Choi Kwang Do

Isn't that a beautiful dog? 

YOU ARE GOING TO LOVE ME FOR THIS SITE!

http://www.northpole.com/

Isn't this a handsome boy?

Grandson is a first degree blackbelt.  He just received a purple stripe on his way to second degree.  

He has red - brown and then he goes for his second degree blackbelt.  This will take about a year.

He has been doing this for about six to seven years now.

Sandra/Madsnapper I figure out how to take a moving picture on my camera AND put it on my blog!

Here is the whole group for this center!  The white coats are kids just starting.  The red coats are in a black belt club and they have promised to stay in until they recieve their black belt.  The blue coats are student instructors and you have to be 13.  The black coats are head instructors - which have to be third degree black belts and higher AND have instructor training.

This is from Auntie Szzzzz blog and she got it from Victorian Trading Catalog.

THOUGHT FOR THE DAY:

From D.M. Dillinger

“People are partying, songs are being sung, Sugarplums are dancing, all in holiday fun. Presents are under the tree, reindeer fly high above, peace on earth, goodwill to all, sending joy and love!”

BLACK BELT TESTING

"I just kept on doing what everyone starts out doing. The real question is, why did other people stop?"
– William Stafford

Today I have a prayer request.

My grandson after 3 years of going through the ranks of colors is going to test for his black belt in Choi Kwang Do tonight from 4 to 7. It's a long test. His sensory issues and ADHD are in full force today and can't sit still to save his life. We are all a little stressed.

Would you say a prayer for him tonight that he receives some peace, strength, calmness and that he does well on his test?

I would sure appreciate it.

THANK YOU!

Red Belt

Thank you smarties out there - it is indeed a Luna Moth. How did you know that? And in some places it is an endangered species!

Testing Day -

THE ROAD TO BLACK BELT

NO UNIFORM 21
NO BELT 20
WHITE BELT 19
WHITE SENIOR 18
YELLOW BELT 17
YELLOW SENIOR 16
GOLD BELT 15
GOLD SENIOR 14
ORANGE BELT 13
ORANGE SENIOR 12
GREEN BELT 11



HALF WAY
GREEN SENIOR 10
BLUE BELT 9
BLUE SENIOR 8
PURPLE BELT 7
PURPLE SENIOR 6
RED BELT 5



Hopefully it will go as follows:
November 2010 RED SENIOR 4
January 2011 BROWN BELT 3
March 2011 BROWN SENIOR 2

JUNE 2011 BLACK BELT 1 (maybe September, but it will be this year!) And we are going to have a party!

He will have been in the program for about five years at this point. Didn't he do great - even if I am a little Prejudice!

At the ceremony they take the old belt off in the back - facing the rear of the Dojo.



They put the new one on in the front.


He is congratulated.


They bow and say to each other Philsung - "Do you best and never give up."

Love,
sandie

Put your heart, mind, intellect, and soul even to your smallest acts. This is the secret of success. - Swami Sivananda

“Ambition has one heel nailed in well, though she stretch her fingers to touch the heavens. ” Lao Tzu (600-531)

The Road to becoming a black belt - its a long one. . .

My GS getting ready to test for purple belt.

Okay now he is actually doing the test for purple senior.

You may think this is no big deal if you have not been in the martial arts world, but it is.

He completed the junior program which took one year.

Then he started over with no belt.

He now has earned his white belt, white belt senior, yellow belt, yellow senior, gold belt, gold belt senior, orange belt, orange belt senior, green, (which is about half way to his black belt). It took about 1 and 1/2 years to complete this.

He has earned his green senior, blue, blue senior, purple, and now purple senior.

He has his red, red senior, brown and brown senior and then tries out for his black belt!

And then of course there are degrees of black belt after that.

It's going to take about 4 1/2 years to 5 years all together and should have it next summer.

Look at my GS sitting still!

Now look at the GS standing STILL!

Now for some of you - you may laugh - but the program is worth it just for this - this was a boy who could not hold still or sit still for a second. He has learned the discipline to hold still - even for a little while - this will help immensely in school.

He he his receiving his purple senior belt - purple with a black stripe.

This instructor is from Russia. He goes to the International Choi Kwang Do Center.

This pictures will enlarge if your interested - just wanted my GA to know how well he's doing.

Sandie

Blue Belt and Star Wars

Beware of the Force -

Well at first I was embarrassed of all this 'stuff' but how can I have a Darth Vader and not have stuff? Right?


This is how creative he is - he has made every ship out of paper. This is the ex-wing fighter. Isn't that great?


So what did the old family do when I was gone? Andy got his blue belt in Choi Kwang Do - I missed it, but I'll see his next ones. He's over half way to black belt - about another year and a half!



It's official he's a blue belt!



Andy's dad is into Star Wars. His uncle is into Star Wars and since he was coming home for Christmas I decided to get Andy into Star Wars. And boy have I succeeded. My daughter and I bought the movies and we watched Star Wars all that week. He has been saving his money and buying figures. We got some planes for Christmas and his birthday.

I think when he does his martial arts he is thinking Star Wars (not sure that is good or not). So we are into Star Wars - everything. And yes - he and his uncle bonded. And you know what I like about Star Wars - I understand it. It's not like Pokemon or Bakugons. And the truth is - everyone understands Star Wars and it is like a universal language everyone knows and can relate too.

