Hi Jane - that sounds such fun. How old is your daughter? They're so bendy when they're young and totally fearless - gymnastics s great.

Sylvia x

Jane

Your post has really made me smile. Good for you and your Daughter. It is so heart warming that the Olympics is inspiring the young.

I was talking to a colleague at work today about the lost generation of children who cannot go out to play on their own because of safety reasons, and have become room and computer bound because they have no outlet to get exercise without having to go ten miles or pay a lot of money. When I was younger (many years ago) in the Summer holidays we would go out for the whole day playing all sorts of lovely games and coming home for tea completely worn out. My sixteen year old has never had that freedom and I so wish she had been able to do this.

Hopefully now that they have started with the "inspire a generation" they will keep on going and encourage all the children to take up activities and sport.

You never know in 16 years time we could be watching your Daughter bring home a "Gold".

Jackie
xx

Love it. There is still a lot of opportunities for youngsters to try things out there, but it does seem to require a lot more commitment from parents to ensure that kids are able to participate and keep safe which is a great pity. Spent a morning earlier this week in the new skateboard park in our town with bmx bikes, also near the river, good for stone throwig and paddling!! A lovely day and free!!

It's a shame that children are constrained by parental fears - I know people who won't let their 12 year olds go out to the local woods at all, even when they were with my girls who are out and about all time. My son has never been into organised sport and certainly likes computer games too much, but he's always been encouraged to get out and climb trees and use his bike to get around. Him and hs mates have had a few scrapes and one brush with the law, but these simply serve to educate him. Now he's 19 and I feel happy that he has the confidence to go off for 3months around Australia and to festivals - I don't worry any more because I know he's sensible and can take care of himself (and me too on occasions - he had to rescue me from some mega waves a couple of years ago when I got into difficulties - thanks goodness for all those hours spent watching swimming lessons!!!!).

Every generation has to deal with dangers - let's face it kids of today know nothing of war like our parents knew, and even 30 years ago we had all the terrorist bombings as part of the Irish troubles and kids still went out to play then! I look around and see a very safe society on the whole - and those few tragedies that do occur get massive publicity and it's disproportionate to the actual chance of it happening to kids we actually know.

Hope this doesn't sound too radical - I'm a pretty mellow person really!

ps I'm so looking forward to having grand children some day and I intend to be fit enough to enjoy all those kiddy activities - I so envy you Jane, with all those lovely times to come