Junior Olympics, baby!

And, Rowan's 8th! She got to sleep in, and we surprised her with a very impromptu breakfast party in the hotel lobby. Grammy and PaPa stopped and got 2 balloons, which we put on her chair. Olga and Val, from the gym, and their mom Natalya joined us, it was so cool. Then it was off to the room to put on the warpaint (lots of sparkly make-up) and head to the college for the competition.The competition was kind of a blur, I cried all through her ball routine and didn't even really see it, because I knew it was the Very Last.There was a fire alarm in the middle of age group awards, which was interesting.

Rowan won her age group for her ball routine (I did get to see it, on video!), I forget hoop (5th??), and not so hot on floor.(Normally one of her best!) They only awarded out to 12th place, so their was a whole lot of girls who got no awards at all, and I was worried! She ended up 3rd all around, in her age group. But overall, she didn't place in anything but ball, 6th best in the whole country. Which certainly doesn't suck!It was sort of a downer seeing the podium though- a lot of girls on it for the overall awards were girls she had been beating all year. Given all that is going on in her life right now though, it was no surprise she wouldn't be at her best. And how surprising her best event was *ball*, which has been far and away her very worst all year. You just never know, I guess!

She is hidden behind the 5th place girl in this photo, the over all (every Level 4 who qualified as one of the 10 best in their region) ball awards.

More to come- we're pretty sad right now because it was final goodbye day to Olga, Val, Brianna, Nicole, Becky and Coach Konstantza. I know we'll be back, but good grief, this just sucks.

What we've been up to!

Lots of gymnastics- here is Gryphon enjoying the best part of practice, snack time.

Lots of goodbyes- here are Rowan and Libby, who met waaayyy back when Rowan did artistic (regular bars and beam) gymnastics. They are such good friends. Libby wrote Rowan a journal full of entries that will just break your heart.

Gryphon and Gracie- who met waiting with their moms for their little sisters to get done with the gym! They bonded over a mutual love of all things Harry Potter.


As for Mark, he has been hanging out at palaces, like this one. Also scouting the Russian section of Seoul for a gym, and walking Cleo, and oh yeah- working. Our household goods are in Korea already, as is my beloved van! So that's great news...except the small shipment that was supposed to be there "early" is no where to be found, and it has all the girls bedding and ALL my home school stuff in it, so....not loving that!

Tomorrow: leave the house for good, last gymnastics practice, stay at a hotel. Leave early Thursday for Virginia Beach, where grammy and PaPa will join us. Watch Rowan kick butt. ;) Watch Nicole kick more butt. Drive back Sunday, stay in a hotel at Dulles with the cat, and we're off. I already have a playdate at the Yongsan pool lined up for Wednesday afternoon with some area homeschoolers, so lets hope our plane gets in on time!!

I'll be posting as much as I can, on our big adventure!

Cleo is in Korea!

Due to complete morons at Delta Airlines, Cleo had to fly to Korea unaccompianed, as cargo. I was NOT happy about this, as you can imagine! We got her kennel all set up, with a guinea pig bottle for water and a pad for any accidents, and made the reservation as soon as Mark got a phone number in Korea.I wrote in Korean all over the cage, as you can see, just in case!

The girls and I drove Cleo up to Dulles, to a big loud warehouse. I was pretty nervous- she had to be there 4 hours before her flight. I put her on the scale, in her cage, and went into an office to do paperwork. When I went back to say a final goodbye, she was actually laying down, calm! That made me think m-a-y-b-e, just ,maybe, she would do all right. When we got home ,an hour later, I called, and they checked on her and...she was laying down! No barking, no stress. Started to feel better.

I obsessively checked the flight status (15 hours in the air!) and Mark was under strict orders to call me as SOON as he had eyes-on her at Incheon. He did, about 4 am, and she was ...you guessed it...laying down in her kennel! Korean workers kept coming by, reading her name off the kennel (in Korean) and talking to her, "Oh! Cleo! Cleo!". Glad I thought of that! :)

Mark got her home, bathed her, and she crashed. She had a few days of jet lag- crashing at 4-5 pm and waking up early wanting out, but has been just fine! I've seen her on Skype, and she seems pretty happy hanging out with Mark. We can't wait to join them!

Here she is, in our house in Korea, on our bed!

We have a house!! In Korea!

Mark has been taking pictures for us sicne he arrived in Korea Monday night, we run to the computer first thing every morning to see what he's sent. Here is the big hotel on Yongsan where he is staying, the Dragon Hill Lodge.

And in today's batch of photos- our house! I wanted pictures of just whatever the housing looked like, but it appears he got a house already. Our door is the upstairs door on the right.
Rowan wanted to know about parks, this playground is right next door.

The interior (I won't bore you with them all) is white tile floors (eeeeww) but otherwise not too bad. Small, outdated, but overall about what you'd expect for military housing. This is looking into the kitchen from what will be the school/play room.

We can't wait!!

Regional Championships!

OK, so the photos are from the video camera, and they suck. Also if they are sideways, they stay that way! But regionals went AWESOME!

First Gryphon, who had her best scores ever! Her first year goal is "not last", just like Rowans was last year. And she made it, all year! RG is not something you just decide to do one day, it takes years of very painful stretching to get flexible enough to do the skills. She's been working all year though, and she has come a long, long way. We're super proud of her!

And then Rowan swept all of the Level 4 events- hoop, ball and floor, no one came close to her scores. Of 54 girls, she is 1st in everything. Regional Champ! So that means she's going to Junior Olympics in Virginia Beach on her birthday!!

I knew she would make the regional team, thats the top 10 girls (regardless of age- up to 15). There are 6 regions in the US, and the top 10 from each region's championships go to Compulsory Junior Olympics. She *had* beat every girl in our region at one meet or another, but never all at the *same time*. Well, she did it today, when it really counted! Her floor routine got an 11.4 out of a possible 12, the highest score I've ever seen in Level 4 this year. She totally brought her A game. Knowing how hard she worked, she deserved every bit of it, too- this has been a tough year. We're very proud of her drive and hard work!

And now the fun video! All the routines for both girls are on Youtube, go here: http://www.youtube.com/user/camibami

But I will put a few on the blog, too!