It's All in the Past

Allie officially began her first season of swimming lessons last week. When I had gone at the end of April to sign her up at the designated time and place, the original plan was to sign both girls up for lessons-- to choose a time where Allie would have a class at the same time Sami would take the "Mommy and Me" class. It would be perfect. However, that plan was foiled when we realized about a month ago after a trip to the beach, that Sami cannot stand water cooler than bathwater. She also hates sand. What kind of a kid is that? What kid hates sand? Actually, to be honest, I never did like sand either (still don't), but I do like to go in the water... as long as it's not above my mid-section. Okay, back to Sami... So, I didn't sign Sami up, and figured I'd just keep her strapped in the stroller while Allie swam. Allie's first day was last Tuesday. After roll-call, her teachers led the brood over to the edge of the pool, directing the kids to sit there and dangle their feet over. Being the first day, it was the day to test their levels to see which teacher they would get. After encouraging them to kick their legs, one teacher went to each kid, and while smiling, reached her arms out to see if they would reach back. If they did, she'd grab them and dunk their lower half in the water to see their reaction. Of course most of the kids got a bit freaked out. I mean, they didn't even see that one coming. The difference between the rest of them and Allie, is that the other kids mainly recovered, with the exception of maybe one other. Allie was all for swimming lessons till that lady decided to "practically drown" her. Once the teacher set Allie back down on the edge of the pool, Allie thought, "Man, I'm outta here!" She got up and walked away, looking for something better to do. Heck, there was a bin full of toys to play with, or a giant whale at the extremely shallow end of the pool that was calling her name. I ran after her and stopped her.

"Allie, where are you going? You need to go back with your class."

"No, I wanna pway with the toys." She walked away from me.

So I caught up to her. "Allie, you need to go back to your swimming lessons-- back in the pool with your class."

"No, I wanna see that whale."

"Okay, let's just go home."

She looked at me. "No, I wanna swim."

"Well, you can go back in the pool with the other kids and your teachers or we can go home. Which one?"

"Back in the pool." And she walked over and sat back on the edge, waiting for help. The teacher came over, took her in, and put her down. Allie was a bit nervous until she realized the pool at that end was about two feet deep. After that, she walked all the way across the pool, and the teacher got her to hang on to the edge and "walk" herself around to the deeper end. She really was quite cooperative once that little fiasco at the beginning was out of the way. Her next lesson wasn't quite as difficult. Although, that "princess" mentality is beginning to surface. While she's not afraid to go in the water, she doesn't seem to want to try to actually swim. Why do that when there's a big strong teacher to do it for her? He can carry her, lift her, support her, hold her, so why should she try to do it all by herself? Ick. What is she? A peasant?

Those girls make me laugh... and cry, too, but we'll skip that for now.

Sami took her first steps on Saturday! Don't get me wrong, she's not walking yet, but she's getting braver, and I don't imagine it will be long before we have another Tasmanian Devil tearing through the house. Although, she is a pretty fast crawler-- a regular Maria Andretti. Once she started crawling, I was just grateful she could actually defend herself against her overbearing big sister. Of course that also means that Allie has become more aggressive as well-- the pushing and shoving and screaming have begun. Ah, yes, sisterly love-- such fond, fond memories. I'm sure Mallory is rolling her eyes at this moment as well. I love you, too, Mal.

Hey, here's something fun! Some friends from our Wymount days at BYU, the Sextons, happened to fly into Melbourne for a beach/Disney World vacation. So we got to have them over for dinner at the end of their trip. Spending time with them just reminded us of how much we miss all our old friends. What a great family! And Allie loved playing hostess to their girls, who were five and three. Krista seemed to really like our Jambalaya, and wanted the recipe, so maybe I'll just include it on the blog. Just as a disclaimer, though, I have no idea how authentically southern it is, but we think it tastes good anyway.

I had better go and tend to the child who is running around diaper-less. Kevin just can be so incorrigible at times.