Chicken, Airplane, Soldier!

You may be wondering about the title of this post... so I'll tell you about it. These words describe the different positions Rachael needs to be in to swim on her back in the water. If you don't get it, then make like a chicken (arms tucked), airplane (arms straight out), and soldier (arms down by sides), and see what motions you're doing :) Better yet, do it in front of someone else. I bet you'll get some strange looks.

Anyway, Rachael is in the second half of her set of swim lessons this summer, and she's doing great. She's made a lot of progress from last year. Between watching out for daredevil leaps off the side of the pool into the water by my 2-yr old, I managed to get a few shots of Rachael learning some new skills.


Swimming on her back, currently in the "Soldier" position :)


Floating all by herself-- she managed it for 25 seconds!


Practicing her kicks across the pool on the noodle


Pushing off the wall and swimming out to Ms. Lynsey


Same thing


And swimming from Ms. Lynsey back to the wall by herself

Rachael is also practicing going under water to retrieve plastic rings off the bottom. She's added one to her total every day, so today she retrieved four! She doesn't really like doing this, but she's being brave... for the most part.

Ryan doesn't seem to have any fear of the water. I have to make sure he's in arm floaties because he'll jump off the side of the pool whether I'm there to catch him or not. Fortunately his arm floaties make him very buoyant! He goes all the way under and then floats right back up, and generally he comes up laughing. He also makes it a point to jump away from me, and then he swats my hands away when I try to guide him or hold him in the water. He wants to do it all by himself! I think he likes the feeling of floating and kicking his own legs. Hey, more power to him; I'm glad he's comfortable in the water. I'm pretty sure he's learning to hold his breath when he goes under water because he doesn't come up coughing. I've just been trying to teach him to kick his legs while I lightly guide him towards the side of the pool. Hopefully he won't be starting completely from scratch next summer when he learns "Chicken, Airplane, Soldier!"