(no subject)

[the_rck]

Our internet connection is exceedingly slow this morning. It took about fifteen minutes to log into DW (I don't dare click on any cut tags, so reading is a truncated experience right now), and I still haven't managed to get into LJ. My Gmail won't load or download, either. I'm not quite sure what to do with myself without my morning routine of checking certain websites. I suppose I could try to figure out where the various library books have got to that I ought to return tomorrow, but I'm not even sure which books to look for, and it's not like I can currently check online.

I'm still not sure if my Remix is done. I feel like I'm leaving a lot hanging. I'm thinking that I'll try writing what comes next and see if I can, just in case I need it. If it works but I don't need it, I can always post it as a sequel later. There are other things I'd rather write, but I think I can write this.

The moment Cordelia's friends went home yesterday, Cordelia announced, loudly and dramatically, that she was bored and that the whole summer is going to be boring. I really have no answer to that. I did check with the mother of her friend who lives a few blocks away, and that friend will be at camps all day. The other mother and I have agreed that the girls can play in the evenings and on weekends, but that still leaves the question of what Cordelia's going to do during the day.

As it turns out, the friend who's moving to California is not the girl Cordelia initially said it was. She mixed up names. The girl who's moving is friend but not a really close friend, so Cordelia's less heartbroken than I expected her to be.

Cordelia's report card came home yesterday. It was excellent. She got an A+ in orchestra. Cordelia did enough extra credit work there that the teacher laughed and noted that, every time she added a new 100% grade, Cordelia's overall class grade went down. Academics don't actually get letter grades anymore (they changed that mid-year). Now, they get numbers from 0-4 with 4 being best. Cordelia got most 4s with a scattering of 3s (she didn't feel it was worth the effort to try to change a 3 to a 4 even where she had the option). The 3s mostly had to do with social interaction/leadership and with critical interpretation of texts.

Cordelia's gym report card came home on Thursday. Her upper body strength is apparently quite good, but she needs to work on several other things. The teacher suggested that she start doing crunches every day, among other things. I rather suspect that's not going to happen. I could be wrong, but that's what I suspect.

Oh, good. I think our internet is behaving again. I finally managed to get into LJ, and my email came through.

To our surprise, Scott has the whole weekend off. Things have been so hectic at work, that neither of us expected it. He will be working twelve hours on Tuesday, however, and possibly the same later in the week. I just hope he has Father's Day off this year. His family likes to do a get together then that I know he wants to go to.

Comments

[untonuggan]

actually pretty impressed about her upper body strength being good, considering that's an area a lot of female-bodied people (myself included) struggle with. if core strength is what the phys ed teacher wants her to build (which it sounds like re: crunches), there are a lot more fun ways than crunches IMHO.

<3

good job on her report card as a whole!

[the_rck]

What would you suggest for core strength? I want to encourage Cordelia to exercise.

Of course, I'm not the best example for her right now. I still can't walk or stand for more than about fifteen minutes at a time, and I haven't tried to pursue exercise that I can do seated.

[untonuggan]

Anything that uses balance requires a lot more core strength than one would realize. So yoga, pilates, but also dance (from what I understand from those who have more stamina than I do, and from that one modern dance class I took). Also if she likes bicyling, it actually builds a fair bit of core strenght if she especially if she is doing more things like hills, the lack of which I have definitely felt on longer rides (and then been motivated to build when not riding so as to be able to do biking more easily.)

Also, basic isometrics (which are kind of like yoga-pilates-made into strength training almost?) can be like a simple thing to add per day. One is doing "plank" pose, for example, which incorporates core muscles but also whole body. I modify it based on my current ability level. Once you learn the form, the idea is to work up to doing it for longer periods of time. (I think I hit 30 seconds, but some people do like two minutes.)

If she is into upper body already, some upper body exercises may build on core strength (for example, push-ups or modified push-ups). Plus doing push-ups can really make you feel like a bad-ass. In PT I have started with wall-push ups, gone to kneeling, and worked up to full (before relapses but yeah).

I have a friend who did a lot of interpretive dance and stuff when she was younger, and I think that was good physically as well as emotionally. Not sure if that is available in your area, but there might be something that interests Cordelia? Or belly dance, hula, swing, contra...?

[evalerie.livejournal.com]

I don't have any great suggestions for a kid who is expecting the summer to be boring -- I think a lot of the solution has to come from the kid, and maybe it's even educational to have to cope with being bored. But I wanted to bounce an idea off you:

There was an article a few years ago about a mom who wanted to make a "coming of age" ritual for her son, who was turning thirteen, because our society has discarded most of those rituals and she thought it could be fun and educational for him to do one. So she set him a series of thirteen tasks that she wrote. They were things like "take the bus for thirteen stops, get out, go to the nearest restaurant, order lunch, and wait there for further instructions," and other things that involved getting a little into nature or exploring their city (which I think was in Australia). I liked this idea and wanted to set something similar for Arlo, who was thirteen at the time. So Jan and I started writing challenges. We didn't get very far with it, and only ended up sending Arlo on one quest, which was to take the city bus to Vault of Midnight, purchase a particular board game, and bring it home. But Arlo did great with it, and learned and grew, and I've always wished that I had set him more tasks like that.

So I am thinking that if you and Cordelia liked the idea, maybe you could set Cordelia a series of customized challenges, invented by you, that are the right size for her to stretch her wings just the right amount.

[the_rck]

I'll mention the idea to Cordelia. She's very reluctant to take the bus on her own, though.

[evalerie.livejournal.com]

Yeah. It doesn't have to involve the bus. Though it could, as a way of challenging her to go outside her comfort zone. But the challenges could be to walk to things in your neighborhood, or to find a scavenger-hunt style list of things at the Leslie Science Center, or to walk or bike to a particular store and buy a particular item there. I think it's totally open to your imagination, and you could totally set the level of challengingness to exactly what is right for Cordelia.

Anyway, I have *no* idea if that would sound appealing to both you and Cordelia. But I figured I would float the idea, because I think it sounds like fun. (That is, it sounds fun to me, though not necessarily to you and Cordelia.)

[evalerie.livejournal.com]

Another thought: Can she be gotten interested in the library's Summer Game? We were really into it one summer. You probably already know this, but you can earn points by doing any of a long list of challenges, ranging from finding particular obscure books in the library's online card catalog to visiting library branches and looking around for codes on the walls, to taking a particular walk in a particular park. I think they said that they are even going to have a challenge on the library's Minecraft server this year, in memory of Jan, who spent a truly stunning amount of time building the model of the city of Ann Arbor on that Minecraft server. Once you accumulate points, you can trade them in for your choice of gear -- frisbees, tote bags, water bottles, sometimes even chocolate.

I think you said that Cordelia isn't very interested in the library's challenge, so probably that's not an option. But I've had fun with it some years, so I figured I would mention it.

Another option would be if she is interested in the game Ingress, where you visit local places and get points for your team if you are the most frequent visitor. Or something like that. I've never tried it, but know several neat people who are into it.

Or geocaching?

Hm. Somehow I think none of these things are up Cordelia's alley. But I don't have any great ideas for things that I think *would* interest her.

Hm.

[the_rck]

She's already playing the summer game. I don't know how much time she's spending on it, but she's mentioned earning some badges online.

She tried Ingress last fall when Scott started playing it, but she quickly got bored and deleted all of that from her phone. I think she might enjoy it if she had a friend to do it with, but otherwise, I suspect she's not going to pick it up again.

Geocaching is another activity she'd enjoy if she had someone to do it with.

She has just put holds on thirteen different books. Hopefully, some of those will be fun for her.