Tag: move

Evaluations

January 29, 2021

Evaluations

This week and next week are skills testing weeks at gym. Evaluations of skills each gymnast has and their ability to move up or stay in their current level to solidify their knowledge.

Most of the time, the coaches catch when their student gymnast gets enough skills and strength or knowledge to move up, but sometimes it takes a “skills test” for a gymnast to show off or put a little more power into her actions!

This made me think about life.

Life is full of levels.

Sometimes we just move through them seamlessly. You know, like gliding from toddlerhood to preschool, or moving from 9th to 10th grade. High school to college is a little more of a push – this is like an evaluation. Are you ready? Well, time is here – which choice do you make?

In our personal growth, we tend to move slowly. It’s when a climatic event causes us to evaluate ourselves that we discover strengths we didn’t know we had or weaknesses we thought we didn’t have. Your eldest child going to college and you are tossed into the whirlwind of various choices, plans, financial issues, helping your young adult navigate stress (praying you can do that well, because she is expressing what you are internalizing!), and believing that a way will be made.

This time you have to view as a positive change. You have to realize that this temporary negative appearance will prove to be the lifetime starting point for your young adult. Your attitude through this is your “evaluation,” your young adult will be taking notes on and remembering. (Everyone else in your household is also watching!)

Sometimes a life “evaluation” is others watching how you navigate troubled waters. Like the death of your father, your sister, your close friend, your child. Losing someone you treasure. That despair can allow you to create a pit to lose yourself in. Or you can look up and pull on the strength that only comes from Jesus. This evaluation is never something we want to face.

Evaluation week went along with my study: Examine yourself to see what is good and right; remove that which leads toward darkness.

(My paraphrase again, I summarized the page-long study to that line. Most of the verses linked all boiled down to that same line as my brain interpreted them.) I imagine darkness to be the depth of one’s soul without Jesus. Since Jesus is Light and darkness is the absence of light, that makes the most sense to me.

See, when trouble hits, I can either turn inside myself and go into darkness or look outside and reach up to Jesus. In Him there is strength to endure everything.

Life has taught me that.

My “evaluations” have proven it.

I pray I always choose to reach up. I want those watching me during “skills testing” to be led to Jesus. That is my goal.

Crazy writer’s brain that sees the little flyer on our desk that reads “skills testing weeks” and launches into deep thoughts… hopefully these wandering thoughts help lift you up!

Type at you later!

~Nancy Tart

My New Gym!

August 22, 2019

Our New Gym!

Have you ever moved? 

YES!  I can remember 19 different homes in my early years.  My husband and I have shifted houses 10 times in almost 17 years. 

I am intimately aware of moving.

I know just how many boxes can fit in a 5×8 moving trailer.  I can look at your furniture and see it morphing into place inside a moving van like blocks in Tetris – just with some blankets and pillows strategically placed here and there for padding.

WGV Gymnastics (which yes, I call “my gym” even though it’s not mine, I coach there… but I love it!) just moved from their old facility to the new one at 135 Center Place Way, Saint Augustine, in World Golf Village area.  (They literally moved across the pond!)

We helped with loading a trailer and cleaning.  Our monster was the pit – do you know how many giant trash bags are needed to clean out 15,000+ 6”x6”x6” foam pit blocks?  We have no clue, but it’s upwards of 500.  And that doesn’t count those wrapped up in the tarp! 

Our new facility has amazing new equipment, huge cooling fans, the climbing rope (Kimberly’s favorite), and I can’t wait to teach classes in the new preschool area!  Our after-school program is very nice.  We have two vans that pick children up from area schools. (Mill Creek, Pacetti Bay, and Palencia Elementary, to name a few – check with the office if you want to find out if your school is covered!) In this program, you can pick which days you need pick up, and your students will have assistance with homework, crafts and games to entertain them, and snacks while they wait for you to pick them up!  Since we are a gymnastics facility, the bonus to the program is access to specified gymnastics classes.

Dozens of people helped out in this massive move.  Teamwork.  That’s why I only know a small facet of the whole picture. 

We finished by sorting all the blocks into good, bad, and ugly. Good went to the new pit, bad to be shredded to make new mats, and ugly to the trash bin. Our teamwork system was separated into groups of various sizes doing specific tasks: One pulled bags up out of the pit, one opened bags, one put good blocks neatly into uHaul boxes, one bagged up the bad & trashed the ugly, and one took “train cars” (aka uHaul boxes loaded with pit blocks) to the door to wait for the “engine” (aka the truck to the new gym).

