I had my black belt graduation ceremony tonight, so I’m “officially” a black belt! I even went to my first black belt class tonight.
For the promotion, we each did a kata (form) and gave a little speech to give thanks to everyone who helped us on our journey. Then we broke some boards; I broke 3 (palm, front kick and side kick). Unfortunatly they again, didn’t have concrete so no major cool breaking yet 🙂 Hopefully I’ll get to do that someday. After breaking we got our belts!
I have a TON of pictures, and I don’t have time to wade through them all tonight. I’ll get them up tomorrow. Paul did a wonderful job getting videos of me breaking this time, so you can see my brute strength *smirks*
More to come tomorrow!
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There are a few more pictures of Patrice and Halle (her puppy) in the gallery. Click the picture below to see them (they are located on page 2).
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Had a really fun weekend…my best friend Mary came here from Illinois to visit for the weekend. We finally got to spend some time together; she was here for Paul’s 30th Bday party in December, but the weekend was so hectic that we really didn’t get much time together. We pretty much hung out and relaxed all weekend. She has been traveling a lot for work and Paul and I have been really busy with the house, so it was nice to sit around and just relax.
On Friday we went to Buffalo Bob’s family restaurant in Florence. It was pretty good; I had the pulled pork which was good, and all other stuff looked yummy.
On Saturday we went to The Funny Bone Comedy Club in Newport. We saw Caroline Rhea from Sabrina the Teenage Witch, and Biggest Loser. She was great! We learned that you have to come with 4 people though. The seating is really strange. The tables are all 4-tops, and if you have 2 or 3 people, you get stuck with strangers. It was weird…we had a group of 5 next to us and one of them had to sit with the table next to them. Several couples went out for what appeared to be a nice night out, and got stuck sitting at the itty bitty 4-top tables with another couple. Weird. But…the show was great and it was a no-smoking showtime, so it was even better.
Overall, a really nice relaxing weekend. Hope you had fun Mary!
-ec
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I’ts been a while since I have posted a blog entry, so I figured I would do one right now.
Had a trade show last weekend in Sebring, FL. It was about 95 degrees and 80%+ humidty every day. Very pretty, but not a whole lot of fun to be outside until after 4pm. There are some pics of the event in our gallery (page 2, paul’s work photos).
I got the FZR running again Tuesday night and finally got it out of Diana’s garage. The Man Upstairs must ride a motorcycle. Weather was gray and raining tuesday. Got the bike running that night, rode it home in the trickling rain. Woke up Wed. morning to a beautiful sunny (and chilly) morning. Rode to work with a smile on my face 🙂 Haven’t ridden since December and I almost forgot how nice it is. Going to try to ride a couple hundred miles this weekend! Probably going to be my main transportation for the foreseeable future. Talon only gets 16-19mpg, bike gets 40-50. At $3 a gallon, thats a nice bit of savings. Maybe I’ll even look into a newer bike that is slightly more comfortable and has better ammenities. 😉
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Patrice from my work is getting a new puppy!! Since her fiance is out of town I went with her to see her puppy, and take pictures of the one she picked out. She’s a Sheltie and she’s SO CUTE!
Click on the pictures below to see lots of pictures of her!
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Colleen and Cate came down this weekend from NY to visit Brian and me. They came on Wednesday and left last night (Sat). They stayed with me in the new house, and since Paul was out of town for work, it was a girl’s weekend! They got to do a lot of sightseeing, shopping and more shopping (sorry Dad!). They got to experience Buffalo Wild Wings for the first time while they were here. We had some other things on our list, like White Castle and Skyline Chili, but Cate’s stomach after eating wings that were a weeeee bit to hot the day before, couldnt’ handle the rest of the crazy food we eat down here in KY 🙂 Guess we’ll have to save those for the next trip!
We drove up to Brian and Ashley’s apartment in Dayton, OH for dinner. We ate at Cold Stone Creamery after stuffing ourselves w/dinner. Yum.
