Swim Lessons!

We had a wonderful time doing swim lessons with Maryellis, she did lessons two times a week for 5 weeks, "Water babies" sure was an adventure.

We had a few other friends who had their babies in the class as well, which added to the fun. Each time we had a lesson the mammas typically did the swimming with the babes. We had lots of songs, baby fetch, wall crawling, jumping off the wall, blowing bubbles, learning to swim with arms, learning to kick, floating and kicking on their backs....and the best/worst part of all: The Dip! I'd say Maryellis did "well" she sure didn't like going to the instructor to dip her, and coming out of it she seemed to shake it off quickly. Towards the last lessons the parents got to dip your baby, that seemed to be better in our case. Our girl is a natural "kicker"-this was her strong suit!

Each class was fun, though some nights she was more tired then others and indifferent about the whole thing, over all we enjoyed them all.

I learned a lot about myself through this, on the evenings that she was having a harder time, I just had to go with the flow, not get sad that she was unhappy. Remembering shes a baby and were going to a evening class to swim in not the warmest of water, so I understand the little cranky moments that she had. Thankfully in the setting we were in- and by the grace of God I didn't ever feel the "parent competition" factor....which I know (unfortunately) is a reality of being a parent >>> feeling judged for how your child is doing, how you are reacting, etc. Its amazing what I can learn from a swim class.

The last class was a play swim, the instructor encouraged the dads to participate too! The babies went on a boat ride...which Maryellis wasn't too sure about at first, took some coaxing that it was fun. Then we each took a turn to go down the slide! Oh it was so fun! The dads did a good job at going down slow with their child, but I'd say the mom's struggled in this. Yikes! Thankfully everyone did well and there were no tears.

 

I'm looking forward to doing swim lessons again with her, I know there is so much more for her to learn, this will be the first of many lessons she'll take. I have lots of memories from doing swim lessons growing up as a young girl, then doing swim team with my sister. I sure hope Maryellis develops a liking to it as her parents do!

blessings,

Emily