Tae Kwan Do

On Friday Gavin tested for the next belt color in Tae Kwan Do. He was at a brown belt, and tested (and earned) his red belt!

The grand master, who owns all the YK Martial Arts locations, spoke to all the kids, below. Yes, that's a lot of kids! All the younger kids tested at the same time, and usually they are split up by lower and medium belt levels. It was crowded, but Gavin had a great time and did well.

Gavin doing his "form" ( a sequence of kicks and blocks unique to each belt level):

At the end, with Master Baek, showing off "fighting stance:"

Ducklings!

Gavin and I were at the Riverwalk this week and we saw two families of ducklings. The first one was a different color duck than the "regular" ones we see all the time:

Gavin decided the ducks were following him.  This family had five baby ducks.

They were super cute! And a bonus - there were NO geese that day! I have no idea why. but I wasn't complaining!

Brookfield Zoo

Gavin and I went to Brookfield Zoo on Tuesday. We got there at 9:40, before the buildings were open. We could look at the outdoor animals and the underwater dolphin viewing, though.

We were the first ones in the dolphin area and it was like they were just waiting for people to arrive. They came up to the glass and floated there, watching us. It was so cool! Then once other people showed up, the dolphins went back to their usual routine of swimming laps around the pool.

These black birds share a space with the macaws. Gavin loves the macaws but is afraid they will fly around and get too close (it's a "free-flight" enclosure), so we watched from the other side of the wire mesh doors. It was a good thing, because the black birds flew down and walked around right where we would've been standing. (They are called "wattled curassows.")

Leopard sharks in the Living Coast exhibit:

Of course, we saw the "real" dolphin show performance at 11:30.

Trying to touch a ray. Those rays were swimming just out of reach of the kids! Gavin managed to touch only one.

Classic pose on the lion:

We'll be going back a few more times before school starts! Send me a message if you want to join us!

Random July

July was cooler than we would have liked  - too cool to get in an unheated pool! We made a few trips to the Morton Arboretum.

Gavin in his  "cool" pose:

Exploring the secret stream. He LOVES this:

Taking advantage of an already-drawn hopscotch game:

Gavin did a week-long Tae Kwan Do camp, and on the last day they played mini-golf. I think he and his buddy DJ were more interested in climbing than golfing, but they had a great time:

Kane County Cougars

For Grandpa Cermak's work picnic this year, the company took everyone out the ballgame. It was one of the local minor league teams, the Kane County Cougars. It was nice and close!

Our friends Mark Maurer and his daughter Paige (who takes Tae Kwan Do with Gavin) were there, too.

The kids were somewhat interested in the game and the stadium...for being 6, I think they did just fine.