Just ticking along with life

I realize I haven't posted anything on this blog in a long time, I must have been preoccupied with other things for a while.  Honestly, I don't feel like anything out of the ordinary has happened recently.  We have had the house up for sale for almost 2 weeks.  It's been the slowest start we have ever had, but it only takes one buyer, right?  As soon as we put the house up for sale, we had 6 inches of snow and it was 20 degrees for a week.  All that after a really mild winter so far-just our luck

I went to Columbia, Missouri to give a talk last week.  It was one of the most grueling things I've done in a long time-talking to many people that I'd never met before, then giving a seminar.  The hotel room was very nice though, you get a lot of room in Columbia.  Ben was jealous

Maggie and her Girl Scout troop have been selling cookies this month.  They held a cookie booth outside Dierberg's on Saturday morning, they had a lot of fun doing anything but selling cookies!!!

Maggie is doing very well with her horse riding, I have been taking her once a week and she gets a different horse every time.  This one is Hidalgo, he's my favourite one so far.  We had to change her regular time this month because we will be gone two Saturdays this month.  I like her Sunday teacher better, so we will probably stick with the new time for a while.

Great Western Invitational 2015

Ben and I went to Oswego for the Great Western Invitational.  It was another great trip, but absolutely freezing cold.  It was quite a drive up there on Saturday morning because the wind was so strong.  Ben did pretty well, I think he was better that at Houston, on the whole.  He didn't do high bar again, his wrist still hurt too much after his parallel bar routine.  I told him he needs to focus on high bar and leave pbars alone until his wrist is better.  He was still happy with his scores, so that's all that matters  

Vault
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JQ6mv8opqHE&feature=youtu.be
Parallel bars
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fSIS3P_Rqtw&feature=youtu.be
Floor
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OjyVcpE6y3I&feature=youtu.be
Pommel
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NtVnwJ2NStw&feature=youtu.be
Rings
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rBBI9MiH5CI&feature=youtu.be

Ceasefire declared today, but Kramatorsk attacked yesterday

Kyiv, February 11, 2015. Pro-Russian militants conducted another atrocity yesterday. They shelled Kramatosk with “Smerch” multiple rocket launchers. Militants targeted airfield in the vicinity of the city, as well as the industrial and residential areas nearby. “According to intelligence report, the shelling was conducted from Horlivka area controlled by illegal armed groups. As a result, 16 people were killed and 64 suffered from the attack,” said Colonel Andriy Lysenko, ATO spokesman, at a briefing at Ukraine Crisis Media Center. Monitors of the OSCE Special Monitoring Mission swiftly arrived on the site of tragedy. The Mission’s report states: “Based on the live observation, the pictures and maps analysis, the SMM assessed that the shelling was coming from the south-south-east direction”. “As one can see from the map these are the areas occupied by militants,” added the ATO spokesman.

Last night President of Ukraine Petro Poroshenko visited Kramatorsk. The President emphasized that he shall insist on a peaceful settlement of the conflict in Donbas and will push for this resolution during the upcoming talks in Minsk today. French writer, philosopher, film director and public figure Bernard-Henri Lévy accompanied President Poroshenko during his visit to Kramatorsk. “Bernard-Henri Lévy was shocked by what he saw in Kramatorsk. He urged the international community to open its eyes on the horrible crimes of Russian-backed militants in eastern Ukraine,” noted Colonel Lysenko during the briefing.

Houston National Invitational 2015

This was Ben's first meet of the season.  It was the 5th meet for the rest of the team.  We didn't know if we were going or not until 4 days before we left, so it was a bit of a rush.  Ben had really wanted to go to Houston and had worked really hard to be able to compete in some events.  We spent most of the time with his friend Liam and his Dad.  They were on the same flights as us.  I had told them we were going down to the Space Center when we arrived and they decided to come with us.  We also ate dinner with them on Thursday night-the boys wanted steak

Ben was really nervous about the meet, but I think he slept OK.  He certainly didn't eat much for breakfast though.