On Saturday before they left we went up to Turtle Creek Flea Market in Cincinnati. It was a lot of fun and reminded us of the good ‘ol days of flea market shopping on the long car trip to KY every year. Everyone got a few cute knick knacks. I got a little glass top jar to put miniature seashells in for one of the bathrooms. Ahh…the joy of flea markets, such a beautiful place 🙂
They had a pretty rough time getting home last night, had to fly into Pennsylvania then drive 5 hours to Albany, NY to pick up their car, then drive 1.5 hours home. Bleh. So goes life on standby sometimes.
Overall, we all had a great extended weekend. Cate & Colleen totally fell in love w/Megabyte this weekend and tried to figure out a way to stuff her in their suitcases. Got some really cute pictures of Cate & Meg:
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The pictures and videos of the black belt test are up.
I’m pretty sore. I went to the chiropractor this morning to get adjusted. I have a nice bruise and welt on my chin from that roundhouse kick. No wonder my neck hurts…
Unfortunatly there aren’t any videos of me breaking, but we’ll be sure to get one from the ceremony when I break concrete.
Click here to see pics/videos
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I don’t even have words to describe the pain and exhaustion I feel right now. It hurts to type.
The test went great. Paul and my mom were there to watch me. I thought they would get to watch from across the room in the waiting area, but they made them sit at the edge of the mats where we tested…no stress!! I did great though. The sparring was horrific, torturous and brutal. I took a hard roundhouse kick to the head and now I can’t move my neck…I have to go to the chiropractor tomorrow morning. 🙁 Other than that, I got bruised, beaten and pounded for 2 minutes. I never want to do that again. But I did it.
Everything else was pretty smooth. I made it through kicks, punches and blocks with no problems, and katas went surprisingly well too.
I broke like a champ 🙂 We had to break one board with a punch, one board with a side kick, two boards with a palm strike and two boards with a front kick. I broke them all on the first try! Unfortunatly, the person that bought the concrete bought the wrong type, so we couldn’t break concrete tonight. (darn 😉 hehe)
We have a ceremony in 2-3 weeks where we will actually receive our black belts and be promoted. I assume that we’ll have to break concrete at that ceremony.
I have to get to bed. My body aches and my pillow is calling my name. We got some good pictures, I’ll post them tomorrow when I’m feeling a bit more chipper.
Thanks to everyone who sent thoughts and prayers my way…they really helped!!
Congrats also to Cathy who tested with me and passed too!! Way to go girl! We did it! 🙂
-ec
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Tomorrow is my black belt test. I feel pretty much prepared, but still a little worried. I have a good attitude about the whole thing. I’ve actually only been back to karate since September, so the opportunity to test is amazing. So, if for some reason I don’t pass, I’ll just try again in 6 months when I really feel comfortable. I feel pretty strongly about all sections (kicks, strikes, blocks, self-defense, one-steps, and breaking), but the sparring worries me because I haven’t done it for 10 years. It just feels foreign to me.
Hopefully Paul will come watch and take some pictures and videos. I’m going to try to get him to at least take videos of me breaking the boards and concrete (yipes)!
Check back Saturday to find out how I did. The test is from 4pm until midnight or so…bleh. If I can get out of bed Saturday, I’ll post about it 🙂
Wish me luck and send strength and safety prayers my way!
-ec
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So the stress is starting to set in…
We close on the house in 2 days! Yikes! I’ve been busy trying to set up appointments with painters to get estimates for the house. I figure it’ll be a lot less hassle and stress to let someone else do the painting than myself, especially since it’s the whole house. So far estimates are higher than we imagined…
I keep having to reschedule the delivery for the appliances b/c we don’t know when the painting will be done, that’s a pain the neck.
Also, my black belt test is next Friday the 24th. Jim, one of the canidates, decided he wanted to take the test in 6 months instead, and Cathy, his wife blew out her knee last night while we were practicing, so I don’t know if she’ll be able to test or not! *sighs*
Can’t wait until all this drama is over…bleh.
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