Kell Longhorn Wrestling

HOOK 'EM Kevin!

Kevin started wrestling as soon as football was over. Glad to say, he loves it. We are getting used to a new sport (again). I think he is really good at it so we are encouraging him to stay with it again next year. Here are some pictures from his first two tournaments. I took a couple and a team parent on the floor took the other ones. I am so grateful because we were so far away and his pictures came out so much better then mine did. The links should take you directly to the shutterfly address to see all of the pictures of the team. I posted my favorites. Kevin was in the 10 & Under for the Kell Longhorn and the Kell Greenhorn.

At home before the Tournament, not a fan of the singlet.

warm ups. Hi Mom!

Click here to view these pictures larger

Click here to view these pictures larger

YAY!! A Bronze medal for coming in 3rd in his bracket! Way to go Kevman :)

Swimming the MLK in Downtown

Ryan is officially 7 for her first meet. This meet (MLK invite) will be tricky every year because of the way her birthday falls. This year she was just older for the meet. Not so big of a deal since she isn't aging up, but it may be an issue in future years. Since she's too young to really care about state cut times, the only thing she is going for is IRON MAN (posting a time in all available events for her age group). She has been missing the 50 Fl for 2 years but at MLK, she finally did it. WAHOO!! Next goal is to post a Top 10 Time for the Gold Girls in each event in her age group, she already has quite a few :)
Jared swam well, he even matched his state cut time for the breast so that made me feel better, he's not going to state on a fluke ;) The poor thing is so close on a couple more events, we'll see. He still has two more meets before state. The reason we are trying to get them in this year is that next year the state cut times are REALLY hard to make. The jump from 9-10 times to 11-12 times is HUGE. He really doesn't have a shot at state next year unless something momentous happens..which I don't foresee-this IS Jared we are talking about. Marching to his own drum is an understatement. His coach always says that he hopes we never get caught in a fire because Jared would still take his sweet time, even then. Anyways, here are some pictures of the day. I know swim pictures can get boring so here are my favorites from the weekend:

LOOK how comfortable he looks on the blocks-AWESOME! It took a long time to get here...

Ryan on the other hand rarely gets intimidated...

...even when the girls are twice her size :)

Great form Pinkie:)

Not to bad for Jared either. He's come a long way this year!

Pinkie's Party

Ryan opening her big gift from mom and dad-Cinderella Castle playset. Ryan was super happy to get this, she has looked at it EVERY time we go to Disney.

That's a nice face. hehe I laugh when I see this one, what a lady...NOT! I have to say, she gets that face from me ;)

Her brothers gave her this, funny.

I had to post this picture. She's reading her own birthday card. I don't have to help anymore except for the really big words. sniff sniff.

HAPPY BIRTHDAY GIRLY!!

HAPPY BIRTHDAY RYAN!!!

Happy 7th Birthday

sweet girl!

WE ♥ YOU!!!
Mom, Dad, Jared and Kevin

Chalker Blockers #739 Regionals!

Regionals!!

Chalker Blockers team #739 was the first team from Chalker to advance from prelims to Regionals. Next stop was State if they qualified. Each group had three chances to run the table with their robots. They also had to present their project to a technical panel of judges as well as a project panel of judges. Lots of presentation skills were learned this year and the kids did an awesome job. I really thought they might have a shot, IF they could get their robots to run the table spot on.

First Run-not good, not too bad. They scored 120 points.

Last run of the table. They only scored 90 points and they made some crucial errors.

What do you do while you're waiting for your turn? Hang out with friends and play games at the different teams tables. Ryan and Marcelene won bears at the ECMS Short Circuit booth. Cute :)

Or you could just hang out under the table, which is what Kev decided to do. I have to admit, we had been there 10 hours and we were waiting for the announcement of the winners. Jared's group did not place in the top three of any of the categories (Team Work, Technical, Project or Table Run) and they did not place in the top 16 overall which meant they did not advance to State. It was a hard loss, they did so great and they came so far in just a few months. Josh and Jared will be going to middle school next year so it should be interesting to see where that takes us. I may be running an independent team out of my house if there isn't a team at Palmer. We shall see. What an awesome experience though!

Snow Day!

Hot cocoa and a PJ Snow day

Wow, school is closed for a dusting! No worries, the ice underneath is the real killer. Either way, it means a snow day for Cobb County and a sleep in day for us! Rob was out of the country due back the next day so we had some time for it to melt before he got home. It took a few days believe it or not. The lakes stayed frozen for another week and a half. Winter to me is 60* NOT 12*!! :)

see the pizza mans footprints in the snow drifts ;)

it's pretty at least, just wish there was more so that the kids could go out and play!

Bronze to Silver

Remember our super excited Bronze Girl??....

...Well, meet our super Silver Girl!!

Sorry the picture quality is low, the camera did NOT like the cold snap we had in January. Going from Arctic to sauna is never a good idea. Ryan couldn't wait to get into the pool to practice so my lens didn't get a chance to defog. This is our Pinkie Girl on her first day of Silver practice. She was officially 6 when she moved up, I wonder if that's normal? I don't think it is. :)

Watching the clock to see when to leave.
Like her new cap? She got that for her birthday. If you don't know the story, there were two Ryan's in her Bronze group so Coach K called her Ryan Pink (her goggle color). The boy Ryan would still look up though so Coach just started calling her Pinkie. Everyone calls her Pinkie at the pool, her friends, all the coaches, the owner of the team...yes, the owner knows who she is. It's kind of like her super power persona. I like to think of her as a mini mascot for Gold, she's such a firecracker and LOVES being in the pool-it really is a lot of fun to watch her swim.

just keep swimming...just keep swimming...

Did you have fun? "YES!!"