First Day of Swimming Lessons

The Parks & Rec Department in Sioux Falls has a great deal on 2 weeks of swim lessons- $10 or $15 if you have your season pass. The only catch is, you have to get the kids registered before the classes fill up.

So here's my story: The Monday evening and Tuesday morning of the week before lessons start is the time to register your kid for lessons. Last year, I forgot all about it on Monday night, didn't get there until Tuesday morning, and all the classes I needed were full. So the kids didn't get lessons. I later found out that a different (less popular) pool might have been the answer to my problem, but we decided to "home school" swim lessons and it worked out fine.

So this year, I thought, I would go to the less popular pool right away, avoiding the long lines and full classes at the hip trendy pool we usually go to. Wait, let me see if I can find pictures of these two pools... OK, here's the hip trendy pool

it includes a zero depth entry, two toddler slides, and a big waterslide (not pictured)

and here's the less popular pool.

This is where they have swim meets. It's a lap pool with a diving board at one end. Not as fun for the little ones.

We live an equal distance between them.

Anyway, registration started at 5:30 Monday night, I had to teach a lesson until 5:30, but she came early, so as soon as I got her out the door, I got the kids in the car and we were headed for the pool by 5:20. Xander kept asking, "Do you think we'll get in this year?" I assured him that I had things all figured out, and we were definitely getting in this year. So we pull up to the pool, where there is only a very short line of 2 or 3 families waiting to register, get out of the car, and I THEN take the time to look at my summer activities guide only to discover to my dismay, that they don't teach preschool lessons at this pool! (it's too deep)

Now, if I would have taken a moment to think things through, I might have decided that since Xander didn't get his first batch of swimming lessons until he was 8 (and he's doing great in the water, by the way), maybe Maia would be OK missing out preschool level swimming lessons- since it's really only a matter of getting used to the water at that age, which we do just fine with on our own. Also, given her great fear of large group situations without me around, I might have just saved my $10.

But I didn't.

I loaded us all back into the car and headed for the hip trendy pool, there to be greeted by 3 lines (one for each time session) probably 50 feet long.

And it was hot.

Luckily, my kids are big enough to go and play on the playground equipment (located maybe a half block away- within eye-shot, but not close enough for those lucky moms who had to bring their toddlers and babies along). 45 minutes later, I got both kids registered for lessons, Maia in the preschool class (4-5 year-olds) and Xander in "Level III, Stroke Readiness" (I just guessed).

So anyway, we go to our first morning of lessons this morning, and they call Maia's name, she hangs on to me for dear life, cries, pouts, and eventually goes with the nice teachers (and cries most of the time). I feel guilty that I'm relieved that mine isn't the whiniest kid in the group.

They get to Level III, and don't call Xander's name. I went and checked, and after all that waiting in line, and the hassle that went with it, they never wrote Xander's name down! Luckily, they were flexible, and let him join the class anyway. I was a little nervous that he wouldn't know enough to do the class, but he told me that what he didn't know, he figured out pretty fast. I watched for a little while from outside the fence, and was relieved to see he was keeping up with the class just fine.

If there's one thing that Xander loves to do, it's swim.

This afternoon after lessons, we went back to the pool (it was still 90 degrees when the sun went down tonight), and Xander said, "Want to see me swim across the deep end and back?"

I didn't know he could do that! Sure enough! It's not pretty, but he's starting to learn how to do the American Crawl, and is definitely building his endurance.

Maia made big strides this afternoon too. She loves to jump into the water into my arms repeatedly (seriously, she could spend 9 hours doing this), and occasionally, she'll even jump to me before she can reach my hands! I know, she's so brave.

Much like Little Vikes Day Camp, I'm hoping that the next day of lessons (which isn't until Wednesday), will be a more positive and enjoyable experience for her.

Mini vacation

I'm terrible about taking pictures this summer! Sorry there's no pics to go with this long post.

We took off for the day Wednesday and went down to Yankton to stay overnight at Mom & Jim's. We picked an absolutely perfect day for it. Matt got up and on his bike at 5:30 am, and rode the 87.6 miles to Mom's place. I got the kids up and out the door by 7:30 and we were there by 9. Mom took the morning off both Wednesday and Thursday (she had meetings she couldn't miss Wednesday afternoon), so we had some time with her before she left for work.

She showed me through all her flowers, walked me through the waist-high wildflowers and grasses that constitute her front yard, then took a shower and went to work.

I did not take a shower at that point, because we were going out on the boat that afternoon... BIG MISTAKE! We'll come back to that later...

So Grampa Jim took us out on the boat and we anchored and just paddled around in the water for several hours. I sunblocked everybody up good, the wind was virtually non-existant (a strange anomoly for South Dakota), and it was a beautiful, sunny 90 degrees. Just right for bumping around in the lake all afternoon.

