A Week of Mourning

One week ago tonight, on Sunday, March 6th, I received a phone call from my mom - a call in which my mom had to tell me that my Nana had passed away earlier that evening.

I knew the call was coming - my Nana had been sick for awhile, and last Friday, my mom called to tell me that things had deteriorated, and my Nana would soon lose her battle.

It didn't matter, nothing could have prepared me for that call.

It's been a long and tiring week. Curt and I left for Acton Monday morning, after getting things at work and skating organized for the week. We spent the week at Tom and Krystle's - it was good, and necessary, to be surrounded by family for the week.

Visitation, or the wake, for my Nana was on Wednesday. The weather was horrible, wet snow and then freezing rain, so we didn't have as many people as expected.

The funeral was on Thursday. I have always been really close to my Nana, and really wanted to speak at her funeral, to share some of the special memories I have of her. It was really hard, and when I got behind the pulpit, I actually didn't think I was going to be able to do it. I got through it, but I did a horrible job - there were a lot of tears and sniffles - and there were times people probably couldn't understand what I was saying. But, I'm still really glad I did it...I know I would always regret it if I had backed out.

Following the funeral, we went to the cemetery for the burial. Again, horrible weather - there were huge puddles, it was muddy, and it rained the entire time we were there. You know that old saying, that rain is the angels in Heaven crying - if that's the case, the angels were crying happy tears on Thursday - they were celebrating the arrival of my Nana in Heaven, while those of us on earth all mourned our loss.

Great is Thy faithfulness!
Morning by morning new mercies I see.
All I have needed Thy hand hath provided;
Great is Thy faithfulness, Lord, unto me!
Lyrics from the hymn 'Great is Thy Faithfulness' - one of the hymns my Nana had selected for the congregation to sing at her funeral.

Blessed are those who mourn, for they will be comforted.
Matthew 5:4

Beaverton Competition

Last weekend I traveled to Beaverton for the last skating competition of the season. Where is Beaverton you ask? Good question, I had no idea either. But, it's near Orillia - which is about three hours from Belleville. So, it was a long way to go for a competition, but I made a bit of a mistake earlier this season, so we had no other choice. A club nearby (as in 40 minutes away) usually has a competition in early March, so I was planning on taking my skaters there - however, they weren't hosting the competition this year, and by the time I realized that, I had missed the registration deadline for the only other competition in our area. The girls are used to going to two competitions a year, so the options for our second one were either Beaverton or Ottawa - I figured when the parents heard our options, they would decide one would be good enough, instead, they all wanted to go to Beaverton...so, we did.

I drove up on the Friday night because I had to be there for 8:15am. The drive was fine, better then I expected it to be - on the way out the door, I grabbed a few old CD's, and it was kinda fun to listen to old favourites from my university days. I spent the night at a local hotel, and discovered that I don't sleep well when at a hotel without Curt. I think every little noise woke me up, and it was cold without him in the same bed.

The actual competition went really well though, and my skaters all did really well and I was a very proud coach!

Hannah, who struggled at the competition in January, did very well with her solo, and ended up placing fourth. She really liked the ribbon that she won, it was multi-coloured and she thought it was perfect, she even thought it was better then a medal. Unfortunately, she had a hard time with her elements, and placed last in that event. I have a really hard time deciding where to register Hannah for competitions, and I felt really bad for her as she was doing her elements - it was obvious that the other girls were much stronger, and that she wasn't going to do well. She knew it too, and was in tears by the time she came off the ice - it broke my heart. But, she's a good kid, and after a little reassurance from me that she would do better in that stage next year, I think she was feeling better.

Little Ella did amazing, again! She won her first medal back in January at Shining Waters, and she must have liked how that felt, because she did it again in Beaverton - and this time, she won medals in both events. And, not just any medal, but gold medals! She was so happy with herself, and enjoyed being up on the podium - so much so, that she spent a few extra seconds up there making sure everyone got pictures of her.


Love this girl!


Ella and I, after her two medals!

Alyssa also did really well, again, and took home two medals. This girl always does well at competitions, and she deserves too, she's a hard worker. This time, she took home gold in her elements and bronze in her solo. Her mom told me that she was a little disappointed with the bronze, but she denied it - and she better not have been. I'm usually pretty quick to set my kids straight if they're too hard on themselves.

