What a week! Sis had 4 long days of practice this week and on the one day she had off, she had to perform in her Christmas program at school!
Her program was pretty cute. It was called Joy Story. It was about the meaning of Christmas and the Joy we get from knowing Jesus. All classes in grades 2-5 participated in the program. Each grade has 3-4 classes. The students dressed up like toys. Most of the girls were dressed up like dolls and the boys like toy soldiers. You could also dress up like a stuffed animal. Sissy chose to dress up like a cat! Easy peasy since that was her Halloween costume!
The entire second grade
Our cute little kitty cat in the first row, second from the left
Sis ran a few errands with me this week and one took us to ACE Hardware. They had this HUGE chair out front. She couldn't help herself. She wanted to sit in the big chair!
Friday was a busy day as well. I substituted in her class all afternoon then I took Sis and her friend Macy immediately to practice. She was at the gym from 3:30-7!!! She was prepping for her mock meet in Ocala on Saturday.
Not everyone was invited to participate in the warm up meet. Just those who were ready to perform their routines. This meet was meant to be a "mock" meet for the girls to practice routines in front of judges and with the pressure of a meet situation. The coaches could help where necessary during this meet as well. That was nice for the kids who needed a little spotting assistance.
Here is Sis with some of her teammates. The younger levels competed in the morning and the older kids in the upper levels in the afternoon. We were in the truck at 5:15 am to get on the road to drive to Ocala. These girls were somehow awake and ready to go!
Sis and her teammate and classmate Macy.
All of the Beaches/Starke (PAC) gymnasts competing in the morning session
She started on Beam. Somehow she got messed up and started her routine on the wrong side of the beam. This threw her off a bit but she handled it very well. She also had her first fall and again, recovered well. I was really proud of her and how she dealt with this. I think the fell came from being flustered. She bounced back and finished her routine strong.
She moved to floor next and did a great job. She hadn't even practiced the entire routine with tumbling before the meet!
She still has some things to work on, but for her first time putting it all together, she did well!
After floor they moved on to vault. This was her highest score with a 9.2! Not bad considering she doesn't practice the level 3 vault very often!
Her last event was bars. It was a last minute decision to have her perform a kip instead of a glide swing to start her routine. I could tell this panicked her a little but she was able to manage it! She doesn't have it perfected yet, but every week she gets a little closer! She also struggles with her front hip circle too - same issue with her kip. Hoping she masters both at the same time! She did well on bars though.
I was really proud of how she handled herself and her first time performing her new routines that she doesn't always get to practice! She practices 3x a week with the level 4 girls and only once a week with the level 3's. I'm glad she's with the older girls because she works harder and those girls are her friends. She will learn more and learn it quicker working out with the older group. Here she is with her bestie. These two have been friends since PreK 4 at Providence Child Development Center. They both go to Prov, on team together, go to church together and she lives only 5 blocks away from us!
As if all this excitement wasn't enough, we left Ocala before lunchtime and drove south to Disney World. We still have passes so we thought it would be a great opportunity to see the Osborne Family lights in Hollywood Studios one last time. They aren't going to be doing it anymore because they will be building their new Star Wars exhibit there.
When we got to Disney we were all starved so we started at Epcot and grabbed some lunch in Germany. It's our favorite country in World Showcase!
These two made Penn State themed Duffy bears in anticipation of the Gator Bowl!
We ended up seeing my friend Lindsey while in Germany! What a small world! Lindsey and I use to teach at CVMS together. She took over my field hockey coaching opening when I had Riley! It was so great to get a chance to catch up!
After we had some fun in Epcot, we drove over to Hollywood Studios. We rode the Tower of Terror and the Rockin' Rollercoaster and then got to check out the lights!
We had so much fun finding all the hidden Mickeys all over the buildings!
We enjoyed the glow of all the lights!
Andy hadn't seen Cinderella's castle taken over by Elsa so we drove over to Magic Kingdom to check out the castle before we headed to our hotel to catch a few zzz's.
The next morning we headed back to Magic Kingdom to ride the Jingle Cruise, Pirates of the Caribbean, Thunder Mountain R.R. and Space Mountain. We also started a new scavenger hunt game that we've never played before. It was the Sorcerer's of Magic Kingdom. We get these cards to cast spells to defeat the villains of Disney. The kids had fun playing that as well as pin trading while we were there.
On the way home we headed to Disney Springs (aka Downtown Disney) to grab some dinner at Raglan Road. It's a great Irish pub with authentic Irish bars shipped over from Dublin. Everything was delicious - drinks and food!
By the time we got home around 7:30pm, we all felt like zombies. Everyone slept well last night! What a week! Whew!
