Arby Won State

I am so proud of my Arby. I posted a few weeks ago that he qualified for State. Well, the state championship was this weekend. Over 200 K-3rd graders participated in the regional tournaments. Only 32 made it to state (8 from each region). Only one person wins. And this year my Arby won it!!!!! Chess is an amazing game. It is so simple to learn yet so completely complicated to master. It is also so individual. If you win, YOU WIN. If you lose, YOU LOSE. The pressure is intense. Every time you play in a rated tournament a number gets attached to you. As you win against higher rated players your rating goes up. When you lose (especially to lower rated players), your rating goes down. Going into a tournament you know where you stand based on your rating, but the mental challenge that goes along with that knowledge can be unbearable. Leading up to State Arby played in numerous tournaments. He played in a city championship and he was the top rated player. He won his first 4 games then lost to a player that he would normally not lose to in the last round. This caused him to have to play in a runoff. By that time he was so mentally beaten by the fact that he stupidly lost his last game by underestimating his opponent that he lost the runoff game as well and did not win the city championship. The next day he played in a local Catholic schools tournament and did the exact same thing - winning 4 games and then losing his last. In the regionals which qualified him for state, he actually came in second. Once at state he was the second top rated player and the boy that came in first in regionals was the top rated player and the previous year's State champion. I really believe his previous losses got him mentally prepared for State. He was not going to let that happen again. He was confident and ready to play. He brought his best game face to the tournament and he won it. We are so incredibly proud of him, but even more importantly he is proud of himself. It is amazing what this weekend has done for his confidence in chess!!


The trophy presentation:











As much as I like the fact that my boys play chess and as much as I used to enjoy the tournaments (I'd spend all day either talking to other moms or reading a book or just sitting around doing nothing - something I NEVER do), attending chess tournaments with CiCi is not so fun. In fact most of the day I spent declaring how I would never do this again (meaning DH wuld be bringing the boys solo from now on). I was exhausted chasing CiCi around and trying to keep her from chewing on everyone's chess pieces while also trying to occupy Kenz. Halfway through the tournament I found a relatively open and safe place outside. I threw the football with Kenz and let CiCi run around.

We had planned to go from Cookeville to Huntsville (to the space center) to enjoy the rest of the three day weekend, but Kenz got sick. After the tournament we went to eat and then returned to our hotel. We were going to get a good night's sleep and then take off Sunday morning. Instead I woke up to the sound of Kenz puking in the hotel bathroom. Yes this was only a few hours after the above picture. We had no warning of this sickness. I can tell you it is not fun to take care of puke in a hotel room. Limited towels, no washing machine, a contained smell. We ended up trashing his clothes and leaving for home the next morning. He slept alot, felt cold, never had fever and is now fine. At first I thought it was the flu (which is why we decided to go straight home), but now I wonder if it was food poisoning or just a 24 hour virus. I am praying none of the rest of us get it!!

What a weekend!!!