Swimmers

This summer, everyone in our family learned new things. I learned that jury duty is not all bad. (I had somehow made it to this point in my life without ever being summoned.) Jewel learned that it is okay to sometimes each sandwiches. She went to camp and they (gasp!) served Chick-Fil-A sandwiches one day. And she bravely tried eating it, bun and all. And discovered that this bread stuff is pretty tasty.  Only one more child to convince that it is okay to eat bread...

But, far more importantly, this summer the three stooges finally learned how to swim. This is something that has always been important to me. My mom took me to swimming lessons from the time I was itty-bitty, and I can't remember ever not being able to swim. I love to swim, and I wanted them to share that love they way they share my love of books. (Even Natalia is starting to like books, but that is a story for another day.) And living on a peninsula between the ocean and a river, water is a way of life in Wilmington. There are beach trips and pool parties and boat rides. Even if my kids didn't end up sharing my love for swimming, I wanted to at least feel comfortable that if they ever fell into water, they could get themselves to the surface and to safety.

Starting the day of his third birthday, there have been three separate incidents where Mike walked into water over his head and just stood there. Frozen. He never flailed or visibly panicked. He just shut down. Underwater. So there has been a lot of work to do to ensure he can survive in the water. Leon and Natalia, thankfully, have a little more sense than their brother, but they still aren't natural swimmers. (Jewel turned into quite the swimmer a couple of years ago, so thankfully, she is no longer a concern in the water.)

I've dutifully taken the kids to swimming lessons every summer, and by last summer, all three stooges could swim IF they were in a pool and IF someone reminded them what to do. It was a start. Unfortunately, life happened and by the time I got around to signing them up for swimming lessons this year, the first session we could get them into was in August. So that meant swimming all summer without lessons. Thankfully, we do most of our swimming at my parents' neighborhood pool that has plenty of shallow areas and a lifeguard on duty.

However, back in July, Leon and Mike were invited to a swim party. They started out swimming in the shallow end, but soon wanted to join all the other kids jumping off the diving board. Of course I said they could go, but that doesn't mean I wasn't dangerously close to having a heart attack while I watched them.

I think they know their limitations, because they started off jumping directly toward the ladder. The first time he hit the water, Mike got himself to the surface, he started moving his arms and legs, and he didn't actually go anywhere. His "freestyle" seemed to turn out an awful lot like treading water. Thankfully, he managed to eventually put it in gear and get himself to the side. (The whole time this was happened, I was dutifully biting my tongue to avoid yelling out encouragement and embarrassing him in front of his friends.) Leon, thankfully, jumped right in and had no issues.

The most amazing thing for me to see, though, was how much their confidence grew that afternoon. And how much better they got at swimming. Since that afternoon where I let them just be kids and figure it out, they've been swimming a ton. And when swimming lessons rolled around this year, they did great. Natalia is always competitive with her siblings, so she tried hard in swimming lessons too, and before I knew it, she was flying in to the 8-foot water right along with her brothers.

So now, of course, the trick is to continue to give them the freedom to (safely) grow their confidence as they try other new things that I might find a wee bit scary. As their mother, I reserve the right to continue to quietly have a heart attack on the side. But maybe even I will learn that they are usually just fine.

Birthday Girl

(For simplicity as I write this, I am referring to Oldest Girl as Jewel since that is the name she uses at home. My apologies if you know her by one of her approximately 12 other names.) 

This little one...

...recently turned 11. To celebrate her birthday, she decided to have a pool party with her besties. My parents have a really nice neighborhood pool near their house here, so we had a perfect location. (My parents primarily live in Ohio, so yes, we were going to throw a party when the parents were out of town. Woohoo!) I emailed the moms of the four invitees, and amazingly there was a date near Jewel's birthday when all four girls were available. We just needed nice weather. This summer has been a mix of extremely hot, humid days and thunderstorms. Neither one is great for swimming, because yes, it can be too hot to swim. We've experienced it. We've also postponed a birthday party due to a hurricane, so there is tropical weather to contend with in late August, too.

