Sand man

Sand must have some sort of magical power over my children. They absolutely love to play in the sand at our pool, maybe even more so than the actual swimming pool. Abe can lose himself for hours in the sand box. Despite three sessions of swim lessons this summer, I still find Abe here most of the time:

Anna has fallen in love with swimming and I can say her loyalties are more equally divided. However, she spent most of last year in the sand area also. Anna's imagination has just simply transferred from sand to water. Mermaids. Go figure. She finds her way back to the sand area for long periods of time every day though. 

I think what amazes me so much is that kids (at least my own kids) can quickly embrace the wide open canvas of sand. Adults simply don't do that any more. The tunnels, the islands, the castles, the highways. Sure, we could entertain ourselves for 20 or 30 minutes, but I've literally watched Abe stay in that sand pit for two hours, oblivious to the world around him. 

Our hope for Abe to finally start swimming underwater didn't really pan out this year. I guess it's a good thing we live in Chicago and not by the beach. However, he has a lot of fun wearing his swim vest and paddling around, chasing after his friends. I think he will accidentally dunk his head underwater while playing one day and then that will be that. 

We suffered through our first set of swim lessons with me threatening and bribing and it never really worked. Once I decided to just sit quietly and see if anything came of the lessons, I realized that our timing is off. He's too fearful of the water right now. Perhaps next summer Abe will loosen up, and, of course, he will be taller and stronger. 

Anna's swimming has improved remarkably this year. She lacks confidence to really swim in the deep, deep area, but I feel confident that she can do it. Anna will swim distances, coming up for a breath and then continuing. However, she has a mental block about swimming in certain "deep" areas. It's hard to talk someone out of a fear. No jumping off the diving board this year. 

So we joined a pool this summer so we could watch our kids play in the sand as much as swim. 

I can live with that.