Swim Team

Our summers for the past several years (wow, I think this was the 5th) have consisted of lots of sitting, sweating, swimming, and swearing (ok, not really on that last one, well maybe from Dave a little... I was getting carried away with my alliteration).  In other words, we've (well, the kids, really) been on the summer swim team.

This year was especially fun because it was Phillip's first year.  He started getting excited about being on the swim team close to a year ago when we bought him a speedo on a clearance sale.  He couldn't wait for his first swim meet to actually get to wear it.  One of my favorite memories of this summer is at our first swim meet when he actually got to wear it.  He had just gotten out of the pool after warm-ups and someone mentioned to him that they liked his Speedo.  His response was: "Well, it doesn't have much speed...people kept passing me.".  I think he thought that wearing a SPEED-o would put some speed in his swim.  I love it.

I volunteered to be in charge of the concessions for our home meets this year and that was quite an adventure.  I was in charge of buying all of the inventory to sell (drinks, candy, food, supplies, etc.), as well as prepare the meat for our "walking tacos" (basically a small bag of either Fritos, or Doritos topped with taco meat and all the fixin's....if you've never tried one, I highly recommend them....YUM!)  During our first meet we ran out of a lot of food and I quickly learned how to better judge quantities of items to buy.  Thankfully my kids put up with me.  They knew that Mondays were "mom's crazy days" and would try extra hard to get along and to help me out where they could.  Finally, by the last meet I felt like I was getting a handle on things, which will hopefully give me a leg up for next year (yes, I was crazy enough to volunteer to do it again).

Everyone had fun and improved.  Phillip started off not even being able to make it across the pool and by the end he not only mastered that, but also figured out the backstroke.  Ryan continued to improve on all of his strokes and has decided that he too would like to join  the year-round team.  Maddie was a huge help.  Not only to me on swim meet days, but to the coaches at practices.  After her practice, she would always stay after to help during the little kids' practices and was always willing to stay after practice to help put away the lane lines.  She also continues to swim great and enjoys it.  Sophie helped with the coaches a lot too.  I think her favorite part of swim team is that the competition is not quite as fierce as during the year-round season, and so she consistently pulled off 1st place finishes.