Not that it usually has much accuracy around here, but I started checking the forecast ten days out from the party. And I checked it daily. I just couldn't help myself. The weather fluctuated between abysmal (severe thunderstorms all day and a tropical system looming) to very promising. Thankfully, the morning of her party was gorgeous. And it was supposed to stay that way through the early afternoon before "tropical storm-ish" (yes, that is what the weather forecast said. Really) arrived in the evening. I realized we were going to be able to get in the party as planned.

Jewel's party was scheduled from 11:00 - 3:00, and the full plan was for everyone to meet at my parents' house, head out to lunch as a group, and then go back for swimming, ice cream sundaes, and presents. Jewel and I planned to head over early to decorate, and Jeff and the other kids would join us closer to the start of the party. We had planned to leave at 10:00 and, amazingly, by 9:45 we were ready to go. We had the many, many bags of things we needed loaded into the car and we were even dressed and looking semi-presentable. (The good part about having the party not at our house - less cleaning and yard work. The bad part about having the party not at our house - we actually had to plan ahead and take everything over. I'm more of a "grab things as you think of them" person when it comes to entertaining, so this was a bit of a challenge for me.) I walked outside and all but spun around in the sunshine while I waited for Jewel to join me. At the last second I grabbed a magazine to read since we would probably have extra time before the guests arrived.

We got in the car, buckled up, and then I went to start the car. I discovered it had a dead battery. Really dead. After 4 or 5 attempts to start the car, I grabbed Jeff who confirmed, yup, dead battery. So I assessed the situation. The rest of the family was not yet ready to go. Also, in order to get everyone to lunch, we needed both vehicles since we had 10 people to transport. Hmmm. I decided the best course of action was to do SOMETHING, so Jewel and I took off to decorate as planned.

While driving, options started running through my head. Back at our house, Jeff was doing the same thing. When Jewel and I arrived at my parents' house, we unloaded the car, put away the cold stuff for the sundaes, and started decorating. Jeff and I had a couple of phone discussions throughout this process. He had one plan. I had another. By the time the balloons were blown up and the streamers hung, we had agreed on a new plan. I stuck a note on the front door in case any guests arrived before we returned, and Jewel and I took off again.

We went home and grabbed Jeff and the siblings. The new plan included stopping by Taco Bell to buy them a 12 pack of tacos (and a bag of burritos. The kids have definitely started really EATING). That way they could chill out at the house while I took the other girls to lunch. The Taco Bell stop made me nervous because you never know how quickly you will get food there, but thankfully, we were pretty quick.

Of course by the time we got to the house, a guest was waiting for us. Thankfully everyone is good friends, and it was no big deal. Jewel enjoyed having a friend help her finish setting up the sundae bar for the party and the craft station where they planned to decorate beach balls.

The party itself was great. The only challenge was the girls had so much fun at lunch that we were there FOREVER, and we needed a little more time for the party. (Because four hours wasn't enough!) Thankfully I was able to get in touch with all of the parents, and everyone was allowed to stay a little longer. I was even able to corral everyone for a picture. (Shoving juice boxes in their hands helped. And it's not like we tried for anything silly like actually getting everyone to look at the camera.)

So we made it through another year AND another birthday party. Not bad.

Water Boy

We usually only give the boys cold food or food that is no more than lukewarm.  Since they still mainly eat with their fingers, this prevents burns on both their hands and mouth.  Occasionally, though, they will be desperate for food, and Michael will be moaning, and we will give them the food before it cools completely.  This happened a little over a week ago, and Michael learned a new word.  "HOT!"  The boy has a healthy fear of hot.  This is good, since he learned it without actually getting burned, and because he doesn't seem to fear anything else.

In particular, the boy has no fear of water.  At the beach, he runs straight for the water.  Once he is in the water, he keeps pointing east, wanting to go deeper and deeper in the water.  He doesn't care when waves knock him down. (He doesn't always get up right away either.  We can't help but wonder if he has a death wish.)  He just wants more!

My parents now have an apartment in Wilmington, and on Sunday night we took the kids swimming at the pool in their apartment complex.  When Michael spotted the water in front of him, it was more of the same.  He couldn't get enough of the water.  He wanted to kick his feet and doggie paddle.  He let my mom hold him so he could swim on his belly.  He let her hold him so he could float on his back.  He loved every second of it.  This child is definitely our swimmer.