I think Oli is a fish.

Claire has been taking Oli to swimming lessons from about the same age as Jack, probably at about 15-20 weeks old.

They go to the Calm-A-Baby pool in Peterborough, where the heated pool is absolutely baking hot whilst you’re sitting on the side waiting, but lovely once you’re in.  The children love it, and best of all, they don’t go blue due to the coldness!

Anyway, there seems to have been a turning point in Oliver’s swimming, as he is like a little fish! He can hold his breathe and kick like mad under water, which actually gives him forward propulsion! He can get things from the bottom of the pool, providing you give him that fatherly shove, of course.

He likes to jump in, and splash around like any 2 year old little monster, but it always makes me laugh to see him when we’re both underwater; when he realises that you’re looking at him, he looks straight back with the biggest, cheesiest grin ever.

He just loves it.

Until you want to get out. Then it’s a nightmare.

Swimming Lessons

Claire’s work had a minor emergency, enough for her to have to go in for the afternoon, so I booked a half-day off work to look after Jack. Although, this wasn’t a normal ‘looking after Jack-day’, as Claire had already planned on taking Jack to the start of the new season’s swimming lessons.

I will admit, I really wasn’t looking forward to this – the thought of being the only bloke very-nearly-naked in a pool with a load of mums and their babies, and singing songs to do anything, much like the cast of Grease. Hmmm.

Anyway, we went, although that was a bit close. Jack got really upset around 15:30 ish and I hadn’t managed to get any food into him, nor very much booby-juice, which turned out, that he was just tired. He needed to sleep and get to it quick-style. I got him into the car at 16:00, to make the 15 minute journey to Huntingdon, to be there for 17:00 – yes, an hour to do a quarter-hour journey, but this was tactical; I spoke to Claire and she said about taking him earlier and leaving him to sleep in the car before going into the pool. Good plan, worked like a charm, as Jack was out-cold just after getting out of town, and so I managed to drive around a bit, get fuel, and find the place – all of this, and was still early, which was good.

After having to chuck a woman and her baby out of the men’s changing room, I got to work in getting Jack into his ‘swim-nappy’ – this is basically a nappy that you pull-on like pants, but is all nappy-like everywhere else. Out of the packet, I got the one with a picture of Nemo on it, as he was going swimming and all. (I did search online for a photo of a Nemo swim-nappy, but to no avail – sorry.)

I had to put Jack back into his car-seat, that I took in with us, as otherwise I’d never be able to get changed myself, as the little blighter has learnt to crawl…!

The session was a half-hour swimming lesson for the child, but it was probably just as much of a lesson for the mums/dads, as it as least showed me that Jack could be dunked and dipped in the water, and not to be molly-cuddled and protected like your instincts tell you to do.

We stood on the side of the pool waiting for the previous group to finish, and I was starting to wonder what I have let myself in for; in the pool was a lady, dressed in a wet-suit, leading the group of about 6 or 7 mums (no blokes) and their babies, some of which who were very small. The pool itself wasn’t massive and is only 0.6m at it’s deepest but, as it’s part of a school for special needs children, it was really hot in there. And for a group of mums (and dads) like that, it was absolutely perfect. The lady was singing and splashing the water around, showing the mums what to do with their baby, demonstrating with a dummy baby that was curiously left to float in a worrying fashion when not needed.

At this point, some of the other mums came over and said hello, starting their conversations off with ‘Is that Jack..?’ It sounds like he’s a celebrity or something, but the truth was that they are mums that were at last season’s sessions with Claire and had remembered him, but even that was nice.

The previous group faded out of the water and the mums in our group wasted no time in getting in. I soon followed and went for the back corner of the pool, towards the deeper part, although I was crouching so that my head was out of the water to match the other mums! (I didn’t want to stand up straight and make myself even more noticeable!!)

The lady in the wet-suit brought us into a circle and sang a song, which then, when repeated, went around each child in the group, saying hello and welcome to the group. A bit weird, but was quite nice in that it welcomed each child in turn, but also spent a moment with the child seeing if he/she would dunk their head or blow bubbles in the water, etc. I could repeat the words to it off the top of my head, as it’s one of those that just seem to lodge themselves in your mind and find myself reciting it even now..! Bah!

