Thanks :) She does work out on her own quite a bit here at home. Our gym tends to only condition at leangth during the summer. There are many many reasons why we are changing gyms though. It isn't just a time thing. Thank you for the video suggestions. Handstands is definitely something she needs to work on.

I wonder if it is just dependent on the area. We are in Texas and things can get highly competitive. The main issue is though that I know from checking around when we were looking for a new gym, that every gym that I called that we compete against does at least 3 more hours a week of practice and it definitely shows. We compete placement at level 3 and higher so maybe that is the difference. I don't know, but I do know that where we are at is not sufficient for my daughter's goals (yes, they really are her goals :) )

Six. Most gyms in our area train for 9 hours at this level with some training as many as 12

I wish our current gym would train more hours. We are in the same position with the scores just not competing because we don't put in the same amount of practice. I guess I also am considering that my daughter is pretty serious so she wants to push through a few levels and just can't get there on the number of hours she has right now. The move to the new gym will fix that though. Everything feels so...half-hearted where we are right now. It would be ok I guess if K wasn't really wanting to do well and putting in the work to prove that to me, but it just isn't working for her.

She is competing new level 3 this year, but is close to having all of the level 4 skills and most of the level 5. The big thing missing right now is her kip but that would be because her current gym isn't even working on it. She has the drive and I am sure with the right coaching could get the skills. She knows it is a long shot but is willing to put in the work so we will see :)

We tried a tumbling class at the gym we are scouting and are very happy! My daughter was quite upset that we were even looking but came out of the class asking if we could totally switch gyms today LOL She looked so much more confident in this new gym. We can't completely switch until we finish our current meet season but I have talked to the coaches at the new place and they tell me she is definitely good for team so she plans on spending the rest of meet season working very hard and attempting to "skip" a level. My understanding is she has to compete at least 1 meet at the next level so she can't entirely skip it. We are kind of risking it by attending both gyms at once, but she isn't getting the tumbling she needs at our current gym (as in I don't trust the way they are teaching it and my daughter is getting hurt as a result) so in order to have a chance at making this gym's team she needs to be correcting her tumbling during the meet season.

My husband is the same way :) For my husband any time is a good time for some TeA. I don't think it is shallow at all. I think in general men tend to be more physically motivated (TeA solves all of the world's problems at least for a moment) and women more emotionally motivated (talk and touch that doesn't necessarily lead to TeA). Neither are bad or shallow and neither fit across the board.

Ohh fun! A place to post meet reports! K did great at her first meet. She placed 1st on bars, 2nd on beam, 3rd All Around and she moved up a division. We are in the process of scounting a new gym for after this meet season for various reasons.

I did let the know she was competing this season. They agreed to let her come take the tumbling classes. I guess I just assumed that if they held tryouts that my daughter would need to go through the same process as any other new to their team girl. I will definitely be talking to them about it as we get ready to make the move. Thank you for the advice. I don't plan on telling them until the day of and I will do it by email.

Yikes! I am afraid my daughter would be dismissed as well and I have already paid all of our meet fees plus just invested in the $300+ worth of leo and warmups that we have to have. In hindsight I wish I had made the move at the end of last season when I started having these feelings, but hindsight is 20/20.

We have decided for various reasons that it is time for us to change gyms. We are committed to our current gym until after meet season in May, but because tryouts for the gym we are looking at are in April, we will need to start the process before that. One of the problems we are haivng with our current gym is not correcting form on a manditory skill and since we have tried tumbling and private classes, my only other option is to enroll her "secretly" into the gym will be moving to for the extra tumbling so she will be prepared for tryouts. We are only in our 2nd year of competing but this is the only gym we have been at and it is a very small personable gym which I have been highly involved with. Frankly, I am sort of scared over how to do this. I mean, honestly, once we leave, it is unlikely we will ever see any of these people again, but I want to do it in the kindest easiest way not only for their sakes but for my daughter's as well. I have seriously tried to sort this out without making such a major move, but it truly is time. I just wondered if anyone has some experience they can share with me?