Lucas and Jillian loaded the bags out with a rope (before it got reassigned to another task) while Kimberly tosses bags up to be sorted! This teamwork went on for hours.

While I only know the pit blocks intimately during this move, I am super excited for the new facility and our growth from here out.  Come and see us at 135 Center Place Drive at WGV Gymnastics!

Type at you next time,

~Nancy Tart

First Sweet Potato & Fit!

July 30, 2019

First Sweet Potato (and Fit!)

Thea is five months old.

She is fascinated with everything.  If it moves, she giggles at it and wants to chase it.  If it makes a sound, she wants to chase it.  If it is in the possession of an older sibling, she wants to touch it.  If it looks fluffy or new (as in she wasn’t looking at it ten seconds ago), she wants to chase it.

For her, “chase” means raise her arms and legs like in a superman hold and shove her body forward, sideways, or backward on her tummy.  I’ve seen my other six babies, remember several siblings as babies, and have had numerous little nieces and nephews over – she is the first to do this type of scoot. (But then, each one has their own unique movement method!)

Theadora in my office

Maybe she has figured out that on hard floors (her entire environment) this type of movement makes the blanket travel with her.

She has learned to roll – has been doing both of these movements since about 3 months (but she rarely wants to go anywhere, so it’s like “surprise! I want to move at this second!” she loves to do the unexpected). 

Lucas will get on one side of her, giggle, and roll away.  She will giggle and follow.  Monkey see, monkey do!  He calls this game “rolling the ball” – I’m literally making her bassinet when I hear, “Mom!  Look!  I’m rolling a ball!” accompanied with a river of giggles from both Lucas and Thea.  He’s rolling in front of Thea and she’s following him all the way across the bed.  He rolls off the end of the bed (a fall of about 9 inches) and I’m about to jump into protect-baby-from-floor-barrier when he puts both hands on Thea’s tummy to keep her from rolling the last flip and says, “can’t go that way, I can fall off but you can’t yet ‘cause your head isn’t done yet.”

Lucas is her protector, her shield from danger, her loving big brother – and the one who leads her into most new (scary for us!) adventures, like rolling non-stop or eating something new – “Look, Mom!  She likes ice cream!”  (*facepalm in my brain* but at least it’s Daddy’s homemade vanilla soft serve) next line is “No, Baby Thea, only big boys can eat cones, you can just taste the ice cream.”  He’s letting her “taste” like we do, tapping one finger on the food and putting it on her tongue.

That backfired with the sweet potatoes. 

Oh, yes, nice story:

A cute 3-month-old goes with her family to Grandma’s favorite restaurant for a celebration.  She’s the epitome of baby cuteness in her Sunday best.  Everyone is being so well-behaved. Mom is having sweet potato (all the others have had sweet potato as a first food) and lets baby taste it.

BABY TURNS INTO VELOCIRAPTOR!

She starts jumping forward, grabbing at the table, mom’s fork, mom’s hair, anything to get back to the sweet potato!  Mom thinks she’s had enough after a few tastes, but NO!  Sweet little cuteness erupts into a full blown literal tantrum!  She flings herself back in frustration and screams! Daddy thinks this is funny. (Everyone else is bug-eyed, is she really throwing a fit?) Daddy says, “watch this” and gives her a small taste on the end of a spoon.  Thea sees the spoon coming, instantly stops fussing, alligator tears evaporate, and she grabs the spoon with both hands and shoves it into her mouth.  Once she sucked it dry, she looks up at Daddy with pleading eyes and babbles in what-adults-can’t-understand to mean “more please?”  He fed her a little more to keep the peace.

 Lucas was even spellbound watching Thea, his sweet, tiny, fragile-looking baby sister toss her baby fit.  Mommy took this excellent opportunity to mention quietly that wasn’t very nice.  He says, “I don’t like that screaming.” To which I answer, “we feel just like you do now when you drop yourself on the floor and start kicking.” (Doesn’t happen often, but it’s been a thing since I started working.) “Oh.” I think gears are turning in his brain.

And this:

is what everyone else in the world sees…

Type at you later,

~Nancy Tart

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