We’ve had a good week for swimming. The afternoon thunderstorms have stayed away, and we’ve had so much fun in the water! Doodle is experimenting and getting a little stronger every few days. It has been fun to see the older kids getting excited about his progress.

On Monday, Doodle was swimming with one pad in his vest. I was planning to take it out soon, so when Sudoku asked if she could try to secretly remove it, I told her to go for it. That sly girl got the pad out without Doodle knowing what had happended. He was doggy paddling around just fine and finally noticed that his vest was rather saggy. When we told him what had happened, he wanted to take the vest completely off and show us how he could jump in without his vest on.

Later, he said, “Watch, mama, I’m going to dive!” Before I could respond, he squated, belly flopped into the water, and came up with a triumphant grin. He calls it “diving” and insists it doesn’t hurt.

Today, Carman taught him to hold on to the ladder and work his way down until he could touch the bottom with his hand. He was so proud and must have touched the bottom 50 times today. He swam from the diving board to the shallow end’s ladder and took a hard, drooling 1 hour nap this afternoon.

Also in the pool…Sudoku learned to do a back dive today.