Putting 8 & unders to bed

I've mentioned before that Chopstick is ready to take on the challenge of the 9/10 Age Group. She has motivation, new goals, and a big challenge ahead of her. We thought it would be fun to symbolically put the 8&U behind her by organizing all of her ribbons, trophies, medals, and All Star Swim Cap into their own box and get ready for the next phase.

Truthfully, I just thought it'd be cool for her to reflect a bit and revel in the success she's had. So we organized them first by place and took the picture.



I think we were both a bit shocked by how many blue, red and white ribbons she had. Over 2/3 of all of her places (including the medals from the two meets that gave 1st/2nd/3rd medals) were podium finishes. That was pretty cool.

So we organized them chronologically next. Of course the 2009 stack was bigger than the 2008 which was bigger than the 2007. And the later ones were much more of the fancy A division ribbons. Neat to see, but kind of expected.

What she did next was really cool. She started flipping the 2009 ribbons over, finding the same race from a year before and comparing times. That's the spirit I've always hoped for -- improvement being the prime motivator (despite my obsessions) and racing only against herself.

It was cool to spend some time reliving the races until we packed everything up neatly in the 8&U box and put it away under her bed.