Anti-Bully Week

Last week was Anti-Bully week at SS's school. Her teacher likes to draw, and teaches the kids at least once a week, and encourages them to draw.  This is good for SS because right now there are no art classes offered locally. Mr. C asked the students to make a drawing about anti bullying. Our daughter has two parents who are incapable of drawing stick figures. I think I have mentioned that when I was a child forensic interviewer the children would make fun of my drawings (drawing during an interview breaks the ice, and busy hands relax kids), much to my colleagues' amusement. They finally made me face the fact that the kids were right and while I was a darn good interviewer, I had to do something about my lack of drawing skills. I had to resort to folding a paper much like an attempt at origami, open it, then color the fold shapes. In the twenty plus years I have known P, I have never seen him draw anything. That is how awful we are at art.

But SS is JJ's sister, never mind that they don't share a strand of DNA, but they both started drawing comics at an early age. JJ started his character Puppet, when he was six years old. I never got an explanation how Puppet came about, but he was still drawing him as a young adult. Imagine our surprise when SS started drawing her own comics. Unlike JJ, SS does not have a go to or main character. She is always coming up with different ideas and characters. They both loved to read comic books and were super hero crazy at the same ages, so that may be the common thread. We do know that prompting and creative help were non existent with either.

So instead of going along and making a drawing, SS made a comic about anti bullying. It's not full ride scholarship good, but we love that our girl is invested in her art, and that she is creative.

I should have listened to SS when she told me I'm not good at taking pictures. Well, this time I was not good at placing the drawing straight on the wall. Would it have killed me to wait until P returned in a few minutes? Patience is not I virtue I possess, and SS wanted to fold her drawing ASAP as to not forget to return it to her teacher tomorrow. That's my story and I'm sticking to it.

SS's return to karate.

SS really enjoyed karate class when she started in kindergarten. Her friend K was in the same class and they both advanced to yellow belt at the same time. K and family moved to Colorado after that, and SS lost the same size person she could pair during sparing. She attended two more sessions after that, but her surprising willingness to spar came to a halt. The child closest to SS's height and weight was way taller and heavier. SS's enthusiasm for karate waned, and we decided it was OK to give her a break. Well, SS asked to return to karate and we said why not.

This evening SS received her yellow belt third degree. She was very pleased with herself, and we are hoping she sticks with the classes, because she really needs it for coordination and discipline. Her instructor is quite an interesting guy. He has a black belt in karate, and is also an art instructor, and soccer coach. Mr. W is an interesting mix of humor and strict adherence to the rules.

He does not always pair the kids with same size partners, explaining if someone attacks them is not always going to be someone their same size. We can't argue with that reasoning, but it still pulls our heartstrings when she is pair with a boy more than a foot taller, who out weights her by 50+ pounds. SS is now rather timid when it comes to same size partners and is quite a soft touch, afraid of hurting her partners. Maybe with time she will become more confident in her skills.

Oh WOW look what I got!

I did it Mama and Baba, I did it! SS was really nervous about the evaluation and was convinced she would not pass. At this level the instructor is far more lenient. It's about getting the kids hooked on the discipline and get them hungry to advance. There was little sparing this time and that suited us just fine. Mainly because we have no idea where SS's sparing gloves are located. She feels icky using gloves worn by many others. Also at some point we will need to address the appropriateness of wearing glasses because accidents happen. But for now SS is just happy to be back, and that is fine with us.

ETA: You know what happens when you have not blogged in so long? You screw up, and I did.