The strange world of competitive calisthenics

If you are a female who grew up in Australia, chances are at some stage you tried your hand at Calisthenics.

I have dim memories of doing calisthenics for a very short time, and very clear memories of my mother's annoyance at being told off by a team official for having sewn sequins in the wrong way on a pink headpiece.  In those days when "all" mothers were home (and the rest were assumed to be), mothers were given patterns and had to sew all the costumes themselves.

These days, thankfully, this is not expected at most clubs, though the costumes are still made by someone. In our case, it's the mother of the calisthenics coach, who has made all the approximately one million costumes used by the team.

Calisthenics, for non-Australian readers, is a competitive team sport that combines elements of floor exercises, ballet, rhythmic gymnastics and marching. It requires concentration, balance, control, flexibility, strength and rhythm. It's practiced in the competitive sense only in Australia, and is currently 100% female (so I learned from Wikipedia).

My daughter M has been doing calisthenics for about six months. She does it because her friends do it, and I'm happy with it because it is very cheap for a kids' sport, it fits in perfectly with A's weekly karate lessons (which are NOT cheap), and because M is a little accident prone and the balance and co-ordination can only help her.

M is in a 7-10 year-old Sub Juniors team (known as "Subbies").  This weekend marked the end of the 2014 competitions with the Victorian State Titles. 8 Sub Junior teams competed in 10 events, and I will not shy from admitting it was a LOOOONG day.

It was also my day for helping out in the dressing rooms as a rostered mum, along with two others. Though I initially thought I had drawn the short straw being rostered to the biggest competition that went from 9am to 3.30pm, in fact it was the best, because (a) better than sitting in the audience watching every team perform every event for all those hours and (b) with so many teams there was plenty of time between each event so it was easy to get the girls get ready in time. Plus, being the last comp, the girls all knew the drill and mostly dressed themselves anyway. My chief duty was hanging up costumes in the girls' dress bags after each change.

I will insert a short plea here, if you are the parent of a calisthenics competitor, please do use an easy-access dress bag, and you know what? Don't bind all the coat hangers together with a rubber band. That is seriously annoying, and no one is going to steal your coat hangers.

Anyway, it was kind of fun, or at least a different way to spend 6 hours. As with every comp, we got up at 6 in the morning to do M's leg tan and then her hair. The hair takes the longest, needing to be gelled and scraped into a high bun, attach a "wiglet" and secure it all with a thousand hair pins. Makeup is minimal in our club, just foundation, then at the comp the coaches add eye liner and pink lipstick.

As we don't have a car right now, my friend MN (mother of M's friend V in the same team) drove us all there and back. She had done two girls' hair because N the mother of the other friend G, can't do it, so N made us all large cafe-quality coffees to drink in the car. Quite a good way to start the day when it has to be started that early.

The comp venue was a lovely theatre attached to a college, and it was a beautiful sunny day, so the constant walking back and forth between dressing room and theatre (via the outside), was no strain.

I spent my free time either watching some of the events, sitting outside in the sun or chatting with others in the foyer.


The events were Marching, Clubs, Rods, Free Exercises, Aesthetics and Song and Dance.
My favourite event is Marching, followed by Free Exercises. My least favourite is Song and Dance, which is like cabaret for kids.

I like the Marching because M's team does an AWESOME routine with quite complicated choreography to a rousing Irish tune, and it's great to watch.

Free Exercises is where you see the backbends, leg lifts, splits, headstands and cartwheels. Some of the girls who have been doing calisthenics for years are amazing in this event. It's quite incredible what they can do. It's like a mixture of pilates and cheerleading.

Club swinging is difficult but frankly a little boring to watch. I shouldn't say that, because our team placed first in the Clubs event yesterday. But, it's not my favourite thing.

Rods: think, baton twirling. It's also difficult, and looks good when done well.

The Aesthetics is very pretty. All the girls wear long floaty dresses and do graceful slow dances to beautiful music.  Unfortunately our team's song was 'When She Loved Me' from Toy Story 2, which has always, and I mean ALWAYS made me cry. It's so freaking sad!!!

Fortunately, watching this song performed over 4 rehearsals and 4 competitions, finally got me to the point (about a week ago I guess) where I could safely sit through it without my nose turning red and my eyes blinking furiously, so by the day of the last competition I was fine.

