The girls attended their first organized class this weekend -- they started gymnastics! It's a recreational class at the YMCA for 4 year olds.
When I first told them about it a couple of weeks ago, Megan didn't want to go, and Kayla was excited. But the day of the class -- Megan completely melted down. She did NOT want to go at all! And Kayla followed suit. The half hour before class was crying by one or both, about one thing or another. They were feeding off each other, and nothing was right with the world. It got to the point that I don't think Megan even knew why she was crying. (Spoiler alert -- she laughed when I showed her this video later and agreed that it wasn't worth it)
Megan, before class
When we got there, we found out they were supposed to wear shorts or leotards - not the pants that we'd been told. Regardless, they did fine.
At first, they sat on the mats with the other kids -- but didn't do the motions they were doing during the warm-up. They'd stand and sit when they were supposed to, but that was about it. It was interesting that they chose to sit across the circle from each other at first. Later on, they started sitting next to each other, though.
When they started doing specific activities one at a time, the girls started getting into it. You could tell by their body language that they were getting comfortable and warming up to the situation. By the end of the class, they were right at home and having fun.
The first activity was to crawl through a tunnel made by a mat, then do a forward roll down an incline. Megan went through the tunnel right away, but Kayla took some coaxing.
(Please forgive the photo quality -- they were taken through a window, quite a distance away, on an iPod Touch. Great camera for an iPod, which I love -- but obviously it's main purpose is not for zoomed-in photos)
Coaxing Kayla through the tunnel
Megan at the end of her somersault
Kayla, mid-somersault
They walked the balance beam forward. Kayla did fine - had her
little arms out for balance, and only stumbled a little bit. She loved
it! Megan, on the other hand, kept her arms down at her sides, and walked quickly across the entire length of the beam without falling off once.
Megan's balance beam style
They both needed help going backwards.
Kayla, backwards on the beam
Megan, backwards on the beam
Megan on the bars
Kayla on the bars
They thought Megan had a bloody nose part way through class, so they brought her out to us. She announced that she missed me, and snuggled. When I realized it wasn't really a bloody nose, I tried to get her to go back into class. She wouldn't, and just snuggled with me. After a couple of minutes, one of the teachers saw she was fine, and came to get her. Megan went with her, saying "I don't want to go" the whole way-- but walking along willingly, holding her hand. When they got back out to the equipment, though, she went running for her turn.
The favorite for them both I believe was the trampoline. They have several trampolines lined up along the back wall. They have them jump the length of the wall, with a foam-block pit at the end.
After class, they were very excited. Megan, who had melted down and did not want to go, was so wound up and bouncing around afterwards, I couldn't get her to give a good video recap. They both got froggy stamps on their hands and little plastic bracelets after class.
Needless to say, they can't wait until next week's class!
