Wednesday, July 8, 2009

the monkey crawl...

Having a swimming pool & a pond in your backyard creates quite the dilemma when you have 4 toddlers who cannot swim. Swimming lessons X4, YIKES! I have checked into it & though important it's also VERY expensive! So where do you find the money?Looks like at least for now it will be Michael & I giving them half assed lessons. I keep telling myself that it is better than nothing! We really are SO lucky to have built our pool BEFORE quads because we never would have built one after them. Heck we would never have been able to afford one now! CRAZY but true! SO we're lucky, broke people with FOUR munchkins that need to learn how to swim! I take them all out in the pool pretty much every day. In the beginning it was rough. They did NOT like it if the water was TOO cold or better yet they did not like going under the water. My how things change with just a few short months. They LOVE it! They will sometimes stand pointing out the sliding glass door "MY pool". I kid them & say NOOO it's MY pool & they would joke back saying it was theirs. We went all out & got ALL the bell's & whistles. At that time we had the money & I never thought I'd become a mommy so this was to be my "sanctuary".


Well it turned out better than we could have expected & now 3 1/2 years later it has served us well! We have a sun shelf where if I ever sunbathed I'd lay out & get my vitamin D. But now it is their playground. The perfect place for a toddler to play! They actually behave & stay there while I bring one of the tribe out into the pool for some "mommy swim lessons".




The twins, Avery & Lindsey, aka "The twins", are WILD! They will jump in towards you, go under the water & come up grinning! Nothing phases them! Brendan is becoming a little fish. He is cautious but LOVES it when I take him under water or get him kicking those legs of his. PLUS he does not want to leave the pool when it's time to go in. Then there's Camryn, the MOST cautious one of all. She can perform leaps & bounds above the rest of them BUT does it the safest way possible. She watches & learns from EVERYONE.She pays attention & sees everything!







My six year old niece can swim like a fish & there was Camryn watching her EVERY move. In two short days she taught Camryn what we've been trying to teach her, them, since March. How to grab onto the side of the pool if they ever fell in & get back to the steps. My cousin Lori started showing them that & we have repeated it hoping they would "get" it. Thanks to Lauren our Camryn can now go all the way around the pool doing...







the monkey crawl...


1 comments:

Classy Fab Sarah said...

I just had a thought and couldn't help but share it. If you are looking for a less expensive alternative for swimming lessons, you might be able to call up a local college or high school, ask for the swimming coach, and see if she knows any student swimmers who might be able to come to your house a few hours a week.
I know when I nannied for my neighbors (triplets), a friend and I taught them how to swim this way.
Just an idea... it looks like they are becoming little fishes though! So cute!

Do NOT copy!