Hodges Happenings: Swimming!

I'm still catching up on some Summer posts, and here is one I didn't want to skip.

Hannah and Hudson started swimming this year!!!

They took lessons from a friend every day for a couple of weeks and we got in at least two days of swimming in each week, unless it rained. It was busy and fun.

Never underestimate how much time and prep goes into swim dates with one Mom, two kids, and a toddler. There's the globs and globs of sunscreen and the 45 minutes it takes to get everyone lathered up and ready to go, then there are the drinks and snacks and extra clothes and towels and goggles and floats, etc. Two hours of swimming takes at least half a day of prep or recovery. There lies one of the reasons we were so busy over the Summer.

So, Hannah graduated from staying afloat wearing a back floatie, but having no real technique to being able to survive and actually technically swim in the deep end, though she prefers the comfort of the float and the shallow end of the pool. We will not be unpacking any floaties for her next year.

As for Hudson, a.k.a Little fish-boy, he whined some when forced to try swimming techniques, but was very brave on his own. He just wanted to do it on his terms. He asked quite frequently to have his instructor just let go so he could do it on his own. He can paddle around all over the pool with the back floatie on, and toward the end of the summer, the instructor got him swimming a few feet without any floats. I think next summer he will be swimming well.

We didn't get a whole lot of pictures since we mostly swam during the day, and I was the one in the pool with the kids.

They both got really brave towards the end and started doing the water slide into the deep end.

As for Andrew, we handed down Hudson's Puddle Jumper floatie and he gladly wore it and got in the pool whenever we wanted him to, but was perfectly happy just tossing everything in the pool from the edge. I spent a lot of time following him around the edge of the pool preventing him from falling in. I was successful every time except one, when I was babysitting a friend's little girl and turned for two seconds to recover her cast that couldn't get wet and...plop. Into the deep end went Andrew. I'm thankful for the floatie he had on because when I heard my friend shout his name and take off over to the pool, he was already just bobbing on top of the water, looking at me as if to say, "What just happened?"

But, he was fine and he actually is pretty brave in the water. He would even let you let go of him and he would "swim" a little on his own.