kudos to Katherine!!

Tonight was Katherine's first gymnastics practice of the summer, which means that she has a new coach and new kids in her class. Her coach tonight was Kelly, whom she absolutely adores. Kelly has a daughter on the team, and is a firm believer in tough love. She drills correct form into those girls and really fine tunes every move they do. She's always pulling on their arms, pointing their toes, and tapping their knees to make sure they don't give out. She's tough on them, but super fun and the kids respect her for it.


With all that being said, she stopped me on the way out of practice tonight and told me that, "Katherine is an amazing talent. She has tons of potential, and is THE leader on the team. She expects big things out of her and will do everything she can to make sure that she excels". She also told me that she was about to give Katherine a big dose of tough love this summer, and constantly challenge her because she could handle it. She looked down at Katherine, smiled and patted her on the head, and asked her if she was ready.... Oh. my. goodness!!!! She could hardly contain her excitement! She's ready for summer gymnastics!! She's ready and willing to do anything and everything Kelly wants her to do. She so badly wants this!


We've also decided to start up some private lessons again this summer. We haven't done any privates since Mr. Tarry, and now that Katherine is firmly entrenched at Chow's and wanting "more" again, it's time to give her the extra boost if that's what she wants. I've said it all along, but if she wants to do this, we'll support her 100% -- physically, emotionally and financially. I'm just so happy for her that she's in a good spot right now and overflowing with happiness.

I was editing pictures tonight and came across these from her meet at Chow's. They uploaded backwards for some silly reason, and quite honestly I'm too tired to try and fix it now.... So in reverse order -- here we go!


Katherine accepting her medal and ribbons. You can't really tell from this picture, but there are four ribbons attached to the sheet she's holding (one for bars, beam, floor and vault). She was the only girl in her class to get all four blues and was beaming with pride!

Katherine on bars --
Katherine with the girls on her TAG team, waiting to go on bars.

Katherine on floor. She's doing a back walkover in the first picture.

handstand forward roll.

The rest of these pictures are on beam. Since I uploaded them backward, here's her dismount! LOL!!

This girl has got some air!!

Waiting for the meet to start.

So there you have it --her first meet at Chow's. By all accounts, it was a success... she was happy with how she did, and surprisingly, wasn't one bit nervous. Considering all the people that were there, I was a little stunned, but so proud of her!