Weeks in Review - Gold Champs, Pure Freedom Rally, and a Swimming Break!

Time is definitely rushing past me as we hurtle towards the end of the 2010-2011 school year!  The past two weeks have been filled with some exciting events, most notably the end-of-short-course-season Gold Championships.

My husband and I spent over 20 hours at the Gold Champs pool last week-end watching Amber and Mason swim!  We are so proud of them - first for qualifying for Gold Champs - and second for making finals in almost all of their events!

Amber at the beginning of her 100 Backstroke race.

Gold Champs are held in a preliminaries/finals format.  The top 10 times in each event compete in evening finals after the morning preliminary swims.  Mason made finals in all 6 of his events!  Amber made finals in 4 out of 5 of her events!

Mason swimming the 50 Breast portion of his 200 Individual Medley.

Even more exciting, at finals, Amber placed second in the 100 Fly, and third in the 100 Free, 50 Free, and 100 Back, taking home medals in all of her events.

Mason did extremely well at finals as well, taking home 5th place medals in the 100 Fly, 50 Fly, and 50 Free. He placed 6th in the 50 Back and 200 IM; and 8th place in the 200 Free, taking home ribbons in those events.

Most amazing of all is that my children are now on a 2 1/2 week break from swimming!!!!!  Since my children started in USA swimming over 3 years ago, we've NEVER had a break.  But, our new swim team takes a few small breaks during the course of the year.  So, for the first time in years, Amber and Mason are on a swimming break.  Amber and Mason both feel like they just have so much time on their hands without the 2 1/2 hour practices (or more for Amber) each day!  BUT, Amber is already starting to miss being in the water...

Last week, my daughter and I attended the Pure Freedom Rally at the main campus of our church.  Most of the teenage girls from Amber's youth group attended as well with their mothers.  It was an amazing night!  Dannah Gresh was the primary speaker for the evening and she spoke about the importance and benefits of living in purity.  In between the teaching times, we enjoyed games and worship music.  Amber and I both enjoyed the night and Amber left even more dedicated to her commitment to purity.  If the Pure Freedom Rally comes to a church near you, I highly recommend attending this moving and fun event with your teenage daughters.

We've also been getting schoolwork done in between all of our other activities!  Here are a few highlights from our homeschool:

• Mason finished Level A of the Phonetic Zoo in Spelling.  He will start Level B tomorrow.  Congratulations Mason!
• Amber earned another A on her Module 12 test in Biology.  Congrats to Amber!  Now, she's down to just FOUR MORE MODULES!  Yahoo!  On Friday, she will complete her last dissection of the course, a frog dissection.
• We are studying ancient Greece in history.  As part of our studies, we watched an incredible video from the History Channel, Last Stand of the 300:  The Legendary Battle at Thermopylae.  I highly recommend this video for older children.  

We have some exciting plans for next week.  We'll all be attending the Midwest Homeschool Convention.  While I'm most looking forward to all of the wonderful seminars, my children are looking forward to seeing Tim Hawkins.  I've already purchased all of our curriculum for next year so I'm going to try to stay away from the Vendor's Hall.....for the most part.  

That was our Weeks in Review!  To read about what other homeschool bloggers have been doing, check out the Weekly Wrap-Up at Weird, Unsocialized Homeschoolers.