Peter's Belt Testing

This weekend was the first session of belt testing for the boys at Tae Kwon Do. Peter has been looking forward to it, but he was also nervous. I was excited for them, but also dreading the amount of time everything took. They're really thorough at Tae Kwon Do, and give each kid a lot of attention, but that means they take a long time.

This session's test was Friday night for Peter and Saturday morning for Grady. With gymnastics already scheduled for Friday, we ended up going for Peter's test at 6:30pm. The group before Peter went over time, so he didn't even start until 7:15pm. We got out right around 8pm.

So, we went through gymnastics, stopped at McDonald's for dinner, then hung out at Tae Kwon Do for an hour and a half. Peter had to go through his memory patterns, self-defense moves, kicking patterns, even knowing all the family members birthdays. They want Tae Kwon Do to teach the kids responsibility and self-control and all those other life skills too, as well as the body awareness and moves.

Peter did so great. He didn't know all the intricacies of when he was supposed to do something, or what to do after he finished. But he remembered all the patterns. Got almost everything on the first try too. The self-defense move of the month was how to get out of someone grabbing the front of your hair. You clap you hands down on top of theirs, squeeze your elbows together and bow as low as you can to through them off balance before you back up until they let go. The goal for the kids is to do it hard enough that they knock the instructor onto their stomach and get away. They practiced a lot this month and Peter did it perfectly during his test.

Then the big event of the night: each kid has to break a balsa wood board before getting their next belt. Peter had to run across the room and side kick the board to break it. He was so nervous and excited for that part. Each time he missed, he'd run back with his nervous giggle and try again. I think it was about 10 times before he finally got it. And when it broke, it seemed he was almost let down. All that excitement and then he kicked and it broke. He was really proud of himself for having done it. He's been holding the board next to him whenever he can, checking it out, putting it back together, pretending to chop it.

I got up this morning to the boys sitting in front of the TV with Peter wearing his new belt and his board right next to him. It seems like he's pretty hooked. I keep telling him there'll be a day he has to decide between gymnastics and Tae Kwon Do because it's just so much time right now, but I have trouble thinking about it because each one is giving him such a good set of skills and confidence.