Z Girl Made It!

2Z have been taking gymnastics lessons for four years now. they started at the little gym and moved up to real gymnastic lessons about two years ago. one summer while we were vacationing in lake tahoe, Z girl saw the 2004 olympics on tv and set her heart on going to the olympics for gymnastics ever since. when we decided to move to texas, one of the first things that popped into my head was that many of the olympic coaches were from texas. maybe Z girl actually has a chance of realizing her dream! at a friend's recommendation, i signed 2Z up for some classes at a gym located in the city we live in. the moment we walked into the gym, we came face to face with a life-size poster of carly patterson, the 2004 olympic all around gold medalist. as it turned out, this gym was where she trained. i was so excited until Z girl attended her first class. her skills lagged way behind even though she already had four years of lessons. however, in the two and a half months since joining this gym, Z girl worked extremely hard to improve. i was so moved by her level of concentration during the classes. i've never seen her take anything so seriously.

Z boy, on the other hand, has always taken gym for fun. also, it was definitely betterto play inside than waiting outside for Z girl to finish. even though he was pretty good at listening to his coaches, he goofed off just as much. as long as he was getting his exercise and enjoying himself, i didn't have a problem with it at all.

this gym, apparently, holds yearly evaluations for all their students. the boys' evaluations took place early in august while the girls' evals are going on this week. imagine B and my surprise when we got a call from Z boy's coach after the eval that he has been recommended to join a team in preparations for competition. the first thing we thought of was," what about Z girl?" the first thing Z girl said, when she heard Z boy was promoted, was, "what about me, mommy?" (you have to imagine the look of hope accompanied by her sweet, girly voice at this point.) i was almost speechless. being the ever resourceful mom, i immediately remembered that her eval was not for another few weeks.

so today, after almost forgetting about evals already, it happened. when we walked into the gym, i saw the coaches all had clipboards in their hands. i didn't tell Z girl right away since i wasn't sure if she'd be nervous or not. anyway, to make an already long story shorter, she got promoted! she ran out of her class shouting, "mommy, i passed. i am moving up." she's actually not on a competitive team yet-- she moved up to the advanced class. but she's so happy with her progress that we are ecstatic for her.

sorry, no pics to post since it's so hard to capture constantly moving kids from the waiting area. plus at any given time, i think there are 100 kids training in the gym. sometimes, i can't even find 2Z in that huge gym!