Riley And the Race Car

Riley had skating class again this week. She is once again miffed at the fact that Ms. Megan has taken away her "race car" and makes her skate without help. She is in Level 1 Hockey, so she started out with the walker, but since Ms. Megan knows she was already in Level 2 before, she knows Riley can skate without it. There are 2 or 3 kids in the class that she takes the race car away from during class. She has gotten pretty darn good without it, but Riley still freaks a little. Honestly, I think she falls more with it than without it because she goes too fast when she has it! I do think she is getting better at not freaking as badly though. We aren't going to push it. If she decides after this winter that she's done, we will move on to something else for her. But at least Daddy can take her out skating for fun now!

Hockey 101 - Year 2

Riley has once again started skating classes. The good news is they started a "Beginner Hockey" class instead of "Beginner Skating" which was run by a U.S. figure skating. This means that Riley has to start at level one again, which is good because she gets to use the "race car" or the walker thing again. We are hoping this will help her confidence and then she will be ready when they take it away at level two. Last year she freaked when she made it to level two so this should help. And in other good news, it seems that her teacher from skating last year has moved over to the hockey skating class and Miss Megan is once again Riley's teacher. That makes three levels of skating with the same teacher. Riley had so much fun this time. Josh is really excited for her to love hockey. Here goes...will I be a hockey mom or not? We should know by the end of the winter if Riley is gonna stick with it or move on to something else. Then we wait for Rowan's turn:) In other good news, I found a lady who does REALLY cute Hockey Mom sparkly t-shirts at the Canterbury sale! I didn't buy one yet...but I will soon if Roo sticks with it;)

Ooooh, also in other good news...there's a lot, I know...Josh's new job allows him to get home in time to pick up Riley and get her to class so I don't have to pack up Rowan and bundle him all up to go watch. We might go sometimes to cheer on Big Sis, but mostly this gets to be Daddy/Daughter time!

Don't Crash!

Snow Plow Sam - Level 2

I will try not to bore you with more pictures of Riley's skating class (same clothes, different day, etc.) but I will probably post Day 1 of her class and the last day just to show any progress she makes (video to come in the next post). Last night's class they started with skating backwards! Riley has been trying this move with Josh for a few weeks so she was excited to do it in class. And there's a lot less using the walker thing too. Big progress from Level 1!

Also, we thought she might get a new teacher for Level 2, but she got Miss Megan again so she's pretty happy about that! She had a few other helpers with last night's class, not sure if they will be regular helpers or just for the first night. Another change: She is in with a whole different group of kids this time. Not sure where everyone went from her first session, but I think she might be the youngest in this group so we'll see how it goes!

Riley's Skating Super Status

Turn on your volume and listen to what Daddy has to say on this video!

Her First "Report Card" - She Passed!

Riley had her last skating class of session one, level one last night. We have really liked her teacher, Miss Megan, and hopefull the teacher at level 2 is just as nice, because Riley passed! Honestly, Josh and I both thought she would have to take level 1 again before she made it to level 2, because this is not uncommon in early skating, but she rocked the ice last night and did a great job! I'll post video in a bit too. She has made a lot of progress since her Nov. 16th debut. Go back and check it out on the Hockey 101 tabs to the right:)

P.S. Josh was really annoyed with me for this tope picture. I tied a jingle bell to Riley's skate and you could hear it all the way at the top of the bleachers:) Hey, it's the week before Christmas!

Skating Lesson #3

Ok, I know you are going to think I'm crazy about the pictures from skating. They all look the same: same jacket, same snow pants, same helmet, etc. Basically the same pictures...but note these pictures are missing one important piece of equipment. In just three short weeks, Riley is able to skate without the help of the walker. They still use them for part of the lesson, but she did really well without holding on. She even did some starting and stopping and starting again without falling. She did have a few spills, but even without the walker, she had fewer falls than last week!

Turkey Skate Video

Turkey's Can Skate?

Daddy was super excited to find out the BP had an open skate this morning, complete with a skating Turkey! They had a great time while Mommy stayed home to bake pie. Josh is thrilled with her progress on the ice. In the past three weeks she has gone from barely standing to moving pretty good on her skates. Soon she will loose the walker and move on her own:)

Riley would like to type her own Thanksgiving message:

khhl 9ppiguiiiiiiop[]]
\ Love Riley...

Progress!

Riley did great at her second skating class! She got up to standing several times on her own from a sitting position...this is something they work on in class, not an indication that she falls all the time. She stayed on her feet better this week too. Not to say she didn't fall a few times, but I don't think we will have any bruises to show for it tomorrow. She is also moving across the ice better and learning to turn herself around when she gets off course...which she tends to do a bit:)

Maybe it was the extra practice she got at open skate with Josh yesterday, although, Josh insists she didn't want to move on the ice because she was afraid to fall. Tonight, she didn't seem afraid at all. She likes to do the "teacher part" and she concentrates really hard. You can even see her talking to herself saying "march, march, march," the whole time she's practicing. We also did not have to fight her when leaving class. Overall a MUCH better night tonight. Daddy is bursting his proud papa bubbles all over the place!

Skating 101 - Age 3

Last night was Riley's first skating lesson. I have to say I was less than impressed with the woman who was running the show, but the teachers who were working with Riley were great...I just wish I knew there names. There was no introduction, no explanation of the program, just some snobbish figure skating coach barking orders to parents who didn't know what they were supposed to do in the first place.

Riley had a great time and didn't want to leave...which led to it's own set of problems, but I think she's going to do fine once she gets the hang of the fact that we're going back every week. This is her first real experience in an organized sport/class/teaching setting since she was too young to remember when we used to go to story time at the library and we never took ECFE and she's not in preschool yet. Overall, I was really proud of how well she listened and followed direction and she wasn't nervous at all, even though she had never met the teachers before...She did great!

The class is broken into two parts. The first half hour is instruction, the second is "open skate" which I only knew because I re-read the registration information before I left for the class. Again, no discussion of this with the parents. Josh brough his skates and got some play time on the ice with his little girl...He's pretty excited about this too:)

Friday Free-Skate

Today was Riley's first skating lesson! Santa brought her skates for Christmas, but we haven't had a chance to take out out skating and Daddy wanted her to learn OUTSIDE first:) So tonight we got the skates sharpened and went up to the park by our house. Here's Riley's first attempt at hockey greatness.