This week the kids had their first camp of the summer. Leo asked to do hip hop camp at Serafina's dance studio. Serafina was reluctant to do it because she didn't really know the male teacher very well, but I assured her he would be very nice and she would have fun. She was a good sport and went to the camp and of course had fun.
Today was the last day and the kids put on a little performance. I sat on one side of the room and took video of mostly Serafina. Here's some fun facts about this video. There's a tiny girl in Serafina's row named Madisyn. She was on Serafina's soccer team and in Leo's class when he did the 2/3 combo. The older girls in the first row are five years older than Serafina. I was pretty proud of how well she kept up with them. See if you can spot Nana at the end of the video.
Tom was there too. He sat on Leo's side of the room and took a video of the performance from his angle. You can spot Nana at end of this one too.
Group shot at the end with their instructor, Mr. Mappy.
Tom and the kids have visited the rock climbing gym several times since the first time they tried it a while back. I kept promising to learn to belay, that is be the person on the ground controlling the ropes. This morning I finally took the class so I could belay. This meant that both kids could climb at the same time so they don't have to wait their turn for Tom to belay them. It also meant that Tom could climb because I can belay him.
Here's Leo getting started on a climb. He did a lot of challenging climbs and did really well. He's light and fearless, and that works in his favor.
I gave me phone to the kids to take pictures of Tom climbing while I belayed him. They didn't. They just took portraits of each other.
Here's Serafina way up high. She is very strong so she's able to accomplish challenging climbs but she isn't always confident about her skills.
Serafina really wanted to get her Merry Band together to watch a truly terrible movie. She wanted to show them this movie because it's about four girls that are different but still stay friends. Tonight we got a chance to have the girls over to watch the movie. We are down to the wire since Jane is moving back to Utah on Tuesday.
Here are the girls with the water bottles we made them (they say Merry Band and their names). They cuddled on the floor to watch the movie even though it was 80 degrees out.
They took a break from the movie to have dinner.
Then we took another break to have an Oreo taste test.
The girls took turns being blindfolded and guessed flavors.
It was pretty fun. Jane and Serafina got all their guesses right.
Then I made them pose for some pictures. They came up with this pose themselves.
Silly pose.
Serafina was in tears when Jane left tonight. I'm hoping we can see her one more time before they leave but there isn't much time.
Even though I had errands to run in the morning and a play date to host in the evening, I couldn't resist a trip to the beach to take advantage of amazing weather.
It was seriously perfect without a cloud in the sky and that's not always the case on a Northern California beach.
Gymnastics everywhere.
Of course we couldn't head home without stopping at our favorite ice cream spot first.
Almost four years ago, I said goodbye to one of my original moms group friends when they picked up and moved to Kansas. Now my friend Jenn is joining her in Kansas. They are actually going to share a property line. Jenn and I have done a good job of getting together for lunch during the school year to catch up and talk about the good old days with baby and toddlers at the park. We spent a lot of time together at parks around here.
We had the girls over one last time to swim. Here's Serafina, Elisa, Katie, Sofia and Leo.
It's really hard to see them go and now that two friends are in Kansas, we may just have to make the trip to visit.
Yep, it's my birthday. Serafina made this sign for my bedroom door.
After getting a chance to go to the gym in the morning, the kids and I headed to Stanford to visit the art museum. We first went to the Anderson Collection, which is housed in a building next to the main museum. They have a lot of modern art, most of it acquired in the 1970s.
This is a Jackson Pollack.
Then we went next door to the main museum. Both are free which is really awesome when you have kids with limited museum stamina.
Of course they had to try out the portrait drawing activity.
Leo drew "a man".
Serafina made a self-portrait.
Everything was really pretty.
We only saw a portion of the museum but since it is free, we will definitely be back to explore what we missed this time.
Tom picked up dinner from one of my favorite restaurants. My mom came over and we had a delicious meal followed by this fancy vegan chocolate cake that Tom made all by himself.
It was a very nice birthday and I feel very spoiled by the wonderful gifts and food I received.
Leo has been enjoying diving. The program switched to the summer schedule last week and his group gets two nights at the pool instead of one at the gym and one at the pool. This weekend his home pool hosted a dive meet that was open to all. His coach encouraged him to enter so he could get the experience of participating in a meet.
He was scheduled to compete in the 3 meter event on Saturday. We got there bright and early to check in and warm up.
It was a beautiful day.
Here he is with his team mates - George, Abigail and Sophia.
Leo competed in the most entry level group for competitive divers. There were only a handful of kids from Santa Clara Diving (his program) participating on Saturday, and a ton of kids from the Stanford diving program. There were at least 20 kids diving in between his dives. The kids do six dives for the event. His coach told us in advance what dives he should register for and all the dives are building block skills that are essential for executing more complicated dives later on.
Here's his first dive of the day, a Forward Jump Straight.
Forward Jump Tuck.
Back Jump Tuck
Forward Entry Straight
He got a little feedback after a couple of dives from his coach Karla.
After he was done, he changed and we wandered over to the award presentation. We weren't sure what to expect. There were only about seven or so other boys competing in his level so I thought his chances of getting a medal was pretty good. He had solid scores and he looked good up there.
And sure enough, he won third place. It was super exciting!
Here he is on the podium. His teammate Sophia won first out of over 20 girls.
He didn't expect to win. Prior to the meet, we talked a lot about this just being a learning experience and how he just needed to try his best and have fun. He was so thrilled. He wore his medal to the falafel joint where we got dinner.
This morning was the 1 meter event. The 1 meter boards are further away from the stands so I couldn't get any good pictures or videos. There were less kids competing today, probably because it's Father's Day. He did really well on some dives and not quite as strong on others. He got third again! Very exciting.
Poor 5th place winner Armando was not having a good morning. He was with the Stanford diving group and he was in tears in the pool and before the awards, and then he was especially miserable after he got fifth. His parents still had him get up on the podium and kept telling him to smile. I felt so much for this kid and his mom. Baseball used to bring out a lot of tears in Leo and I've been that mom trying so hard to get your kid just to suck it up enough to get through the activity.
I'm not sure how Leo would have felt if he got a ribbon instead of a medal. I'd like to think he would accept it with grace. He enjoyed being part of the meet and wants to do it again. I knocked out 50% of my volunteer responsibilities on Saturday by working in the snack shack for almost four hours. It was super exhausting but less disgusting than the little league snack shack.