My daughter was SO beautiful up on stage, standing apart from the team in her very own spotlight, in her long blue dress, her hair piled up on her head over her beautiful long neck, and making the kind of graceful, controlled movements of which I could hardly believe she was capable.

Taking photos at competitions is strictly verboten, but here is a snippet of M at her first rehearsal:

I still find Calisthenics a somewhat weird activity. I'm not really sure how much M actually likes it, or whether she will continue. She doesn't hate it, and she has improved her flexibility and balance since she started, and she gets to spend more time with her friends. Plus it's a cheap activity and other than having to help out backstage for one competition every year, it's no hassle for the parents. So for all that I'm happy with it.

What is/was your favourite/least favourite kids' activity?

12 Resolutions: September (and August recap)

This year I'm playing along with #12Resolutions on Twitter and Facebook. The idea is to set yourself short-term, achievable goals, one each month. 

For August my goal was to waste less time on my smartphone.

I achieved this, though probably to be honest I've slipped back a little in the last week (then again, it is September now, so I'm in the clear...) 

I did indeed sort out my linen cupboard, which took a good two hours plus. There's time right there not spent on 9Gag, Twitter or Slate.  I cleaned out the kitchen, and sorted and put away the sundry clothes sitting in piles next to my bed.

I also got a bit more sleep each night, and consequently found it a little easier to wake up.

And now that I'm taking the train more than I am driving to work, I get to play/read on my phone during the daily commute, so I didn't even miss much phone time.

And now here we are almost halfway into September and I'm only now setting this month's goal.  However, like most of these resolutions, this one aims to be ongoing, so it doesn't really matter how late I've started.

This month I resolve to do floor exercises for 15 minutes a day.

Floor exercises are fantastic for increasing flexibility and tone, and they can easily be done at home, for free! When I was in my late teens I lost quite a bit of weight and toned right up using floor exercises. 

Since I broke my arm two years ago and then sprained my ankle last year, I spent a lot of the last 2 years less mobile than I used to be, and consequently I've stiffened up a lot. Part of it is age I suppose, but I'm not that old either! Time for action.

I really wish I had this book:

Jeremy Chan/Flickr

What's on your to-do list this month?

Kids and Fat

If you live in Australia, you will have seen, read or heard of the attacks on Chrissie Swan for having an overweight toddler. Chrissie Swan seems a lovely decent person and many have sprung to her deference - e.g. Susie O'Brien, Mamamia, Five Frogs on a Blog and Woogsworld to name those I have read. All made excellent points.

I will add another.

People are born with varying propensities to getting fat. We're not all born the same clean perfect slate as so much parenting commentary seems to suggest these days. Everyone is different. So every kid is different. Some get fat easily, some don't.

Like Chrissie Swan, I have struggled with weight all my life. Swan says in the latest Sunday Life magazine that she was put on her first diet at 11. Well I was put on my first one at five, so I win!
My next one was at age ten, and I have been dieting, exercising, or intending to diet and exercise, ever since.

I got slim in my late teens and held it till I was thirty. Then, wham! office jobs. I was a goner.

When I was slim in my twenties life was pretty glorious, except for the fact I was hungry constantly, my muscles were sore from exercising all the time, and I was resentful of every boyfriend who wolfed down whatever he wanted and asked me why I wasn't eating.

My husband is a thin person, and when we first met I couldn't believe I'd snagged him. Then I got nervous. Then I was happy. Apart from the fact I loved him, I reasoned being married to a thin person would keep me on my toes. I would be too ashamed to get fat married to someone like that.
(Sadly, with time I managed to overcome this obstacle).

Also in the back of my mind was the thought that when we had kids, his thin DNA would offset my fat DNA and my kids would be a lovely mix of just-right, avoiding the misery and self-doubt that had plagued my childhood as variously sturdy, chubby, or overweight.

Eighteen years later and here we are with two beautiful, beautiful girls. One of whom is tall and thin and eats a tonne, and the other who is rounder and sturdier, eats a lot less and has a propensity to gain weight.

We didn't get mixed versions of ourselves. We got one of each!

M. is a wiry bundle of energy like her Dad. She can't sit still. She is often hot, runs around wearing nothing and is always hungry. She self-regulates well with food. She eats most things. She loves cakes and sweets but no more than she loves fruit, meat and cheese. Her one weakness is chocolate, which she used to be able to eat heaps of but lately is going off.

