A little more splash...

Because I am a gluten for punishment, I signed my kids up for another session of swimming lessons.  It is always so much work to get them to the pool almost everyday for a two week period and I feel like everything else gets put on hold.  But on the flip side, they learn so much, and it keeps them busy during the summer.  And in actuality I am bound and determined to leave behind the water fear behaviors that my boys have adopted and I figure exposure is the key.  This summer it is finally starting to pay off.

Spencer made huge progress this summer.  He is much more comfortable in the water and with his teacher.  And by the end of this session is putting his head under water all the way all by himself!  I am super proud of him.  This has been a major fear for him over the last few years, so all the more exciting for him to have conquered!



 Jacob also made great progress in his session of mommy and me lessons we did.  I was hopeful he would go to a class without me, but when that failed we went to plan B, and it was a good thing for him.  The teacher of this class was a little "forward thinking" and after the first class I wasn't sure either Jacob or I were going to like it.  But I decided to keep at it and her methods worked.  By the end of the session he would spend time in the water alone with the teacher, and was willingly blowing bubbles.

And the weekend after swim lessons, he actually went under water on his own (purposely) and came up smiling!  Now the challenge will be to keep the boys in the water on a regular basis so they are able to maintain this level of comfort-ability...wish me luck!  I find it so hard to keep up through the winter months when school and soccer and swim and music lessons pick back up.

Maren moved up to a new level on her lessons and was busy learning more strokes and building endurance.  She did fabulous and at the end of the session the teacher spent a few days working on diving, which was very cool.  She  has come so far! 

 I am super proud of her and her hard work!

 And Amanda finished up her long course season in pool a few weeks ago.  She qualified for western slopes championships in three events (50 free, 100 free, and 200 free) almost broke the 3 minute mark on her 200 free.  She was super excited to get to swim in front of Grandma Patty and Madison and Megan when they were in town a few weeks ago for that meet.  Although she didn't get her best times it was a great learning experience for her.  As was watching her idol, Missy Franklin win gold in the Olympics, honestly I couldn't ask for a better role model for my girl.  She was completely glued to the TV for the week of swimming competitions.  And can give you a play by play if you happened to miss any event=)  

 At the end of the season her team does a firecracker relay event full of fun for the kids.  Amanda's leg was to swim 50, jump out of the pool and into a sleeping bag, then out of the bag and back into the water for another 50.  Others were sprayed down with shaving cream, or swam fully clothed.  In the end they all made a whirlpool together in the kiddie pool and had a pot luck breakfast.  After a lot of hard work, it was great to see the kids have fun together and celebrate a great season.

And while Amanda has swam this past season the kids have very patiently watched many of long meets by my side. They were super excited when one of the meets had this awesome pool they could play at.   Spencer pretending to be a shark...

The pool had a fun slide that I could take the kids down on my lap.  Both boys were super reluctant, but they both did it.  A lady told me after that she wished I could have seen Jacobs face when we hit the water.  He wouldn't go near the ladder again after that.