Once the circle-work was over, everybody dissipated to their own little area of the pool and then it seemed like it was only really Jack and myself in there, occasionally listening to the new instruction from the lady in the suit. There was a bit of swooshing Jack around the pool in my arms to a song, ending with you having to kiss and praise him for doing so well, to which he looked at me as if to say ‘yeah, what about it, dad?’.

She broke out the funky-looking purple and yellow floats, and got us to sit our babies on them and drive them across the water in speed-boat style, as well as lay them on the float on their bellies and get them to paddle in a body-board style. She then also tried to get the mums (and me) to lay the float on the side of the pool, sit the baby on top and then yank the float into the water, submerging the baby. Yeah… it was only really me that tried that one, and even then, I was a bit cautious about actually ‘dunking’ the poor child, although I don’t know why – maybe I’m worried that he hasn’t learnt to stop breathing under water or something!

A bit more singing and splashing later, and she’s getting us to teach our babies how to hold onto the rail around the pool, and then how to climb safely out of a pool, ending up laying on the deck in line with the pool edge. He’s probably a bit young to worry about doing this, as at 7 months old, there’s not a lot of chance of him being far from one of us!

She brought us into the centre of the pool again in a circle style and thanked us for coming along this week, which is when I noticed the next group on the pool-side waiting to get in and have their lesson. Admittedly, in their group, there was a few more blokes than in mine!

But in all, Jack was really good. He didn’t cry or moan at all throughout the half-hour session, so he obviously liked it. And so did I, it was a good couple of hours spent, even if he did cry half the way home!

I’m glad, though, that Claire had booked him in for these lessons – Claire used to swim a lot when she was younger, but even so, getting Jack in the water when he is young has got to be good for him, by way of exercise and all that for when he’s older. I didn’t spend that much time when I was young playing in swimming pools – I can swim, but I don’t really get excited about swimming length after length, or anything like that!

Swimming in the ‘tub!

On the bank holiday weekend, we went to my parents’ house for a BBQ, with my sister, Emma, and her other half, Vincent.

Before we left the house, Claire asked if I thought it was an idea to take my swimming trunks, as well as Jack’s swim-nappy and us both get in the hot tub over there. I’m not normally fussed about hot tubs, but it sounded like a good idea, as when Claire, Jack and I went swimming in Ely before, it wasn’t as warm in there as Claire had sold it to me.

We almost forgot about the whole thing, but I soon got my milk-bottle-white legs out and my not-so-hairy chest, and donned the shorts in true summer style… all for Jack’s benefit, of course.

Once we were in, Jack loved it in there, as it was already set to be about 38 degrees C, which was a stroke of luck – we normally run Jack’s bath to be about 37, so he probably didn’t notice the difference.

Actually, it worked out really well, as being a hot tub, it was plenty big enough for the pair of us (and there wasn’t any other screaming and crying kids in there distracting him, like there are in the pool) but it wasn’t too big that it was an effort.

My mum had bought these little plastic toys that suck up the bath water and when you squeeze them, they shoot out the water, so we brought them along too, seeing as we’re technically in a bath. Needless to say, it wasn’t Jack that found that they could reach his grandma sitting a good distance away. Ahem.

The kiddies’ pool that Claire takes Jack to in Ely gets deeper towards the end, but even a short-wheel-based person could stand up straight in there, which is fine if you’re a nipper, but the adults all get cold, as it’s difficult to stay under the water so you get cold really quick. Minor point, but… you know.

Anyway, My family assumed the role of the paparazzi in my absence and so I also got a taste as to what I’ve been subjecting visitors to our house with!!

The weather was just brilliant though – easily the warmest day we’ve had so far this year. Just glad that it was over a weekend, and not during the week when I get to see how nice a day it is from inside the office at work.

The Family Swimming Trip

Claire, Jack and I all went swimming this morning together for the first time, which was great.

We went to the swimming pool at Ely, as there’s a baby-pool there which is warm (apparently anyway!!) and wasn’t too deep at any point. Jack was floating around with either one of us holding his head out of the water, whilst he splashed and kicked away.

At one point when we first got there, we think he fell asleep in the pool, as he looked comfortable enough! I don’t think he slept in the car on the way there when he should have, and was looking a little tired before we started. And then later he got a bit grumpy, so we had to cut it short after about 3/4 of an hour in there.

Our friends down the road turned up there too with our God-daughter and her little baby brother, but just as we was about to leave, which was a shame. We saw them to say hello but didn’t get any splash-time. Maybe next time.