Jun 9, 2012

Selling Out for Swimming

Josh took the day off work yesterday in order to provide a little moral support for Noah (AND me) by attending Noah's last swim lesson.  And Praise Jesus, the boy had a complete turnaround and was able to put his face in the water and do strokes at the same time.  He also walked around independent of his teacher and practiced more strokes during the walking.  He finally was willing to open his eyes underwater.  And then, glory be!, he kicked, stroked, and went under all at the same time as long as he could do it at the the steps!  I hardly recognized the boy without all the screaming and crying. We left there so surprised and proud for Noah!  Some shots of my son when he's not worried about "sinking".




Anyway, we all breathed a giant sigh of relief that the week could at least end on a high and confident note for our poor boy and we resolved to get him some more time in the water before his next swim classes start up the last week of June.  We've been invited to a couple friends' pools next week, I have plans to take the kids to the pool at our civic center, and I'm gonna invite ourselves to be a guest of another friend when she next hits the Y's pool. :)  In the meantime, Josh finally convinced me to let us buy another big, ugly pool of our own.  We simply must pounce on Noah's progress and give him a few Mommy/Daddy style lessons of our own.  We've had a big Intex pool before that ended up bitten and popped by Noah, so this one Josh had his eye on is the hard rimmed kind with a thick, thick liner instead.  And it wasn't cheap! This poses a problem for a tight budgeted family.  So, we did what we TN Browns do best.  We sold some stuff on my beloved Girlfriends Trading Post in a matter of minutes!

We sold this cutie patootie playhouse that was getting no action whatsoever.


We sold this plasma car that wasn't getting any play either.


Josh bagged up some Legos from the zillion pounds that we have and they sold like hotcakes.


I sold a little dress Anna's outgrown.


And we listed this remote-control truck that doesn't have any takers yet.  I'll probably have to drop the price soon, but that'll get 'er done. 


All these things earned us a grand total of $150 which is exactly what the new pool cost on sale at Target this weekend.  Perfect timing!  Say hello to our new backyard eyesore - just add water!


That boy will learn to swim this summer or I will drown him myself.

6 comments:

Cindy said...

After hearing about Noah's swim lesson experiences, I am completely dreading Claire's this week.

Kimberly said...

Go in with very low expectations and you won't be disappointed. :) Lesson learned!

Cindy said...

I don't care if she learns to swim or go under water this year. I just want her to learn to float on her back (which she does in the tub) and/or tread water to buy me some time to rescue her if she falls into deep water. It would be awesome if she learned to dog paddle to the side of the pool, but like you said: low expectations.

I wish we could spend more time at pools this summer so that she could gradually learn to swim on her own, but I can't do that with Ben at this age.

Kimberly said...

Yeah, that is a great bottom line... That she just learn to be comfortable in the water ... namely, NOT panic. That should have been our only goal going into this past week. Just get used to the water.

And you know you are more than welcome to come party at our pool! I feel your pain!

Cindy said...

This post inspired me to give GTP another try. Please let me know if you think I've priced something too high, because I have no idea what to list things for.

I'm hoping that James and I can alternate keeping Ben and taking Claire to the Gallatin pool some weekends this summer. Ben loves baths but hates swimming in pools, even our kiddie pool. But I'd hate having to wear a wet, cold swim diaper too :-)

Amy Faye Brown said...

Jealous! Enjoy your pool!