And Naomi, another skater who didn't do very well at the competition in January. She's actually struggled all season, and hasn't been making a lot of progress. Her mom and I had discussions about her not coming back to skating next year. So, going into this competition, I did something I would never usually do. Naomi is right on the fence in terms of what stage she should compete at; usually, when I have skaters like that, I bump them to the higher level, and that's what I did with her in January, but then she didn't do well. So, this time, I decided to bump her down, but only because I didn't think she would be coming back, and I wanted her to end on a good note. And that she did - she ended up first in her elements and third in her solo! She was so excited, and so was her mom. And, now they're talking about skating next year?!? Ooops, that kinda kicked me in the butt...it could be hard to explain to them next year that I'm not going to hold her back just so she wins medals, that is NOT my style.

Oh, and one of my Quinte skaters made the trip to Beaverton, too. Unfortunately, Kailtin didn't have a very good day - she finished last and second last in her two events. She didn't skate her best solo though, and she knew that; she actually got a little confused and lost her spot at one point - you see it all the time, but none of my skaters have done that before, it was stressful. She had to do some tough elements too, things we hadn't worked on prior to preparing for the competition (I only starting giving Kaitlin lessons in November, and only give her one lesson a week).

And, to finish the day off, I got to drive home in a snow storm, and the three hour trip turned into four hours! Luckily, I left at the same time as one of my Tweed families, and they made sure to keep me close, which I appreciated! Even though I was still driving alone, it was good to have someone I knew in a vehicle right in front of me.

So, competitions have wrapped up for the season, and now it's on to carnival preparation. We started practices for that this week, and although it's a busy time, I'm already excited for the big day!

More Family Day Stuff

First of all, I'm cheating...I'm way behind in posting, so I'm changing the date to try to keep things in order.

Now, onto Day 2 of the Robertson's visit.

Sunday was pretty low key - we went to the mall, and ended up being there all morning. I've never really enjoyed our local mall - it's small, and doesn't have any great stores - but, Tom and Krystle didn't seem to mind, and they managed to pick up stuff for the whole family.

We stayed in for dinner, and although I planned on making something, we decided on something much better - we had pizza delivered! The reason I mention this is because we've lived here for three years, and never knew we could get pizza delivered out here, could be dangerous information :)

Monday was actually 'Family Day' and we made the best of it this year, we all went bowling! It was Nolan's first time, and he had a blast. And, because he was having so much fun, it was fun for the rest of us.


Nolan's very first try - getting a little help from Dad, and a 'ramp'.


Celebrating his great shot!


Nolan getting into it - by the look on that face, he's hoping for a strike!


And, judging by that face, he may have gotten a strike?!? :)


Check out that score sheet - 'NR' up top is Nolan, and he broke 100! Pretty impressive considering there were no bumpers in the gutters, his only help was that 'ramp' thing...and he didn't even use that every time, he wanted to bowl like us. And, take another look, 'MV' was the big winner with a score of 146 - yup, that was me!

So, I think bowling was a big hit, and it was a fun way to spend the morning.

Unfortunately, that pretty much wrapped up our weekend. After lunch and naps, the Robertson's hit the road to get home in good time, and I went off to skating for the evening.

It was a great weekend - thanks to Tom and Krystle for making the trip! We really enjoyed having you, and can't wait until your next visit.

Belated Family Day Post

Well, I am a full week behind in posting this, but I don't want to skip this post because we had a really fun weekend. Tom, Krystle, Nolan and Abby came for a visit - they arrived on Saturday and left Monday afternoon, so we had lots of time for visiting.

They arrived while I was at skating, and when I got home from the rink, everyone was napping...it was hard to resist going in to wake Nolan up, I'd been waiting for a hug and kiss from that little guy for awhile :)

Anyway, once everyone was awake and ready to go, the boys and I headed over to the rink across the road for a little skate. Nolan was pretty excited to get to play hockey, and I was excited to see how Nolan's skating was coming. However, when we were talking about going, Nolan told me that I wasn't allowed to go because I was 'a bad girl skater'...what?!?! Don't know where that came from, last time we went skating, he didn't mention anything of the sort. Obviously I went with them anyway, but then when I put my skates on and started skating, Nolan told me to 'STOP' and then said I had to have a penalty because I had white skates...what?!?!


The boys out skating; Nolan was the goalie the whole time, so I didn't actually get to see much skating, but he was having fun, so that's OK.


Nolan and I on the ice. You can see that his comments had an affect on me, and that I really love him, because I have a hockey stick in my hand :)

After skating, it was off to town to go out for dinner. We went to a restaurant called 'The Bull & Boar'. We tried this restaurant last time the Robertson's were in town, and we all really liked it, so it may become a tradition when they visit.