Australia. Though I would also consider Rome. My husband is British so we have had a chance to do some traveling. We loved France and England/Scotland/Wales is beautiful though not my favorite. By far if I could go anywhere it would be back to Australia, but not touristy areas. I would go back where I was sort of near some of the big attractions (the Reef) but off the beaten path.

I'd love to see what your parties are like!

I should say I factor in our gifts to the birthday child in our budget. She is interested in art so we will likely invest in getting her a standing easel, some canvases and such. I also plan on having some of her current pieces framed. I guess the party itself will probably stay right around $200, but again, this is her first party in 5 years so I am going a bit over the top with decorations and food :) Those of you who throw parties for under $50 I applaud you. Even when we used to throw smallish parties by the time I ordered enough $5 pizzas and juice boxes I was over $50. Never mind cake and all that. On non-party years we take the birthday child out for a special treat and they get a gift from us. That usually stays under $50 just depending on where we eat.

Let me know when you find them. K needs long legs and has a skinny waist but has thick muscular thighs. Everything we have tried so far looks awkward on her shape. Someone should start a line for gymnasts LOL

I would work on boosting your immune system. Cut out all sugar for a while and if you can manage it I would even cut out wheat, consider using a good brand of essential oils, get into the sun as often as possible, take a capful of acv every day, get on some probiotics and so on. It sounds like your immune system never had a chance to recover so you need to be doing all you can to get it working back at peak efficiency. I hope you all kick this soon. Such nasty stuff to have to deal with once much less over and over again!

We have gotten to where we only do the "big" numbers for parties so I have a bigger budget than I would normally have if we did one every year. For my daughter's 10th we are budgeting about $350-$500. I am DIYing a lot of this party (a tea party), but since she hasn't had a party in about 5 years I want it to be really nice for her. Anyways, I was just curious to see how others budgeted.

I am in N.Texas. I know of a few families that have had the flu. At least family had the flu shot and they have been ill for several weeks now. I am not sure on the others. We have not had the shot and have not gotten ill so far. Honestly, I am surprised that we haven't at least had a mild illness due to the fact that my daughter is at gymnastics for 7 hours per week and I can only imagine the germs in that place, even with the disinfecting. We try to be proactive with our health. Lots of essential oils, probiotics and so on. I would like to think they are really paying off this year. ETA: There have been 17 confirmed deaths I believe. I don't know many of the details on those who passed.

I would do a primer just because it will cut down the number of coats you need. You could try a combined paint primer. Are you using oil based paint or water based? That also makes a difference.

I am late to the party but here are mine: I hate cake. I am all for breastfeeding when and where you need to but oh my word please stop posting pictures of it on Facebook. I don't think being a SAHM mom is that hard and it is all I can do when I hear others complain about it not to roll my eyes. Especially if their kids are in PS. I think reading Twilight could have been the stupidest waste of time and most definitely waste of braincells I have ever engaged in. The story is stupid, the characters are stupid and on top of that it is just crappy writing.

Keira loves bars but that is where she has the most trouble. She hates beam but I think she does pretty good on it. I think her floor is going to look nice this year too. She is good at her vault as well, but so far it hasn't really challenged her so she doesn't particularly care one way or the other about it. She is definitely a power gymnast so we are going to have to work on grace and artistic movement now that she is moving up to achievement. I'm not ready to worry about taking ballet or anything just yet though. I am interested to see which division she lands in. This year there are a lot of new level 3 girls and most are fairly young so it will be interesting all the way around to see how they do. Team is expensive. We couldn't do it if we weren't be helped by family.

Our competition leo was somewhere around $180 and we will get 2 years out of it. We had to have warm ups this year since we joined the team too late last year to get ours ordered, but we don't change warm-ups (or haven't so far) so I will get use out of that until she out grows it. We did have to have a new practice leo this year as well which is about $60.