Swim Lessons

Autumn has had swim lessons for the past two weeks. I was amazed by how quickly she learned this year. From the very first day she started doggy paddling for a few seconds on her own and ended up swimming with her face down from one side to the other of the pool (of course with breaks in between). She also learned to go to the bottom (with a little help) to retrieve a toy, to float on her belly and roll over to her back, and how to hold her arms up when she jumps into the water. It is such a relief to know now that if she fell into a body of water she could keep herself up for a few seconds or swim out and not just sink.

Her instructor said she would be ready for the next level up next year (without Mom or Dad) and possibly the level above that with one exception- She had to learn to take instruction and be able to sit with the class. Autumn was very stubborn with her instructor and generally wouldn't do much that she told her and would then do it after much persuasion from me or Corry. She is so stubborn and if it looks like something she doesn't want to do or is something she is tired of doing, she's just not going to do it. She doesn't generally cry or throw a fit, she just doesn't do it. So we'll see where she's at next year and hopefully with a little age and a year of preschool she'll be ready for independent swim lessons. She did amazing this year even with her stubborness. Her instructor told me several times that even though she didn't want to do things at first, she was still doing everything and more in terms of swimming.

Autumn & Daddy

I think these pics with Corry were Day 2 of swim lessons and she was learning to swim on her own.
Jumping- she has no problem with jumping! We worked on her jumping and then swimming with her face in the water to us and backed up more and more.

The day Shelby got to swim with Autumn.....I didn't sign her up this year just because I knew it would be such a long hour with her and she is so crazy in the water, seriously, spastic! She wants to swim on her own and doesn't realize she can't! I took her one day thinking she could play in the baby pool while Autumn had lessons but they made everyone get out of the baby pool for some reason so we joined Autumn's class for the remainder of the day. That just reconfirmed my decision of not signing her up! She was so sad that she didn't get to go swim everyday, though.