I was pretty excited, I haven’t been to wushu since June/July, when they all went to China for the summer. I have sort of enjoyed my free Tuesday and Thursday nights, and so has Caralyne. A month or so ago she told me she was really glad that I didn’t go to wushu anymore. That bummed me out a little. Wushu is something I have enjoyed for the last 8+ years, and all of Caralyne’s life I’ve been there two nights out of the week. So, she has the right to want me around, and I should at the same time be allowed to continue one of my big passions in life.

So, I got her ready Sunday morning and took her with me, we both went as students :)

She was pretty excited, and I was very proud that she not only jogged with all of us in the beginning, but she fully participated in the whole class with the other kids. Sunday classes are great for this, since its one class for all levels. The also let me get a great workout, and after class we ate some delicious Chineses food (and Kringle, but it wasn’t that popular…), then she ran around and played tag for an hour while I talked with Pierre, James, Miles and all the other people there.

I’ve missed that place, and I’ve missed the killer workout only Wushu West can give you. I feel I’m in pretty good shape, yet its no where near the kind of “Wushu Shape” that you need to be in to survive a whole class. Today was pretty light, but I did manage to push myself hard enough to destroy my right leg. All the kicking and jumping really seized it up.

Caralyne excited about her first class

Basics. Miles was working on a butterfly kick.

Caralyne taking a break and getting some water. Good idea!

Figuring out what to do next

Weapons! This is James doing chain-whip

We had a good time, Patti said we could come together on Sundays. I’m going to think about it, paying for the two of us to go might be hard, but at least we get to do something together in the process.

James was very excited to see me, so he told me a bunch of different ways I could work wushu back in my schedule. Pierre offered his own special “Pierre brand” of advice on the subject of payments. We’ll see, today was a great class, I had a great attitude while training and I was very happy that I could do frog leaps, and look over to see Caralyne kicking some target pads. James had said that he’s been leading the classes with a heavy focus on basics and leg strengthening, so he tried to woo me even more with promises of brutal leg conditioning. I can believe it, we did a awesome ab workout at the end (synchronized situps, then synchronized double trunk twisters).

We’ll see.

Group photo

My Dad and I are very similar, one of those similar traits is that we procrastinate and push things like Christmas off until ALMOST March :)

This get together worked out last year, so we did it again. The traditional holiday schedule is so crazy and overwhelming (especially for an introvert) that it is miserable to try and cram everything in within a few days. With us getting together two months after settling down from the real event, its nice and relaxing and we get to have Pizza without worrying that the place will close due to a holiday.

So here are a few pictures from our visit:

Tawny, Jeff and Colten

Michele and Owen

Melissa

Live Oak tree

Happy trying to hide from me

Still trying to resist

I'm very persistent, he finally gave in and let me ruff him up

My Dad, Dave

You can see the entire gallery here:
http://www.m87-blackhole.org/photos/2009-christmas-in-feb/