Some days are just too good to be true.
This morning we had another Tae Kwon Do class. Of course we practiced the form together before we went. At class Master Hong asked me to be the “Captain” of a small group of orange stripe belt students that didn’t have their green tape yet – including H2. So we practiced some more.
After about 30 minutes one of the senior black belts (Ms Joy who will soon be a Master herself) joined us for green tape testing. And again, H2 was told that she was this close. I could see her face falter. She had been sure that today she would do it (but she still has sequencing issues and tends to get her footwork mixed up around steps 6 or 7).
After class we lined up to get their attitude tapes (another requirement for belt testing – this one is about behavior outside of class which the girls aced). And I mentioned to Ms Joy just how hard this was for H2. Ms Joy had been the girls’ teacher back in the Tiny Tiger days and clearly likes them – so she asked us if we had time to wait until she helped the other students so she could take another look at H2.
We went outside and practiced some more. At this point H2 had done her form about 20-25 times this morning. We went back inside and then Ms Joy took H2 and told me and S2 to wait inside. I of course peeked (but in a way that H2 couldn’t see that I was watching). H2 continued to struggle at the same steps. They are hard as they are unusual and different from what the girls have done for the past year and a half. First you do a half step with the left foot; you just get the feet closer – something we haven’t done before. Then you step again with that same left foot (again, a first). And to make matters worse, instead of punching with the same arm as you do the step (i.e., left), you have to punch with the opposite arm (yet again something we never had to do). So this is really hard – I struggled with it, too.
Ms Joy did the whole form and parts of the form with her for at least another ten minutes – by the time they came back inside H2 had done the form at least 30 times. Once or twice she was perfect, but most of the times she got something wrong. My heart just ached as I thought I knew what was going to happen. And H2 clearly looked just infinitely sad. And then Ms Joy said “H2, you worked so hard on this and I can tell that you can do it. I will give you the green tape under the condition that you practice these three steps over and over with your dad.
H2 at first thought she had heard wrong. And then you saw that total joy and happiness on her face. Priceless.
We celebrated. First with smoothies, then (since the girls complained being cold and hungry) we had banana bread and a latte (me) and hot chocolate (the girls) next door at Starbucks.
That alone would make for a great day, but it got better. Tonight was Daddy and Daughter Dinner. The girls had been looking forward to this for weeks and finally, finally today was the day. The excitement of the morning and the excitement waiting for the evening created a couple of rough spots during the day, but nothing that caused any real problems. And then they were allowed to get dressed. And I did their hair – one braid for H2, two braids for S2. And we got to go.
The girls and K2 had bought four different dress-up dresses and the girls had been worrying which one to wear – but then as they had to pick tonight they knew right what they wanted. I guess they had made their decision at some point the last couple of days.
Strangely S2 has started to make a really serious face whenever someone takes pictures – I have to ask her to find out why… maybe it’s because we told her not to be the big fake smile… but a couple of pictures in the series show her break out of the overly serious look, anyway.
We drove to the community center. And a couple of cars ahead of us was this massive huge stretch limo. As in Hollywood sized – you don’t see this much in Portland. Another dad had rented a limousine for his two daughters and two friends of them. Wow, I felt like a bit of an underachiever. But the girls of course didn’t care one bit.
They ran in, scoped the place, found the arts projects, the treasure hunt, the picture taking, everything. I stopped counting how many times they told me that they had a wonderful time and how much they enjoyed this. It was fun.
I apologize for the quality of this picture. It’s a photo of the picture they took (and printed out) at the event. I didn’t have a chance to scan it and do the best possible job at post-processing. But I really wanted to post it as it shows the three of us together. Again, S2’s face is not an indication of unhappiness, it’s just what she does for pictures right now.
So yes, a wonderful day. We came home about an hour past their usual bed time. The girls are sound asleep and maybe tomorrow morning they won’t wake me up before six? Who knows. I told H2 that it was ok if she wanted to come snuggle – after all it will be my last night here for who-knows how long.
tagged with pictures
