Another Ten for Thursday

1 - There are only 8 more days left of school!  Hooray!!  I'm most excited to not have to make school lunch anymore.  What does that say about me?

2 - Addison has her gymnastics showcase tomorrow.  After being in gymnastics for 6 months or so, she has improved so much and loves her coach Miss Tracy.  It is amazing to see what she is able to do and even more amazing - she hasn't broken any bones!

3 -The boys don't get a showcase because they moved from being in a recreational class to the "Pre-Team" class the session of the showcase.  Had I only known!  But their improvement is fantastic as well.  The things they are able to do now in comparison to when they first started is incredible.

4 - Our neighbors came to warn us that a 6 foot alligator had come from behind our house and crossed the street to rest on their driveway for awhile.  They warned us because we let our children play outside and often leave our garage door up.  Can you imagine it coming into our garage to get cool and we shut it in ourselves?  From their description of when they saw it, we must have just missed it.  We were getting home late from swimming and I had been cleaning out the car while Marc put the kids to bed.  Just missed it.

5 - Coleman is getting ready for his 8th birthday and his baptism.  We are grateful to all of our friends out here in Florida who are helping to make this special occasion truly memorable.  It is hard to have such momentous occasions away from all of our family and friends in Utah.  But we are grateful my Mom is able to make it out and for all of those here.

6 - Missionary Work has been a strong emphasis at Church lately.  It has been fun to see our kids take it to heart.  Coleman invited some neighbors and some friends as well as his 2nd grade teacher to his baptism.  We'll hope that they are all able to make it. 

7 - Coleman and Campbell have both started learning the butterfly stroke at swim lessons.  It just amazes me.  I never learned how to do that stroke and here they are at 8 & 6 doing the butterfly.  Granted, it is the beginnings of the butterfly - they call it the Caterpillar.  Still amazing.

8 - I was a little worried that our kids wouldn't remember our cruise in the years to come and made some off hand comment about it.  My little Cam took it to heart and just about every other day, he will hug me and say, "I still remember the Disney Dream."  or "I still remember the cruise Mommy.  I won't forget."  Love that kid!

9 - Cooper is cruisin'!  He has been crawling for a couple of months now - faster and faster.  But he now pulls himself up on just about anything sturdy enough to hold his weight and then he will walk around.  The unfortunate thing has been when he pushes the little kid chairs around the tile floor and the foot of the chair will catch and he will just go down, usually whacking his face in the process.  So many bruises - poor guy.

10 - For those who don't know - we went on a Disney cruise.  The Disney Dream to the Bahamas for 4 nights and had a glorious family vacation.  My Mom and David were able to join us and share joining staterooms. The shows were spectacular, the entertainment everywhere on the ship was incredible, the food was pretty good (but we are a family of picky eaters) - all in all it was fantastic!  Our only wish was that it had been longer.  I tried to get Marc to splurge with me for the 7 night cruise but he was quite resistant.  But he won't be for our next cruise!!!   I'm sure once we upload the photos I'll do a blog just on the cruise.  I highly recommend them!

The Walk of Shame

Our children have been taking swimming lessons for the past two weeks at Seal Swim School which is a fantastic but also aggressive swim school.  I was so optimistic at first.  I would be with Cooper in the Parent Tot class and the other three would all be in their lessons at the same time.  Cooper really enjoyed himself for the first week but by the second week he understood that he would be going under the water several times.  The tears began and the screams continued throughout each class.  Beyond just the tears was how long he was expected to stay under water.   After a couple of seconds I was ready to scoop him up but the teacher was much stricter.  By week two, it had become our own personal torture chamber and I began to count down the days until it was all over.  I expressed my concerns that I was teaching him to fear and loathe the water as well as the fact that he has barely grasped the concept that he can crawl let alone to swim to the wall and pull himself up and out.  He is not even 10 months old and he is also a chub-a-wub!  It takes a lot to pull that big body out of the water! 

The owner, who has been doing this for decades, came over and worked with Cooper and I for a minute and diagnosed our problem almost immediately.  Me.  I am the problem.  I am not a strict parent when it comes to teaching kids how to swim.  He knows that I will rescue him and not make him work for it.  She decided to work with him for the rest of that class - I think to prove that I'm the problem.  After she took him, the class teacher looked at me and said, "Mom, you can get out of the pool now."  It seriously felt like the walk of shame.  I had not made the cut - I was a weak parent.  I had to get out and go sit on the sidelines. 

I am actually quite happy because it is true - I am a weak parent.  It broke my heart to hear his wails.  Luckily, he gets private lessons (for no additional charge) for the remaining two weeks.  It began today and although he did cry for over half of the lesson, he had already showed improvements.  He could hang onto the wall and started to kick when he swam underwater.  It still tugs at my heart but I'm trying to have faith that this is the right thing to do. 

The biggest drawback is that I now drive over 30 minutes each way to swimming every single day - twice on Mondays.  That is in addition to the two days a week of gymnastics.  I really do feel like we are living in our car at times.  But I have to just keep chanting - two more weeks - two more weeks.  But on the bright side - Coleman and Campbell just learned the beginnings of the butterfly stroke.  They called it "The Caterpillar".  And Addison can now swim the length of the pool.  It's all worth it right?