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Eli earns two stripes!
Well, it has been insanely busy the past week and a half, but all good stuff:
Saturday, Damariscotta (45 min. south): eco’s 50th b-day dinner party….the first time I can remember in more than a decade where I got to go to a dinner party with only grown ups…what a concept!
Tuesday, Bangor (1 hr 20 min. northwest): taught a class at Pauline’s house
Thursday, Lowell, Mass. (3 1/2 hours south…about 400 miles round-trip): gave a trunk show / talk at the New England Quilt Museum and ladies’ road trip with Cheri and Meg…more on this in another post
Saturday, Augusta (1 hour west): Art Quilts Maine bi-monthly meeting
Monday, Brunswick (1 hr 15 min. south): Frayed Edges, although alas our last with Deborah here in Maine…the movers come next week to take her to Texas……wahhhhnnnn hahhhhnn (more on this in another post, too)
BUT…. on Friday January 27th, Eli’s tae kwon do / karate school had testing for moving up the ranks. Eli and two classmates, Erin and Eliza, had their yellow belts and were tested for their first of two stripes on the way up to green belt. Eli began tae kwon do in Sept. 2004, and took to it like a duck to water. Obedient, focused, coordinated (my son???? Must get that from his dad), enthused….he did exceptionally well to earn his yellow belt at the end of karate camp this past summer, after just one year. Other kids had taken two years and more to get that far. In this first photo, Eli is performing his forms, routines that are mock “fights” with imaginary opponents. Students are judged on the precision of their moves, including angle of hand, arm, foot and back positions.
The kids all lined up to get the results. The parents all Looooovvvvveeee the respect and obedience that is part and parcel of the responsibility taught with the tae kwon do. Every single one of the kids did a great job this time. Eli is third from the right (adult, shortest kid–wee Zach, then Eli).
Eli, Erin and Eliza were all called forward. We were all incredibly surprised, pleased and proud when Sensei Tammy (the blonde) said the kids were all testing for their yellow belt, but that all 9 black belts felt the children had shown they had earned BOTH stripes!!! In the last picture, Sensei Sue awards Eli his stripes.
The head of the school, the guy all in black in the center of the table in the photo above, said there was even talk of the three earning their green belts that night! Fortunately, the teachers who know them well spoke up and said the kids are good, but they aren’t there quite yet! Eli, as the youngest, especially needs to have a good perspective on just how much work is needed to advance to green belt. After green, you earn two stripes to red belt, then two stripes to black belt. And the kids can’t test for black until they are 18, since maturity is part of the requirement–not just the physical moves. He has ten years to that, so no rush. And we’re really proud of him!
