New belts!

Yesterday was a big day at karate for the older boys.  Malcolm, who already skipped yellow belt when he moved up to the big class in August, made purple stripe for his belt today.  He was pretty pumped since he has been practicing a lot.  He also (no surprise) likes sparring, too.

And Michael made blue belt! He has been working hard but we knew this would be a tough test for him to move up to the higher class group. The biggest thing was that he had to break a board. It was a little bit worrisome whether he'd be able to do it...but he did!  We are so proud of him.  I think he was pretty proud, too.  So happy to see him build some self-confidence on what he can achieve here, even though we know it is hard for him!  He really doesn't like sparring but he gets out there every week and tries.  Great job, Michael.

Teaching moments

The YMCA karate program only lets kids start at age 5, so Joseph can't do it yet but he is very interested to watch his brothers do it.  Recently he asked Michael if he would show him how to do some karate moves, especially kicks.  It was very sweet :)