An Ode to Summer: Swimming Lessons

We’ll break up the birthday extravaganza with some swimming lesson photos. I may have mentioned this a few—or a few hundred—times, but I love summer. This summer didn’t start out great, but it ended up very nicely. Part of the reason that is wasn’t going so well at the beginning was that I just needed to be around water more. I am a water girl to the core. I planned many trips to Hawaii and Mexico this summer, imagining all the time I would spend on the beach and under the sea. I knew that we were not going to be taking these trips any time soon, but it was therapeutic to plan them nonetheless. It was a welcome change to our routine to begin swimming lessons. Katie and Paul made a lot of progress this year. Not as much as I would have liked, but at least they can be in the water without me holding them. It won’t be too long before I have two competent swimmers. And Averi…well, we’ll just say that she doesn’t have any interest in any water activity that involves her head going below the surface. It will happen eventually. Look! There she goes. She will go underwater if she feels like it. Stinker.   Katie makes the most hilarious faces while she’s swimming. I love it. She definitely got that trait from her father. He makes the most awesome faces ever.        This girl and I got to hang out a lot during swimming lessons. She’s such a fun baby that I didn’t mind at all.   I’m so mad that I didn’t find this little play area until the last day of swimming lessons. It would have saved a lot of stress over the four weeks of swimming lessons. One of our traditions was eating lunch at the park after swimming lessons. Here is Bridget trying to eat a pear that is half the size of her face. A pear that large is hard to hang on to… …and there it goes. Wonderful mother that I am, I let her keep eating it after it got a good roll on the ground. Immune system! Arrr, matey. As soon as I saw this picture I was reminded of this picture of Katie from years ago: And this one of Paul: Apparently I get a kick out of feeding my babies fruit that is too large for them to eat and taking pictures of them trying. Who knew? But it’s ridiculously adorable, so that would explain it.