Swimming Lessons with a toddler – from Angel to Devil and back again.
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I have been really good with taking Emmy swimming; she went with Paul and me for the first time when she was about 10 weeks old – gone are the days when you need to wait until all the injections are out of the way, so I thought best to get her used to it early.
Having been a Nanny for 14 years, I have taken most of the children in my care to their swimming lessons, so I have picked up all of the songs, rhymes, and necessary skills to avoid paying for lessons and just teach her myself.
This has paid off, and Emmy loves swimming, has no fear of water and even tolerates going underwater.
She can and happily dunks herself under to get the swimming toys I have brought her if we are playing on the steps in the shallow water, she has started to prefer goggles recently but only because she has seen other children wearing them. She has armbands, which I use with her sometimes just to show her that Mummy can let go and teach her not to panic. I also brought her a swimming woggle, which she can use happily.
That being said, Swimming Lessons with a toddler is a completely different ball game!
Since being pregnant I seem to be so tired that I ‘forget’ about taking her swimming at the weekends or on my days off or find excuses not to do it, and I’ve been feeling really guilty about this recently so I bit the bullet and signed her up to swimming lessons at our local gym. My thoughts are that if I have paid for her lessons in advance, then she will NOT miss them, and I will stop making excuses. It actually works out the same price as me taking her on my own as it does for lessons; however, the 12 weeks are paid in advance – so that’s £61.20 spent, which WILL NOT be wasted!!
Last Tuesday saw our first lesson. Mummy and a very excited Emmy hit the changing rooms, got changed and waited for our lesson. Still excited this all looked like it was to be a success….In we got with the other 5 parents and children, all good so far. Emmy does really well – loves the warm-up songs, shows off her skills in the pool kicking her legs and windmilling her arms as instructed, blows bubbles and soon catches the teacher’s attention, who thinks she is great, confident, and so far a star pupil – cue proud Mummy moment.
This is going great…. Mummy is happy, Emmy is happy, everyone is commenting on how well she is doing for her first lesson, then they have to flip onto their backs with the woggle….yes great, Emmy does this once happily but then having to do it again – NO THANK YOU she decides!!
Cue screaming, hitting Mummy, crying, you name it. Getting louder and louder, Mummy getting redder and redder and wanting the pool to swallow her up. This continued for the rest of the lesson, even when they were allowed to jump in (which is what sparked the tantrum as she wanted to jump in). Still it was her first structured lesson I guess and I’ve seen worse, but I decided then that swimming lessons would be Daddy’s thing!!
Daddy rarely takes her swimming, I can count on two hands the times he has Tuesday’s swimming lessons should be Daddy/Daughter time. He was more than happy with this and had suggested it before her 1st lesson but Mummy thought she wanted to do it – on hindsight at 25 weeks pregnant it would be best for Daddy.
Today was her second lesson and as hoped she was perfectly behaved for Daddy. Now I don’t mind one bit as I have a theory – she behaved as it’s a novelty Daddy taking her. When I take her she and I have fun – she enjoys it but knows what Mummy will let her do, she doesn’t with Daddy so therefore has to listen to him and the teacher as she is a little unsure if Daddy will catch her like Mummy etc…
I’m hoping next week will be as successful as Daddy and Emmy both enjoyed it lot – Daddy especially as Emmy became the teacher’s pet again today, getting lots of praise for doing everything perfectly. So that is the start of a new Daddy/Daughter special time in our household and hopefully means I get an hour to myself too.
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Clare
Hi, I'm Clare (Emmy's Mummy). A former Nanny and Mother of 2 - Emmy (born February 2010) and Harry (born October 2012). We are Essex based and share our adventures and misadventures of a busy crazy life.
Comments (3)
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It was very shorted lived 🙁 She is such a Mummy's girl I had to take her again this week.
Hope Daddy and Emmy continue to have fun swimming and mammy gets some rest x
Since the admin of this web page is working, no uncertainty very shortly it will be well-known, due to its quality contents.
Here is my page: throne rush hack ios (tinyurl.com)
It was very shorted lived 🙁 She is such a Mummy's girl I had to take her again this week.
Hope Daddy and Emmy continue to have fun swimming and mammy gets some rest x