Nobody got sunburned, I am proud to report.

Xander's favorite activity aboard the boat is to jump off, climb up, jump off, climb up, jump off, climb up (etc.). We wore that kid out! This has been his favorite thing to do aboard Grandma's boat for years! He's finally to the age where he can do it without help and without inhaling a bunch of water every time and barfing up after each jump. (ahh.... the good old days)

Maia, as usual, was a little less adventurous. She did discover that sitting inside one of the tubes (the kind with a mesh bottom that you pull behind a motorboat), is like having her very own little swimming pool. Once she figured that out, she was happy as a clam.

I layed in the sun and soaked up the rays. I know, you're not supposed to do that, but I didn't get that much sun, my tan looks so much healthier than my pasty white skin I've sported all these years (literally 2 decades), and ah, it was so relaxing!

Matt swam around with us for a while, then got on the boat under the canopy and hung out with Jim (who does NOT swim), until weariness from the morning's ride overtook him and he zonked out for a while.

Mom called after she was done with her meetings, so we went and met her for supper at the Marina, then went back out in the boat for a little while before heading in for the evening.

One of Matt's favorite things about going to Mom's is that she gets the channel that shows Tour de France coverage, so he got to watch 2 stages during our stay, which made him really happy. Don't get him started on this topic, by the way. He's really passionate about cycling...

After bathing both kids, we had a fire in the chiminea on the deck (no marshmellows to roast), then we put them to bed.

About this time, I started to discover that I had a problem... Remember my little visit to Mom's flowers? Apparently, I was visited by a rabid crop of chiggers, but the bites didn't manifest themselves until about bedtime that night.

I have not had chiggers this bad since I was about 14 or so, and went picking chokecherries a day or two before leaving for summer camp. I remember being quite miserable then, but this was worse. Because this is now.

(If you are unfamiliar with either chiggers or chokecherries, you might not be from South Dakota)

Now, I have learned a few things about chiggers in the past few days. I'll just link you to the web page that I found about them. I was thankful to learn that they do not acutally crawl into your skin and live there as is the common understanding around here. But they are seriously ferocious.

Sadly, I am not looking so good in my bikini swimsuit as I was just a week ago. I look like I have chicken pox. That should go over well at the public swimming pool! :)

But chigger itching aside, we had a great time, and will have to try to get out there again before the summer is over and gone.

Riding bikes and nearly getting saved

The summer has been really quite uneventful. I intentionally didn't hyper-schedule the kids, and as a result, we are having a fun, relaxed summer.

Xander is starting to finally get the feel for riding his bike after another day of working on it with Matt (after about 6 weeks off- I wouldn't say he's particularly motivated to learn). Yesterday afternoon, Matt & Xander went down to the park and plugged away at it in the grass again. Then they came back up to the house and tried on the cement for a while. Xander got a couple of good crashes in, one with Dad, when the handlebars poked into his chest (OW!), and one later with me- a scraped knee on the curb when he forgot how to stop. Matt made him get right back up and on the bike after his crash, but I let him quit and come inside. Oops. Now he never wants to ride again.

Maybe.

This morning at children's church he learned that a little girl about 6 months older than Maia (making her 4 1/2 to Xander's 8 1/2) learned to ride her 2-wheeled bike yesterday (in his defense, he's an oldest child, and she has 3 older brothers). He was man enough to still ask that God would help him learn how to ride his bike as a prayer request.

Today the kids played downstairs while I had Bible study in the kitchen and Matt updated his blog, talked to his folks and read in the upstairs. The kids came up with a new game: "Slap the prince." It goes like this- Maia lays down under a blanket, Xander comes along and says, "Someone is under the blanket. I wonder who it is?" He then removes the blanket and says, "Oh a sleeping princess. I must kiss her on the forehead," which he does. Maia then opens her eyes and slaps him.

Fun game.

As I was getting Maia ready for bed tonight, she told me that her heart was breaking because she missed Jesus. I said, "You know, if you ask Jesus, he will come and live in your heart, then you never have to miss him again." I tried to explain some basic salvation stuff to her and we talked about how we all want to do naughty things sometimes. "Do you ever do naughty things?"

"No."

"Are you ever disobedient?"

"Yes."

"Are you ever mean to your brother?"

"Yes."

"Do you ever tell a lie?"

"No.......(much prodding here)....... yes." By now, she's starting to feel pretty bad about things.

"Do you want to be forgiven for all those naughty things you've done? Because Jesus will do that for you and make you feel all clean inside."

"Nah. I'll do it tomorrow. Let's have a tea party."

I guess she's used to living under the weight of sin at the old age of 4.