Abby at dinner; I think she looks so cute in this picture - look at those eyelashes, and her lips - too bad Tom's toque is on her!

Saturday was also bath night, not that I have a lot to say about this, but I do have a few fun pictures to share.


Just before bath time, Nolan had to come out to the living room to show me his boxers! This one just makes me laugh, Nolan's face is so funny, and Abby looks pretty comfy there with her brother.


Mohawks! You can tell that Abby's hair is getting long, her mohawk wouldn't stand up, it kept flopping over.


We also tried to get a good picture of Abby and I before bath time - we wanted a picture where you could read her shirt, this is the closest we could come. Her shirt says 'My Aunt is my BFF'...I got it for her back in July, when Curt and I were in California.

So that wraps up Day 1 - I didn't plan on this being so long, or having so many pictures - but once I saw how long it was getting, I decided I better break this up. More pics to come from the rest of their visit :)

In No Particular Order

It's Friday night - Curt has a hockey game, after which he'll probably go out for beer and wings, and I'm at home watching TV, which is totally fine by me, in fact, I wouldn't have it any other way.

It's been another busy week, and it's going to be a busy weekend, so I'm glad to have some down time.

I really wanted to write a post while I have the time, but I don't really have anything to write about, so here comes some random thoughts from the week.

1. As I mentioned, we're in for a busy weekend - and that's because we're having company, my brother and his family are coming for a few days, and I'm REALLY excited! I haven't seen them since Christmas, and that's too long to go between visits.

We were hoping to go skating while they're here (on the rink that Curt made in the park across the street), but, it's been really mild the last two days, so it's more like a pool now. The forecast says it's going to get cold again, so maybe we'll get lucky and it will re-freeze.

2. So yeah, it's been mild for a few days...I think it was 7 degrees this afternoon! It's been a nice little taste of spring, but the reality is, we still have plenty of cold weather to get through before it's really spring.

3. We've started working on carnival at one of the clubs I coach at. We decided on 'Around the World' as a theme - and anyone who knows me is going to think it was my idea, but it wasn't, another coach came up with it - but, I am very excited about it! I will be choreographing a number with my older STARSkaters, and I'm going to use music from Africa! I started looking for music last weekend, it's going to be hard to select just one song :)

4. Curt and I are going to Acton in April, although Curt doesn't really know this yet ;) My nephew Nolan is going to be in his own skating carnival, and I can't miss that. He's going to be a monkey...ha!

5. Curling continues to be a lot of fun, but, we're not doing as well as we were when we first started. I guess we had some serious beginners luck, and it's run out. A few weeks ago, Curt figured out the league standings, and we were tied for third...we haven't won a game since then, so now we're probably down to fourth or fifth. Hopefully we can turn things back around, we need to get ourselves into the "A" Pool for playoffs!

And, I'm going to finish with the most random stuff of all...

6. Last weekend we watched the movie 'Conviction'; it was really good, a tear jerker, and I highly recommend it. And, I'm reading a really good book. It's called 'The Guernsey Literary and Potato Peel Pie Society'; it's a weird title, and I never would have bought it, but, some friends and I started a book club, and this is the first selection.

And now, I have some carnival stuff to prepare for tomorrow - and when that's done, I'm going to read for awhile - then it's off to bed nice and early, so I'm well rested for the weekend!

Distant Memories

This post is long overdue, but I wanted to go ahead and write about two skating competitions that I attended with my skaters back in January. The first one was Shining Waters, a competition for my CanSkate/lower level skaters, and the second one was Whitby Invitational, a competition for my STARSkate/higher level skaters.

SHINING WATERS
Shining Waters Interclub was hosted by Norwood & District Figure Skating Club this year; I had six kids competing, four from Tweed and two from Quinte.

There was a lot of drama surrounding our Tweed entries - one of our registration packages was received a week after the deadline, and they weren't going to let the majority of our kids in. The worst part was that most of the kids who were going to be turned away were our CanSkaters - this was going to be their first competition, so they had gone out and purchased new dresses, Tweed jackets, etc. and it looked like it was all going to be for nothing. The other concern was that this competition is often what helps hook young skaters in, they experience a fun competition and can't wait to do it again. About a week and a half before the competition, an error in the scheduling was discovered, and we were informed that our skaters would be allowed to compete - so it all ended well, it just caused a lot of stress for a few weeks!

