Swimming at the Hunters' house

We ride our bikes to Grandma and Grandpa Hunter's house as often as possible (it would be every day if it was up to the girls) to swim in their fabulous pool. Although Abigail has started taking swim lessons twice a week, when we swim for fun, she wears a "floaty suit." Abigail watches Frances, and wants to do everything she does, so a few days ago, Abby wanted to jump off the diving board! Frances can do all sorts of fancy things off the board, including a flawless backdive. When it's Abby's turn, I tread water in the deep end, and she launches off the board. The challenge has been to slow her down as she hits the water (flat, like a pancake) without having her land on my head! Yesterday, Abigail announced that she wanted to jump off the diving board all by herself, without me catching her. I thought that once she went under the water, she would decide it was not such a good idea, and want me to catch her again. Boy, was I wrong! I still tread water there in the deep end, but Abby jumps off, hits the water and goes under, pops up, and starts paddling for the side. She has also decided that she can "swim" all by herself. She can dogpaddle around in the floaty suit, as long as there are no waves to hit her in the nose!


And when she is done swimming (usually when she needs to use the bathroom, and it is too hard to get her back into that floaty suit!) she gets to wrap up in a towel, sit in the warm sunshine, and eat a cookie!