Swimming Lessons!

Kendall had swimming lessons all last week with Mrs. Carol! She went Monday - Friday from 10:00-10:30 and she did so great! The lessons were all by herself, so she got personal attention from Carol the whole time. At the first of the week, she didn't do so well. I had to make her get in the pool and on Monday she cried for pretty much the first 20 minutes. Tuesday she only cried for 5 minutes, but Wednesday she went back up to 10 minutes! So we had a plan for Thursday. We got her this Belle doll and told her that if she got in the pool and didn't cry, we would give her the doll. It worked! She got right in and didn't cry and did well again on Friday! Here is a picture of Belle watching her swim on Thursday. :)

Once she settled down from all the crying, even on Monday, she had a fun time and she did everything Mrs. Carol asked her to do. We just couldn't even figure out why she spent so much time crying! One thing Carol taught her was to scoop her arms and say "chocolate and vanilla" like she was scooping ice cream. She loved that!

She also taught her how to swim to "safety" - the side. She was good at that.

Our goal all week was to get her to put her head in the water while she swam. She was great at moving her arms while kicking her feet and she would blow bubbles, but she was hesitant at first to put her eyes in the water. We tried to talk her into goggles, but she didn't want to wear them. Tuesday night, Randy, Mom, and I took the girls to the rec center to swim and to let Kendall practice what she was learning. She was off playing with Randy and all of a sudden she said, "Dad, want to see me go underwater?? Ok, 1, 2, 3, 4, 5!" And she jumped under water with her eyes open and blew bubbles! All on her own! We made a big deal about it to her teacher on Wednesday, and for the last three days she was able to practice ACTUALLY SWIMMING! farther and farther across the pool with her eyes under and everything!

At the end of class every day she got to practice diving for princesses. That was her favorite part!

She did such a great job and learned so much! Since Friday, we have been to swim twice, just so that she keeps practicing what she learned. We are so proud of our little fish!