And the best part about Star Wars - it is about good and evil and good wins out - just like it SHOULD!

So when I was gone he decorated his room with Star Wars - we need some more things, but the Star Wars room has started. I had made some pictures of the internet and my daughter laminated them.

My daughter bought stickers for his room - glo in the dark.


His room is busy - the towels are up on the windows because the sun comes in his room too early!


And here is a new picture of my niece. Cutie pie.
Isn't she a doll - she looks just like her aunt!!!!!!!!! Just kidding she looks like her mom.

Allan Alda - Wikipedia - Happy BIrthday -

"I still don't like the word agnostic. It's too fancy. I'm simply not a believer. But, as simple as this notion is, it confuses some people. Someone wrote a Wikipedia entry about me, identifying me as an atheist because I'd said in a book I wrote that I wasn't a believer. I guess in a world uncomfortable with uncertainty, an unbeliever must be an atheist, and possibly an infidel. This gets us back to that most pressing of human questions: why do people worry so much about other people's holding beliefs other than their own?"

I didn't know this about him myself.

Does anyone remember the movie Same Time Next Year? With Ellen Burstyn. It was kind of cute.

Love, Chatty

The Road to Black Belt

The Road to Black Belt is a long one, but a worthy one. My grandson went all the way through the junior program to junior black belt which took about a year. Now he is in 'real' black belt training. His red coat symbolizes that he has decided to go all the way through to black belt - the others stay in white. This is his testing day - there is a panel of five black belts on the stage judging them.

This is Andy doing one of his patterns for green belt senior. He did the whole junior program. Then he started over with no belt, earned his white belt, white belt senior, yellow belt and yellow senior, gold belt and gold belt senior, orange belt and orange belt senior, and then to green and now to green senior. He is half way to his green belt. About another 1 1/2 to 2 years.



His next color will be blue, blue senior, purple, purple senior, red, red senior, brown and brown senior and the black! And then of course there are degrees of black belt.



Here he is getting is new green senior belt - that means it's green with a black stripe running through it. He works on the pattern in green belt and then as a senior green belt he works it on both sides of the body - left and right.



Andy you have done a lot of hard work - congrats on your green senior. You have been wanting and working at that for a long time.



Finally - the road being washed away during the heavy storm this past fall is finally finished - we lost a lot of trees - looks a little barren - but drivable!



From Wikipedia:
Abigail Adams – wife of John Adams, who was the second President of the United States, and the mother of John Quincy Adams, the sixth. She was the first Second Lady of the United States.
When John Adams was elected President of the United States, Mrs. Adams continued a formal pattern of entertaining. With the removal of the capital to Washington in 1800- she became the first First Lady to preside over the White House, or President's House as it was then known. The city was wilderness, the President's House far from completion. She found the unfinished mansion in Washington "habitable" and the location "beautiful" but complained that, despite the thick woods nearby, she could find no one willing to chop and haul firewood for the First Family. Mrs. Adams' health, never robust, suffered in Washington. She took an active role in politics and policy, unlike the quiet presence of Martha Washington. She was so politically active that her political opponents came to refer to her as "Mrs. President".

Abigail Adams was an advocate of married women's property rights and more opportunities for women, particularly in the field of education. Women, she believed, should not submit to laws not made in their interest, nor should they be content with the simple role of being companions to their husbands. They should educate themselves and thus be recognized for their intellectual capabilities, so they could guide and influence the lives of their children and husbands.

Smart woman!

Love,
Chatty

Spring has sprung . . .

How long the sun and moon have been turning day and night, just to spend one night with You!

Rumi

"If spring came but once in a century, instead of once a year, or burst forth with the sound of an earthquake, and not in silence, what wonder and expectation there would be in all hearts to behold the miraculous change!" ~ Henry Wadsworth Longfellow

My daughter's wedding shower today - the first real event for her upcoming wedding. My living room is filling up with wedding gifts. It's a beautiful spring day - the weather is beautiful - it's the the second day of spring - I'm having lunch with family and friends - what more could you ask for? I am blessed. (We're going to a tea room after we spend three hours of watching Grand Master Choi train the kids from my grandson's school . . . but that's another story.)

I'm realizing that this time my daughter's wedding is for real. Her first marriage, I knew better, I knew it was just a matter of time (sad to say). I was thinking that I was getting better about my grandson and my daughter leaving home (for the last time), but last night my grandson got me crying . . . he's so confused . . .

Sometimes my life seems like a revolving door. Daughter and grandson in, my friend in from Virginia and out this Tuesday, the puppy in, then taking the puppy out (!), the wedding invites out, the replies coming in, my husband out during the week, in on the weekends, my daughter's packages in taking over the house, the boxes getting packed to go out in May, my grandson wondering what will happen to his world when he moves out (we're out getting him someone to talk too, out for karate, my daughters fiance coming in, friends in and friends out - whew - I long for just one hour alone - or I think I do - something tells me to be careful for what I wish for - I just may get it.

I'm going to go from my busiest of busies to my emptiness of empties . . .

Don't you wish you could some time in a bottle and save it for later?

I'm not going to worry about it today though, for "Spring, an experience in immortality," said Henry David Thoreau, and I for one, am going to enjoy it.

Hope y'all do too. The worries and stress won't go away - but for now, I'm just going with the flow.

Love,
Chatty
Thanks for the pictures Miss Penniwig!