Proud of my daughter!
My daughter survived the private black belt test last night at our Tae Kwon Do school, Overlake True Martial Arts. This is for her provisional black belt. She has to have that a minimum of a year before she’s eligible to test for her first degree. She’s twelve. I’m so stoked for her. This is a significant effort for anyone to go through. Years of hard work and dedication, extra classes, outside work, stress, worry and joy. She’s really earned her shot at this and I could not be prouder.
My son has his first degree, and he’s nineteen. He started at a later age than my daughter did, so she’s ahead of the curve in our family. I’m proudly on my blue belt, though my two jobs are preventing me from attending class as regularly as I need to be. It’s a way of life, not something you can just toss off every now and again.
I’m looking forward to getting back into it in a couple weeks and begin the long slog back to ground zero, and then onward to advanced blue.
Meanwhile, tonight we celebrate the second, public, test. Will be fun to see those who survived last night’s private test, in with all the other ranked students who test.
Black belt tests only happen a couple times a year. Excitement is the order of the weekend.
Went to my next camping class with Girl Scouts. Saturday from 10am to Sunday at noon. Learned a TON, and had a blast, but man, was it cold — at or below freezing. And if you’ve never slept on a bunk, in an open-air A-frame cabin, that was made for kids, you haven’t enjoyed the real life. 
Sending ARCs out. Packaged six tonight. One to Australia and one to South Africa. The rest are more local in geography.
Read Harbinger last week. Needed a few days to think about it. It’s a powerful book, honestly. Lot of metaphysical concepts working around in my brain after the ride.