Madeleine in her "floaty belt" before her first swimming lesson.
Emily in her "floaty belt" before her first swimming lesson. (photo disclaimer: I'm fully aware she doesn't have all of her head, but "we" were a bit squirmy and sadly, this is the best of the bunch.)We survived our first week of swimming lessons. The lessons are M-Th from 4:30-5; our current level is for 3-5 year olds so we are definitely the novices of the group. On Monday Emily and Madeleine happily obliged their teacher, Miss Gina, and would sit on the edge of the pool, lean over and splash their hands. They also happily sat and kicked their feet in the water. Then Gina took the kids, one by one, into the pool - no dice. Emily was taken, had a nervous breakdown and Madeleine, watching from the side, decided this was perhaps not the best activity in which to participate. Gina demonstrated amazing patience and by the end of the 30 minutes our girls would let her take them in the water as long as she stayed near the wall. Monday evening and all day Tuesday we spent our time discussing the fact we won't sink as we are wearing a floaty belt, have Miss Gina and can use the ducks (more little floaty gizmos). We entered our second lesson confident in our abilities. Miss Gina wasn't there. We were not convinced of the other instructor's abilities. Madeleine sat on the edge of the pool and chewed on the extra strap length of her floaty belt (blechhh), Emily sat on the edge of the pool and looked around - the entire time... look out Olympics, here we come! Wednesday Miss Gina returned and we once again allowed her to take us in the pool and even move a bit away from the wall. On Thursday we happily threw our rubber ducks across the width of the pool so we could "swim" out to get them back (with Miss Gina of course). We also let Miss Gina bob us up and down in the water and were even caught smiling a time or two. We also managed to half-way hang on to the edge of the pool while floating on tummies and kicking our feet. At the end of the lesson Emily (who has periodic dramatic tendencies) burst into tears and treated all present to gut-wrenching sobs. I went over to the edge of the pool to get her out as she was disrupting the concluding game of playing Ring Around The Rosie on the shallowest step. Gina asked if she was okay and I said yes, but mentioned Madeleine was "in trouble". I had looked up just in time to see Madeleine step off the last step and while her floaty belt kept her from sinking, she was floundering and gasping in a rather panicked state. Gina retrieved Madeleine and I had two of them in tears, one from temper and the other from fear - fear won and was given more attention. Gina came to check on them and commented that they "have good arms" from the "throw your duck across the pool" game. I said I knew that based on the strength with which we throw things at each other on a routine basis. Anyhow, Madeleine is fine and both girls were impressed with the speed with which Miss Gina moved when retrieving her, we are looking forward to returning tomorrow for week two.
This past week was our last week at Mother's Day Out. It is with some trepidation (on the part of all three of us) that we will start official preschool ("peeschool") in the fall. Emily and Madeleine had a very nice last two weeks with the program and a lot of fun making masks as their art project (Both girls immediately go to the table to create their art when they arrive. We have the prevailing attitude, the more the better, and Emily in particular is a fan of glue...I see a career as a wallpaper hanger in her future.) Thanks to Miss Deena and Miss Emily (not Schreiber) for a wonderful summer.
In other Miss Deena news, she babysat when Till and I went to dinner for our anniversary last week. More importantly she introduced the girls to nail polish and the next morning we had two very excited little girls who proudly showed off twenty painted toes. If this isn't Fancy Nancy glamour, I don't know what is!
Speaking of Fancy Nancy, the girls have discovered a literary heroine from their mother's childhood. The little badger Frances from the Frances series by Russell and Lillian Hoban. Aunt Liz gave us several Frances books for our first birthday and they were recently spotted on a bookshelf containing books we will grow into. At this point we have tackled A Birthday for Frances, Bedtime for Frances, A Baby Sister for Frances, A Bargain for Frances and Bread and Jam for Frances. We own, but have not read, Best Friends for Frances....may appear on the plane. Bread and Jam for Frances is our definite favorite and Madeleine announced the other morning she was going to eat toast every morning until she gets tired of it - like Bread and Jam for Frances. The books are fairly long for the preschool crowd and I was surprised the girls did as well as they did sitting through a book of that length....however, there are periodic occasions when we start some pretty heavy paraphrasing half-way through.
Madeleine in the mask she made at school.
Emily in her mask from school. She isn't cross-eyed, but certainly has that appearance with the mask.
Emily and Miss Deena.
Madeleine and Miss Deena.
We have our countdown to Spokane going (four "night-nights" left) and two of us are a bit more enthusiastic about the flight than the oldest member of the group. We have also started packing (as in we took turns dragging the carry-on suitcases up and down the hall.....I actually try and have us packed 24 hours ahead of time, saved me when I got food poisoning at the Econ. Dept. Christmas party in December, two days before we flew out for Christmas - I love it when my compulsive tendencies are validated). We have been discussing the virtue of using airport restrooms instead of airplane restrooms, but there isn't much we can do besides cross our fingers (and wear our "airplane underwear" the disposable training pants - just in case. I never used them when potty training, went straight from diaper to underwear, so we are firmly convinced they are something to be used only at 30,000 feet). We are hoping to be entertained by the portable DVD player, dyed pasta with which to make necklaces, story books, coloring books and of course approximately 739 stickers.....we'll just have to wait and see.
