Month: December 2011

The girls' friend Ben had his (belated) birthday party at Splash Lagoon, a local indoor waterpark, and invited the girls.  I came along as well to help with the kids, and everyone had a great time.  It's very nice playing around in a heated waterpark and looking at the snow out the window. 

The kids rode all the rides and swam in all the pools.  I think the most amusing part was watching the lifeguards' confused reactions to Ben and Ana practicing their lutz lifts in the wave pool.  They so obviously had no idea what to make of it! 

After all the waterparking, they had ice cream and cupcakes in the room at night.  A very nice and enjoyable party.

Dealia's rhythmic gymnastics team had a holiday exhibition today.  Each of the girls did two of their competitive routines.  It was quite interesting, and very pretty to watch.  And we got to see De doing rhythmic for the first time.  She will compete Level 3 rhythmic this season, as well as Level 4 artistic, and her first rhythmic competition will be the 2nd weekend of January, in Ohio.

Here is her floor routine:

 

And her ball routine:

 

Very nice single day competition in Columbus.  We did this one last year — a lot of fun.  Ben came with us as well, and the kids had a great time playing in the hotel pool, watching 'Up' on TV, and then of course spending the next day skating. 

Jenya skated Pre-Preliminary "A" (no axel) for her free skate, and won (1st out of 5).  She also skated Pre-Preliminary compulsory, and placed 2nd (out of 6).  Here's her free skate:

 

 

Ana skated No Test Free Skate for the second time ever, and placed 2nd out of 5.  She also skated No Test Compulsory, and placed 4th out of 7.  Here is her free skate:

 

 

And Dealia skated as well – moving up to Basic Skills Level 6 for her free skate.  She placed 3rd out of 4.  Here's her skate – note the dress, it's actually her rhythmic competition leo, but it looked so nice we decided to use it for skating too.

 

 

Jenya and her Lego Robotics team had their annual Western PA lego league competition today.  This year the research topic involved food safety, and they did their project on listeria. 

They had spent the previous few months working hard, and it showed.  They had very good results — 9th place overall out of something like 100 teams, and they got 2nd place in the software competition!  This means they got one of the really nifty trophies — made from legos, natch. 

Here's a pic of the team — Jenya's the one in the skirt.