One of my favourite parts of the day was when my little skater Ella, who is only five, placed third in Individual Elements. This was the first time she won a medal; and leading up to the competition, her mom told that if she won a medal, she would give her a toonie! So, when her mom lifted her up to show her the results sheet, she looked at her mom and said 'Do I really get a WHOLE toonie now?!'

Another highlight was having another skater, Alyssa, place first in both her Individual Elements and her FreeSkate. This little girl works so hard, my older kids could really learn from her and the work ethic she has! Anyway, she said to me after she found out about the gold in Individual Elements, 'That was my goal, because last year I was second, so this year I wanted to get first!' Way to set goals, Alyssa! :)

It was the first competition for one of my Quinte skaters, Kaitlin, so when she placed third in her Individual Elements she was VERY excited (as were her parents)!

Unfortunately, two of my skaters placed last, or second to last, in all of their events...that is always really hard to handle as a coach. It's not that they skated poorly, they went out and did their best, it's just that they had some stiff competition. They have another competition in two weeks, and I certainly hope that they do better there - I made some changes to their solos, and they get to do a different set of elements, so hopefully that helps.

WHITBY INVITATIONAL
I had four skaters competing at this competition, all from Tweed, and it was a great competition...well, for three out of four of them, anyway.

My first skater of the day, Britteny, didn't skate her best - she is usually a very powerful skater, with lots of speed, but she was hesitant and looked slow at the competition. The main components of her solo were done well, but she skated it slow and ended up finishing just behind the music. She was devastated, and really hard on herself, even when she found out that she placed fifth out of ten. I had never seen this side of her, probably because this is the first time she hasn't placed in the top three - but, this is also the first time that she has faced this type of competition. It was a good lesson for her, even though she doesn't know it yet :)

My second skater of the day, Jillian, is the one who didn't fare so well - she ended up placing seventh out of nine. This poor girl is just not meant to jump, she's been working on three main jumps all season, and still can't land them. So, unfortunately, I knew going into the competition that she wouldn't do well. Prior to this competition, Jillian, her mom and I had had a little meeting, and we discussed the struggles she has with jumps, and the three of us decided it might be best to take a break from them for a bit, so she doesn't just get frustrated and want to quit skating - so, now that the competition is behind her, we've been choreographing an interpretive program, and she seems to be having a lot more fun.

My next skater, Kate, had a great skate and like Britteny, placed fifth out of ten.

And finally, Leah, she is my 'loose cannon'...I just never know what to expect from her when it comes to competitions. But, she skated a great program, had one of the best axle attempts I've seen her do, and ended up placing fifth out of eleven.

So, three fifth place finishes...at least they're consistent!

This was the last competition of the season for these girls, so I'm glad that it went well for them.

Now, it's time for them to focus on Dance and FreeSkate for an upcoming test day.

Continued Absence

Well, as you know, things have been really quiet on my blog for the last few months...and, unfortunately, I think they're going to stay that way for awhile.

Last week, my contract at work was extended, again...and, not just for two weeks (which I was expecting), it's been extended all the way to May 20th.

Honestly, I have mixed feelings about this...

There are the obvious positives - it's a job; it's a 'real' job in the social services field, so I'm kinda using my degree; it pays well; they've accommodated my skating schedule; and, it's Monday to Friday.

But, there are some negatives, too - although it's a 'real' job in the social services field, sometimes I feel like I used my degree more while working at the golf course; it's been pretty hectic working all day Monday to Friday, and then skating three nights a week and Saturdays; and, the work itself is boring and monotonous.

This job has been a very good experience, and I've learned a lot, even in the short time that I've been there.

I've learned a lot about social services - I had no idea this program even existed prior to starting, so that alone is big; but, in dealing with the clients, I've also learned a lot about other programs that exist in our area.

I've also learned a lot about myself - I can be really patient when it comes to teaching kids to skate, not so much when I'm dealing with irate people yelling at me on the phone; no matter how boring and monotonous the job, I'm still going to give 110%; and, I'm on the fence about whether or not I'm really a Monday to Friday, nine to five, kinda girl.

So, I'm trying to be positive and appreciate the opportunity while I have it. I'm sure the next few months will fly by and I'll be back to the dreaded 'job searching'...I can only hope that this new experience is beneficial on my resume.

And, that turned into a really wordy post, and all I'm trying to say is that my posts will probably continue to be few and far between for awhile.