A., like me, is naturally sedentary and likes her carbs. She would sit and watch TV for hours if we let her (though with regular bouts of energetic dancing as she watches). She loves anything sweet and craves sweet tastes, getting grumpy or upset (sometimes with a tinge of shame, which breaks my heart) when we refuse her. She is fussier with "proper" foods and drives me crazy not eating dinner.  I find myself bribing her with dessert to eat her meat and veggies, which I know is not the "right" thing to do.

I'm very conscious of not inducing food paranoia and try to be natural and relaxed around food and exercise with my kids. We have fruit every day, I cook meals from scratch, they drink plenty of water and we have both healthy and unhealthy snacks. I try to inculcate the behaviours and attitudes around food that M. exhibits naturally. I model good food behaviour around them.

But A's propensity is innate and whatever I do, she will battle this problem.  It pains me to anticipate the difficulties she will probably have in this area, and the inevitable comparisons she will make with her sister (in fact she has already started to do that). When she was five I had my first of no doubt many pep talks with her when she asked me "why is everyone else skinny and I'm not?"
She was (and is) not overweight, and not the only "rounded" little girl in her circle, but kids pick up on what's the "right" way to be very early.

I know when she gets older she will probably blame me for her battles, and in the sense that this was inherited from me she will be right.

Of course there are worse things - I know that. And I will make sure she knows that too.


The thing is, we all have our cross to bear. If you're not fat, then you're something else.
If your kids eat well and it's easy to parent them in relation to food, then you are struggling with something else that Chrissie Swan is managing effortlessly.

What's your cross to bear? 

Have your kids inherited it or do they have their own?

How supportive/understanding do you find people to be?

Thirty Minutes a Day

Today's exercise: Greek dancing at the Melbourne Pontian club Christmas party!
A good work-out for waist, arms, knees and soul.

Thirty Minutes a Day

Today's exercise:

• 7am: one 50 minute walk (normal pace) to and around the foreshore walk at Lakes Entrance.
• 11am: one twenty minute walk around and on the beach, and 5 minutes of running through sand with the kids
• 2pm: 10 minutes leisurely swimming
• and planned for the evening: another 20 minute walk around the esplanade.

 

All still very sedate and nothing compared to the exercise I used to manage in a day, but pretty good going for me these days!

Thirty Minutes a Day - Thursday

Okay, I admit it - my thirty minutes a day have not happened the last few days. The first 2 because it was so HOT, the third because we were in the car en route to our holiday and the fourth because, once again, it was HOT. We did do a bit of walking and swimming on these days but nothing that would even add up to 30 minutes, so I'm not counting them.

I'm getting back into it now.

So yesterday's exercise was:

• thirty-five minutes in the pools at our holiday park, mostly lazing around or playing with the kids, but I did do a few laps - I will count this as five minutes' exercise to keep honest
• two twenty-minute rather leisurely walks (no other kind when with kids) - one around the Esplanade and one around the Foreshore Walk

Leisurely as it was it must have done something - I retired for the evening pleasantly spent and with that slightly smug satisfaction one feels at the end of a physical day.

Thirty minutes a day

I'm on holiday from work and today's 30 minutes are done! 10 minutes on the exercise bike, 20 minutes of "pilates" (floor exercises we used to call them). I am on a roll, baby!
I need a shower.

Thirty Minutes a Day

I have decided to make myself do 30 minutes of exercise a day.
I know that's no big deal for a normal person, but it is for me considering I have pretty much been living on a conveyor belt between home, my car and my office chair since I went back to work full-time. Three years ago.

This is not going to be easy.
Firstly because I have NO time, and secondly because I have got so far out of the habit of exercising.
But I will allow myself to break up the day's exercise into 10 or 15 minute chunks, to get me going.

Today's exercise:

• one fifteen-minute power walk around the local shopping centre (It's true - I wore my sneakers)
• one more leisurely twenty minute walk window-shopping for shoes (yeah that counts - I'm starting from zero here)

Feel the burn!

Exercise

We all know that little-but-regular exercise is better than heavy-but-infrequent work-outs so to that end I have decided to try and do a little of something every day. After today’s effort I ask myself: can 10 minutes of solo totem tennis in the backyard be considered exercise? And given it is 10 minutes more than anything that I have been doing in recent memory, I respond: yes it can.