Busy Weekend!

We had quite a busy couple of days. On Saturday, the girls had their end-of-year horse show at Macnair's Country Acres, where they've been taking riding lessons since last fall. WOW, was it hot. Miss Tonna came to cheer the girls on (and she did a fabulous job entertaining the Snort, too):



The girls got to give their instructor 3 ponies or horses that they wanted to ride, so that they had their best chance at doing well in the show. The girls normally ride ponies, but Emma did ride Babe, a horse, once, and that's who she got to ride. She placed first in her class! Here she is with Babe and her first place ribbon:



Abbie rode Vogue, a lovely chestnut pony. She was in the last class of the day, and those ponies were DONE being cooperative. I don't blame them a bit. Vogue was not of a mindset to do anything without a great deal of persuasion, but Abbie did an excellent job of using her voice and her leg (and finally a crop) to get Vogue to do what she was supposed to do. Abbie placed second in her class, but *I* thought she deserved the blue ribbon. Here she is on Vogue:



And here are the girls with their instructor, Miss Laura:



We had to wait about an hour in between the girls' show classes, and it was. just. so. HOT! The Snort was exceptionally well-behaved for a tiny boy who really probably didn't need to be out in the heat for so long. Emma helped keep him happy too. She's such a good big sister!



On Sunday morning, we went to church, and then had to hustle to make it to the girls' gymnastics show. We got to see them perform small routines on the bar, beam and floor, and "vault" - really a large piece of foam that they jumped onto, not an actual vault. Emma opted not to do the bars. Here is Abbie on the bars, her favorite:



Here is Emma on the beam:



Apparently the people at the gym had opted not to turn the air conditioning on - it was quite warm in there. They did turn it on about 2/3 of the way through the program, but still:



Phew!



The girls both got medals for participation. Here's Abbie:



And here's Emma:



For next year, Todd and I have decided that the girls need to limit their activities to horses and one other thing. It's clear to us that Emma should stick with dance, and Abbie should continue with gymnastics. Emma, of course, wants to do it all, but she's afraid of the uneven parallel bars, so unless we decide to let her do a "tramp & tumble" class, she won't do gymnastics anymore. I asked one of the coaches how many times per week Abbie should take gymnastics to give it a good shot to see if she'd be good at it. She told me that Abbie had caught her eye, and we could have her evaluated to see if she's ready to participate in a more advanced class! I'm so proud!

This has been a fun year, watching them improve in their dance, gymnastics and horses. I know if we limited them to one thing, they would choose horses hands down, so I'm really grateful that we're able to afford dance and gymnastics as well, thanks to the girls' very generous Grammy and Papa.

For the summer, the girls will continue with their pony lessons, and they've decided to try the Scotts Mill Swim Team - the Sea Dragons. They seem to enjoy it so far. It's great exercise for them, and I'm delighted that they're really learning to swim. Swimming was Todd's sport, so it's fun for him to watch them, too. So far Abbie is best at backstroke, and Emma looks like a freestyler. Their first meet is in 10 days or so - gotta go find those swimsuits!