Alice's first* swim lesson

*Ok, technically Alice had swim lessons when she was about 22 months old, but it was more like time in the water for her to play.

I signed Alice up for her first real swim lessons at the Triangle Aquatic Center, an indoor pool about five minutes from our house, which is super convenient. The series includes 8 lessons, on Sunday afternoons from 4:20-4:50. I'd been prepping Alice for the lessons for a couple of days, emphasizing that she had better listen to whatever her teacher tells her, and if she misbehaved too egregiously she would not get any videos at bedtime snack. We also watched a few videos of kids at swim lessons so she would know what to expect, since she has no memory of the lessons from two years ago.

When the afternoon finally arrived, she was so excited that when I got back from my walk, she was sitting in the bathroom completely naked, waiting for me to find her "swimsuit with cherries on it." Her swim lesson wasn't for another hour. I convinced her to put some clothes on and eat a snack before getting ready.  She was in one of her crazy states, probably due to excitement, so it was surprisingly difficult to wrangle her through snack, into her suit, and out to the car. I was worried she would be bezerk at the lesson, but luckily she calmed down.

She did quite well. The only problem with the lesson is that even with only five kids in the class, they still just sit there freezing most of the time, while the teacher does each activity with each kid.