Go baby go!

Miss 10 is a talented gymnast. Her team just won the State championships in her level (and as a credit to their amazing coaches and girls so did lots of the other levels in their club). She has beautiful form, lots of energy and determination. She gets pretty nervous about competing, but to me, once she’s going, it seems to go away. She likened it to the feeling that you’re about to fall flat on your face in front of hundreds of people. Which actually, as far as competition gymnastics goes, falling off the beam or bars or missing the vault or misjudging your round-off would mean you would fall flat on your face in front of hundreds of people. We had a State gym competition yesterday and she didn’t fall once, in fact she ended up with a silver medal. Clever chicken.

I am not much of a competition sports mum, my threat to take the floor for a solo routine during the break was the only time she gave me ‘the look’ and she requested us to ‘clap only and not cheer loudly’ (I did both and she didn’t notice!). My clever friend did a beautiful really super tight braid in her hair, but I’m sure if I was more talented as a competitive sports mum I’ve have worked out the whole hair-do thing (our club fortunately is not into tizzy or makeup, but last year rocking up with her hair in a scrappy pony tail and no idea of competition mum etiquette (I would tell you what this is but as I have no idea I can’t, sorry) was a bit stressful). As kids we didn’t do competitive sports, so perhaps I didn’t learn how to do from my parents, but although I loved watching my girl compete and the whole excitement of the loud music and marching on and awards, I’m not driven for it. She’s amazing anyway, and as well as.

She is a cracker, Miss 10. Her latest performance includes her singing ‘Roar’ by Katy Perry without music to a choreographed dance with her friends. She’s always liked clothes that are not the ones I like, and insisted on wearing them even though I’ve tried to convince her otherwise. Once when she was about 5 she asked me if her older sister was the good baby and she was the “bad baby?”. I had to explain (as she’d obviously overheard me telling the story of her colic where she cried pitifully for the first 8 months of her life and rarely slept. And neither did I and I honestly thought I was going insane (I certainly behaved like an insane person, and there’s a particular manic smile I remember from that time)) that she had bad belly ache when she was a baby and it made it her really sad. Even though she was sad she was certainly not bad (the other stories she may have heard about her older sister were how she was so cool she would sleep anywhere – like under tables at restaurants and at the movies and even in the back of my ex-ambulance panel van out the front of the pub in a small coastal town (this is definitely not something I should share. Forget you read that)) and she always had sticking up crazy hair and enthusiasm for life that was unbeatable. She was cool with that, and I made sure after that time that I didn’t tell those stories within her ear shot or I told the edited version about her being sad (and no mention about me being crazy).

And that’s the joy of lots of children, a chance with each to enjoy their talents, and foibles, and create a story of their life (my oldest daughter does know the sleeping in the car at the pub story and likes to tease me about my poor parenting, I certainly won’t try to deny that, but she was with her dog, and I was just there (in the pub), and she slept in her camp bed the whole time and didn’t know it was the pub and not a house – denial all over).

I’m one proud Mumma today, not just because Miss 10 is a level 3 State Champion silver medallist, but because she’s cool and amazing, and has a talent for gymnastics. Go baby go.