Saturday was our first swimming lesson. Last year Zoe loved it so much she never wanted to get out of the water. We spent extra time jumping in, playing with a noodle and singing Do You Know the Popcorn Man.
To say I was excited about this year is putting it lightly.
We got in the water, met some of the other kids and our teacher who is named after a character in the Sound of Music. If that's not a girl destined to be a toddler swim class teacher, I don't know what is. It only elevated my hopes of this year's swim lesson to be the year Zoe realized her potential in the water and cemented her a future as an Olympian.
Sometimes I'm known to be dramatic.
Apparently so is Zoe.
The first song of If You're Happy and You Know it was a bust. She cried, wiggled and did whatever she could to free herself from the torture of being in the water and being forced to sing.
Liesl (see, total Sound of Music name) caught on that it was time to do something interactive, so she brought out balls. The kids were to throw them and then mock swim to them as their parents basically maneuvered them through the water. This distracted Zoe for all of 2.5 minutes. Which is the entire amount of time that she enjoyed the class.
She wanted nothing to do with jumping in, nothing to do with London Bridge, the noodles, nothing. It was basically 20 minutes of wailing and gnashing of teeth. She wanted out of my arms, out of the pool and out of this class like 20 minutes ago.
With only 2.5 minutes left in class, we went to get our towels. That's when she decided she wanted back in the pool.
We were by the entry into the pool that is gradual, so toddlers can actually walk in without being in 3 feet of water immediately. This gave Zoe a sense of being much bigger than she was. She wanted to walk to her class. Alone.
She made it to where the water was touching her bottom lip before I pulled her out. The sense of being too short and drowning are foreign to her. After all, we're always telling her what a big girl she is. I guess that means when you're not quite 3 feet, you can still stand, above water, in 3.5 feet of water.
She was beyond mad at me. It took an additional 45 minutes after class for her to calm down.
We only have 5 more days until all those parents in the class can go home and say, "gee Brianna you did so good, not like that other little girl in the ladybug swimsuit." At least we did accomplish something during our 2.5 minutes of swim lessons.
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