who learn ballroom dance and then compete. These type of films are motivators that teach kids that they can reach their dreams. Dream on, Dream away!

Our Runnin' Girl!

Finally downloaded these pictures from my phone. These are from November when May ran her 5K. There's May on the right. She's running with her friend Rebecca. Funny thing about this picture is that I was trying to take it while she was running toward me. I kept having problems with the track wheel on my phone and locking my phone (which is the icon under the camera icon). It took me three tries and I finally got her, but as she was running away from me!

She had three dedicated and encouraging coaches. One of them was the wife of Nathan's outstanding fourth grade teacher, Mr. Ulrich. He was there (though not pictured) supporting his wife and all these great third and fourth grade girls who ran that day.

Jump Rope Club

May joined her school's Jump Rope Club a couple of months ago. When she started out, she was what is known as a "non-jumper." Since then she has been working hard and can do some amazing tricks. It was hard to take pictures because the lighting was poor enough that I needed to use the night picture option which excluded the action picture option.

May appeared in several of the groups that performed and did amazing tricks like: pretzel, front-cross, and squat. I was dazzled by the whole show. They will continue practice and perform again in the spring, hopefully out-of-doors so that I can get some better pictures!
(That's May doing "squat" in the middle. See how fast they move??!!)

Two items of note

First, Nathan got his arrow of light in October, on his birthday, actually. He also got his religious square knot and several other Webelos pins. I was so pleased with his work and the greatest reward was that he was so pleased that he had done the work and earned the rewards. A great step forward for Boy Scouts! And, of course, I have to say, it was some work for me too and I learned a lot. (Bad mom. I didn't bring my camera to this event!)

Second, May ran her first 5K in November. I did bring my phone to this event and took pictures which hopefully I'll add in later this week. She was part of a program called Girls on the Run. The girls had two practices per week for about ten weeks with three wonderful coaches. They also learned valuable life lessons as they went along about encouraging others, thinking positive thoughts, saying no to drugs, exercising and eating healthy, among other things. The team spirit was wonderful and it was so fun to see young girls working so hard to achieve a goal. May wants to participate again. They have chapters all over the nation. Check into it for your girl. It's very worth-while!

Can't get it together

We're back from our vacation but I just can't seem to get my act together to actually write about it and post pictures. Between Joseph and I we took about 1300 pictures. Many of them need to be deleted and we have a lot of duplicates.

We had such a nice vacation, but we have decided that we should either never go on vacation or just be on vacation ALL THE TIME! (Side note: Joseph thinks we would eventually run out of funds this way!) It has been so hard for me to try to acclimate myself to regular life. Things are really firing up next week as the activities start up again.

Nathan, though he has allergies or the beginnings of a voice change, has been granted at least one more semester in choir, for which I am grateful. He leans toward playing the cello this year. May will do choir as well as a group called "Girls on the Run" and will be training to run a 5K in November. I'm thinking of trying this running program that my brother found online where you start out small and work up. I haven't run since college, so this should be interesting!

Elijah doesn't have anything going besides first grade. He had a good time in soccer camp in August. Sariah is going to take a Community Music School class starting next week. We'll do library storytime as well as the Nature center preschool program. She's enjoying getting more attention since the others returned to school, and her behavior proves it!

Joseph has been named "Interim Director of the Office of General Assessment and Accountability," so he's officially a big wig (paycheck doesn't match, unfortunately!). He'll be in this position for some unnamed amount of time until they restructure the office and hire new people. Good work, Joseph! What an honor to be chosen!

Brigham is obsessed with keys. Just yesterday I told Joseph that we needed to get him his own set because he's always carrying mine around and I'm afraid he'll lose them. Then, guess what? He lost them. Now he has his own set and I have mine, but I can tell he's envious of my new set and has his eyes on them! He likes to open and shut the doors and try to lock and unlock them. He goes around saying "Doh, doh, doh, doh." (means door) We think he's awfully cute.

Sometime soon I'll get these photos sorted out and try to write for my posterity about our vacation! :)

Max's Race

In 2005, Nathan knew a little boy named Max who would sometimes come into his 2nd grade classroom to play. Max's kindergarten class was right across the hall from Nathan's 2nd grade classroom. In March of that year Max got really sick and passed away. In his honor, his parents hold a 5K race every summer to raise money for the local hospital pediatrics ward. We have attended all three years. The first two years, the kids did a fun run sprint. This year we decided to walk the whole thing as a family. My kids were really good sports even though it was a stretch for all three of the oldest kids to walk the whole thing at about a 19 minute pace. May and I will try to run the kid's one mile next year. I haven't done any running since I was in college, so this should be interesting!