Pool time!

Mike & Lindsey went back to work today, so after breakfast we headed over to meet Grandma at the pool. The kids had a blast swimming around with Ben and I, and we had the entire pool to ourselves. The lifeguard even gave them a huge box of toys to play with which made our water time even more fun.

Pool day with Grandma!

Ben and I needed to attend Owen's new preschool's Parent Orientation night tonight, so Grandma offered to babysit and stay over so that we could go out to dinner afterwards to celebrate our anniversary (9 years!). (She even stayed the next morning so I could get some work done too ~ thank you Grandma!!)

I worked during the day, and then in the afternoon when the kids woke up from their naps, we took Grandma to our pool. It was a gorgeous day - not too hot, and the water was perfect - and the kids loved showing off their water skills.

Thank you Grandma for watching Owen and Vivian while we had a fun date night! 

Water baby in a bikini

We took a break at the pool tonight for a snack, and I couldn't help but snap this pic of Vivian sitting in front of me on the lounge chair in her itty bitty yellow butterfly bikini. :)

Recent brag on FB

Owen's first ever jump off the diving board.

Note the huge smile on his face. :)

Thank you to Kelly for being his jump target.

Swimming on a Sunday

I took a run this afternoon and since Ben had filled up the baby pool before we left for church this morning, it was almost like a hot tub once we all jumped in around 4:30pm. Such a nice way to relax and enjoy the last few hours of the weekend.

First dip of the season

Owen & Vivi got in their kiddie pool for the first time this weekend. Saturday night Kel & Matt, Kayla & Ryan came over for pizza on the grill and a quick jump in the water. Missing from these pics is Owen, because I think he was thawing out from the chilly water. :)

Swimming Sunday morning

New swim school

Owen's first lesson at Carlile Swimming was this morning. We were up at 6:45am, had breakfast and were dressed and ready to go (all 4 of us!) by 8am. It's less than a 10 minute drive to the pool, but we wanted to get there a little early to get him settled in and to meet his new teacher before his 8:30am lesson started.

He was a little shy at first, but once he got into the water he became Mister Swimmer Man within a few minutes. His teacher would take turns with the two of them (there can be up to 4 in his class at a time, but there was only one other little boy this morning). Once when she took the other boy to have him kick while she held him, Owen jumped right in and started swimming towards her. I think it took her by surprise. Guess I should have warned her that he just finished his ISR course and he's pretty brave in the water now.

All in all, he had fun. I think he probably could move up to the next level and we'll see what they say next week. Because at one point his teacher was having him float while holding him and he was playing with a toy in his hands while he floated - it's a piece of cake to him now.

Looking forward to seeing his swimming skills blossom over these next couple of months.

Carlile Swimming open house

After our winery picnic we headed over to the Carlile Swim School open house so that Owen could meet Tom Dolan and get an autograph and picture with him. We got a chance to tour the facility and see where his lessons would be held. It is such a neat place! We are so excited for Owen to start his new lessons tomorrow! Can't you tell how excited he is?

Owen can swim!

Owen had his second to last ISR swim lesson today and he did GREAT! (We had a minor setback two weeks ago when his instructor attempted to do fall-ins with him and it scared him. So after taking two days plus spring break week off, he got right back into it this week and was again swimming like a champ after taking the first two days back a little easy.)

He did his test yesterday with clothes and shoes on, and of course I forgot the good camera and only had my phone to take videos with. Unfortunately they all were too big to email to myself in order to try to post, so I will have to go out to the AT&T store at some point to get the USB cable that will allow me to download the pictures and videos that have been accumulating on my phone's memory card. I'll get to that some day.

All in all, his swimming skills went from about nothing (other than being able to hold his breath under water) to being able to swim, float, swim in a matter of 5 weeks. It's a pretty amazing program and we are so fortunate to have been able to enroll Owen. Maybe we have a future backstroker or water polo player on our hands? Only time will tell!

I was sure to put the camera in my purse and charge its battery while I was at work so that I would be able to tape Owen's lesson today. We are so proud of how far he has come in such a short amount of time!

(Sorry for my crummy camera skills - I was trying to watch him at the same time as I was filming which clearly wasn't the best idea. Notice as he gets into his float in the middle of the pool he looks up and over at my and smiles then gets all excited and squeals before swimming to the side. Funnyman.)

Tomorrow is his final lesson with Miss Nancy and I'll be getting in the water with him so that she can show me how to practice with him. Then on Sunday morning he starts lessons at Carlile Swimming, so we'll see how he does in a class with three other preschoolers. :)

Floating is fun!

Owen wrapped up his fourth week of ISR lessons today. He has been doing really well, as per his instructor, and is on track to graduate at the end of next week when he (hopefully!) passes the tests. We've been impressed with his progress so far and look forward to his next series of swim lessons with Carlile Swimming starting in May. It's an Australian program that was brought to the US by former Olympic swimmer Tom Dolan who grew up in Arlington. We're so lucky that they decided on Ashburn for their location and Owen will be in the Tadpole class on Sunday mornings with three other kids his age. We can't wait!

Swimming - lesson 13

Owen has been in ISR swimming lessons now for a few weeks. Today was his 13th lesson (the lessons are each only 8-10 minutes long, 5 days a week). He's doing really well and loves going to his lessons. His teacher Miss Nancy says he's doing an excellent job, he's very comfortable in the water, and that he has great breath control. Such great breath control that he doesn't want to float and rest for more than a second or two before swimming again. We're working on getting him to take longer rests in his float.