The meet was a huge one.  They only invited teams that were really good, so SLGC was lucky to be invited. However, that meant that they were up against some huge competition.  There were at least 4 gyms from California, including #1 and # 2, also one from Mexico and one from Argentina.  The meet was held at NRG arena, the place was huge.  No wonder Ben was nervous.

Floor
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9LOS3E_EJqQ&list=UUAOWX-wOARFYsMlXtYv82vA&index=1

Vault
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=abBjeBBmtg4&index=2&list=UUAOWX-wOARFYsMlXtYv82vA

Pommel
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XAVsNv32_ZQ&list=UUAOWX-wOARFYsMlXtYv82vA&index=4

Rings
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cmIDWLKccVo&list=UUAOWX-wOARFYsMlXtYv82vA&index=3

Ben did pretty well.  He got 5th place on vault and was middle of the pack with other events.  Not bad considering he's been out for so long.  He didn't do high bar and only half of parallel bars.  He hasn't got all his skills back yet....

Trip to Houston Space Center

While Ben and I were in Houston, we went to the Houston Space Center.  I thought Ben would like to see it, plus I wanted him to have some idea of the space program.  It's so different to when I was that age and every launch was a huge event.

One of Ben's team mates went with us and they had a great time in the kids area, landing shuttles and sitting in simulators like this

One of the astronauts made this bench

We took the tram ride and stopped at the old Mission Control.  The current one is on the floor below

I think the boys liked the training center the best

This is Orion, the newest space project.  

A robonaut!!!

This is Memorial Grove.  There is a tree planted for each fallen astronaut.  There are trees planted on the other side of the road to commemorate civilians who have passed away

The last stop was at the Saturn V area.  It was really amazing to see

Maggie's new riding stables

The Equestrian Assisted Therapy told me that Maggie is too advanced for them.  After one session, it was apparent that it's not the right place for her.  I took her to Kraus riding stables yesterday, it's a regular stables and I hope she can continue with them.  I think she will be OK if she does private lessons and has one of us to help her at all times.
I was a little concerned when they told us that she would have to do a written exam to advance (she has a whole book to study), but at this point we aren't too worried about advancing as much as Maggie just enjoying lessons.
I filled out some paperwork and then we went down to saddle up Maggie's horse.  This was her horse for the day, his name is Quincy.  They give the kids a different horse every time they go.  You have to get there about 15 mins before the lesson so that you can get your horse ready. I had to help Maggie find her horses's equipment because she could not find his name on the wall, these are things she will need help with.

Maggie did pretty well with watching Madeline set the horse up.  I hope she remembered more than I did though.  Caroline had gone with us and she used to ride horses, so I think she will be more help!!!

Maggie had to brush the horse with two separate brushes to get all the dirt off before saddling him.  Then she had to clean out his hooves.  This is all a new world to us

Maggie did really well in the arena and even had the horse going back and forth through cones.

She is going to start doing private lessons on Saturdays.  Hopefully she can progress to group lessons once she gets the hang of it all.  I think she will be OK if she can keep her focus.  She usually does well if it's something she is interested in.  When they gave her instructions with saddling the horse, she takes a while to process it.  It was obvious that she was unsure of what she was doing, but I think she will manage to keep up after a few sessions.

Still growing....

I took Ben to Dr Tollefsen on Friday.  He is still growing well, not quite caught up with me yet, but less than an inch left!!!  He is now 5 ft 3.2 in and he weighs 114 lbs.  He's put on a lot of weight and  by the look of him, it's all muscle.  We talked about what to do in the future.  She said that they will continue to give him growth hormone  until he grows less than one inch each year.  So far, he's growing about 3 inches a year, so he has plenty to go.  They did a bone scan and I need to get his blood drawn again-he will NOT be happy about that

Got this from his doctor:
Ben's bone age was read as 14 years, but I thought it was slightly older. His height prediction is terrific - 169.4 cm (66.7") to 173.2 cm (68.2")!