Leilani had her first swimming lesson yesterday. By chance at a birthday party we met a woman who told us about teaching her children to swim at an age of 9 months. Elizabeth is a counselor at Kapa’a middle school, and she explained patiently how to do the first lesson – and then agreed to meet us at the beach and help us.
Lesson one involved saying “1, 2, 3 breathe” and dunking Leilani underwater, and letting go of her for a split second, passing her from Andy to me. I then brought her up, and was all enthusiastic and praised her for being such a great little swimmer. We did it only 3 times, it was pretty cold and windy and we didn’t want her to freeze on top of the startling experience. She was a good student, and didn’t swallow water, cough or cry, but I could tell she was not so sure that it was all the fun we pretended it to be. As a reward she got draged through the water, kicking her legs and splashing happily, doing the Leilanifish. Next week she will have lesson 2.
As a sidenote: Leilani is really cranky these days, and yesterday before going to the beach she cried and was all upset, but when she saw me get out my bathingsuit she went from crying to a big grin in less than a second…