Swimming!

We were finally able to enroll Owen in an ISR class. We had been interested ever since seeing it on the Today Show and then seeing how successful our friend's daughter Olivia has been since completing a similar program in Houston. She continues to amaze us and we are so excited that Owen will soon be swimming like this! The lessons are 10 minutes long, five days a week for five weeks. He'll be starting when we get back on Monday so to get some practice in first, we headed to the pool. The water was nice and warm since it is a heated pool and Owen had so much fun it was difficult to pull him out of the water to eat lunch!

Grandma treated us to lunch poolside and held Vivian while the three of us ate. Vivi got to wear one of her adorable swimsuits, but never actually made it into the water since she was having more fun snoozing. :)

We noticed that Owen has started to get the concept of holding his breath when he goes under the water since he was not coming up choking on the pool water anymore. He kept wanting us to throw him up in the air so Ben and I had a nice game of "catch" and it was definitely a good workout since he's thirty pounds now.

Ocean City - day 1

Aunt Hillary and Grandma Marshall invited Owen and I to go with them to Ocean City for a night! It was a great way for Grandma to finish up her school year. She had her last day (a 1/2 day) and we met up at their house to start our journey. Owen napped on the way to the boat where we left Grandma's car. Then we all rode together in the Highlander the rest of the way to the beach. We sang several rounds of "Old MacDonald" when Owen started getting fussy. It would always put a smile back on his face. :)

We got to the hotel around 3pm and checked in. It was such a nice, spacious room with two double beds, a full kitchen, jacuzzi tub and separate room with a pull-out couch, 2nd TV and table and chairs. The best part? The gorgeous ocean view! We unpacked and put our suits and sunscreen on and headed down to enjoy the beach.

Owen took a tiny bit of warming up to the water, but pretty soon he was frolicking in the sand and surf. Grandma and Aunt Hillary built a sand castle for him. It was a little overcast, but warm and just a really nice afternoon on the beach.



After a couple of hours we headed up to the pool for a quick dip. It was a fully-equipped kiddie pool complete with lazy river, spraying whale, and not one but two slides! The slides were a little too big for Owen, so he just splashed around with Aunt Hillary before we decided he was shivering and we should head up to get ready for dinner.

After everyone showered and changed, we made our way out to the boardwalk to have a nice walk before picking a restaurant. We walked for awhile before deciding on Shananigan's. It was a great spot complete with Irish music and ocean view. We all enjoyed our meals ~ especially Owen who devoured his grilled cheese, pickles, applesauce and some of Grandma's fries.

Then it was off to find dessert! So many choices on the boardwalk. I found my favorite ~ Polish water ice ~ and Hillary and I each got one and took turns sharing with Owen. We also hit up the Candy Kitchen for salt water taffy and Fisher's for caramel corn and white cheddar popcorn for Ben.

By the time we got back to the room it was 9:15 and Owen was so pooped he went right to sleep in his Pack'NPlay. It was such a great day in Ocean City we can't wait to do it again tomorrow!

Basketball and swimmin' on a Friday

The weather was perfect today so around 10am Owen and I put on our swimsuits and slathered on the sunscreen. Then I filled up his froggy pool and we headed out to play on the deck before lunch. At first all Owen wanted to do was shoot hoops. Finally I coaxed him into the pool. He had so much fun playing with his bucket and when I said, "Owen, dump some water on your head!" he did!

After awhile he got bored in there all by himself. I was getting hot, so I asked him to pour a bucket-full of water onto my feet. Of course, he poured it right in my lap, soaking me. I didn't mind, it was nice to cool off. Since I was already wet, I jumped in his pool with him. We had a blast. Wish I could have captured it on camera, but I was too nervous he'd splash water everywhere.

It was a great way to spend the morning and after lunch we both took long naps.

Mommy swims with Owen

Swim lessons!

Owen had a blast at his first swim lesson! There was tons of splashing, kicking, paddling, and bubble-blowing. Looking forward to seeing our little tadpole blossom into a strong little swimmer. :)

Swimmin' on a Sunday

It was a dreary Sunday here, so after church we decided to take Owen swimming at the Rec center. I decided to sit this one out and play photographer instead. Unfortunately, I made the crucial mistake of forgetting to put the memory card back into the DSLR camera after uploading them to my laptop and thus we were stuck taking pictures with our point-and-shoot.

He hasn't been swimming for about 5 months, but he picked right up where he left off and was splashing up a storm. Ben's eyes loved this.



They practiced backstroke for a few minutes:


Then it was time for Owen to really get his face wet.



You guessed it. I had a mini-heart attack and yelled to Ben that he needed to stay closer to him.

Ben didn't listen to me ~ here's the proof:

But hey, at least they were having fun, right???

Then they did the slide about 10 times. Owen got so brave that Ben would let go of him and he would land under water at the bottom of the slide before Ben would quickly scoop him up. So fun!








In true terrible 2's fashion, we had a mini-tantrum upon pulling Owen away from the pool. However, it was short-lived, thank goodness. We went home to have lunch and a nap and then spent the remainder of the afternoon watching football and relaxing in our pj's. What a nice way to spend a Sunday. :)