I've waited for this day my whole life

After teaching about 30,000 lessons, (well, that may be an exaggeration, but I did teach swimming lessons from the time I was 15 until I graduated grad school which adds up to be ALOT of swimming lessons) Needless to say, after teaching so many lessons, one tends to notice trends. There are always those kids who are terrified to put their face in the water and that ends up being their grand accomplishment after 5 weeks of lessons, there's usually a kid who won't keep his head above water long enough to listen to instructions, the show off who always wants the teachers attention and says "look what I can do!" (Much to my embarrassment, that was me back in the day when I took swimming lessons at the old Bubble). There is a kid in every class who tries like the dickens to do what you ask but just lack the coordination to move both arms and legs at the same time. There are the kids who show up for one or two days of the session and then you never know what happened to them and then there are the cutie-patooties that made me want to have children in the first place- the little boys and girls who come up out of the water with the biggest watery grins and you just want to give them an extra squishy squeeze after they jump in as the third monkey on the wall.

I've had many years to think and wonder about what my kids would be like. I wanted to be the cool Mom that didn't interfere too much and trusted the teacher (and maybe even tipped and thanked her at the end of the session). I wanted my child to be one of those well behaved scrumptious children that made teaching fun. I've been teaching Jack, and I know that I could teach him what he needs to know, but I feel like he shouldn't miss out on the swimming class opportunity. My mom always said that we listened better and took our swimming teacher more seriously than we did her, and I think there's truth in that. So I registered Jack for level 2-(He can already float so he doesn't need 5 weeks of blowing bubbles) and we went to his first swimming lesson Thursday.
He did great!! He kicked, he swam, he did "big arms," he floated on his back, he blew bubbles to the fishies, and he nearly drowned and Laura and I had to jump up to rescue him ( I think his teacher was embarrassed but HELLO- he broke the cardinal rule of teaching swimming- Never turn your back on your class!) I thought Jack was very cute (and squishy) and he actually listened to his teacher (when he wasn't climbing on the platforms handrail). I think he showed up the older girl in his class who wasn't nearly as comfortable in the water as Jack - and yes I just may be a little biased and competitive when it comes to swimming. I think it will be a fun experience for Jack .

(I will take real pictures of his next lesson as these are just from my cell phone.)

I shocked myself by how excited I was to watch Jack's first swimming lesson. I was literally jumping up and down- Adam and Laura thought I was a little crazy. I felt like all those other kids had been preparing me for the time when I would take my own son and teach him this valuable skill. It was such a different perspective to be the one sitting on deck observing the swimming lesson. I considered being a cool mom and not mentioning the teachers error, but then I changed my mind and mentioned it to his boss. I guess safety is more important than being cool.