Swimming Holes We Have Known: badges

Swimming badge: The SUPERHERO SPLASH

I have to admit something: I hate taking my kid to swimming lessons. I want to love it. I want to feel inspired and excited by the process, and all the potential, but truth be told, I despise the whole thing. I don't have to go in with my oldest anymore, which is a relief (also an impossibility with another (younger) kid in the mix), and I've managed to read a few pages of a book every now and then. Or school through Instagram, or send a few long-overdue emails, but mostly, I just sit on the humid bench hating everything. (Mostly, I just want to trade places. He can sit on the deck, and I can swim. Wouldn't that be amazing? Half the pool for lessons, half for the parents to go for a dip themselves?)

My oldest is not (yet) a fan of the water. It's definitely gotten better. Tuesdays last fall would start at 7am with swim-dread and it would build and build until the 5:30 time slot and it would make the day unbearable. So far, that's subsided, which is a huge relief.

The thing is, I remember HATING swimming lessons. I loved swimming, I loved the water. At my grandparent's cottage, I'd be in the lake minutes after breakfast and would stay in until it was time to roast marshmallows at night, but I HATED swimming lessons back in the city. I'd always fail. I could never tread water. The other side of the pool was always so impossibly far away. Instructors were either too harsh or too chipper and no matter what I always wanted to impress them and always disappointed them.

It's such an intense situation—a tiny window, one-on-one, once a week, charged with expectations. It's such a lose-lose situation, really.

So I get it. Jack, I totally get it. But, as a wise dad friend of mine says, there are two things that are non-negotiable: swimming lessons and school. And so, we eat "bravery unicorns" on the way there, and celebrate with hotdogs afterwards (Side note: I distinctly remember getting McDLTs after my lessons at Norseman Pool!)

Mid-way through the term, my brilliant fella realized that "dunks" were the biggest point of fear, so he re-branded them, "SUPERHERO SPLASHES" and I can't even tell you what a difference that made. It was incredible. Thank god for marketing backgrounds...

Jack finished up last week and got a mama-made badge celebrating his superhero splashes, and my very brave, still-very-scared-of-the-water kiddo tried every week. Really, what more can you ask for?

AND my fella made him the most incredible book—photos of superheroes swimming, alongside photos of Jack in the pool. He just about burst when he saw himself next to a photo of Spidey and it's now fully in the bedtime reading rotation. I'm hoping this softens his memory of the pool, reshapes them even, so that instead of the fear, he remembers his bravery, his courage and the rush of pride in his accomplishments.

Here's to hoping. And to a summer of swimming joy...(it'll be warm enough one of these days, right?!) My goal is to make this summer all about having fun in the water. I want it all to feel lighter, and more playful. I want the pressure to be off. I'm so hoping we can find that, my kiddo and me.

Lindsay
Monday, June 3, 2019

Two new badges for my two little swimmers

badges

I still have all of my Brownie badges—one where I helped make a campfire, another where I got to teach some sort of folk dance all of the other Brownies. Even a sports one, though I’m pretty sure I didn’t deserve that one.

But sadly, I don’t have my swimming badges. Those were hard one, especially my red badge that I had to take three or four times over because I just couldn’t tread water. And my Green badge—I still remember how cold the pool was that summer. My teacher was Greg and he was a hard-ass and we were all scared of him, and we all thought had failed until that last triumphant moment on the very last class. For my White badge, I had to do butterfly, which kept me away every night for two weeks. After I got my Blue badge, my pal Peter’s mom told my mom how graceful my backstroke was. I've never forgotten that.

Kids still get badges, but not for the preschool round of lessons, which is a shame because I'm all for getting kids hooked on the reward of getting badges early! But that's never stopped me before (see Exhibit A and B). I commemorated my son's first ever round of swimming lessons with his Inchworm Kick badge and his bubble blowing badge.

For the record, the baby should've passed Guardian 1—she actually did everything to pass her level in the first class—bubbles, head dunking, kicking, the whole nine yards. She is fearless and brave and loves the water more than anything.

Though truthfully, I don’t actually care of my kids pass swimming lessons or not at the moment (will this change as they get older? Maybe). But at this stage, it's all about falling in love with the water, figuring out how their bodies can move in it, learning to trust that the water can hold them up.

But I'm all about celebrating everything, so I made them both badges—one to commemorate my son's new found love of the water and his bravery during his first round of parent-free swimming lessons. And the one for my daughter celebrates her bubble-blowing and head-dunking— my braveheart water baby who astounded me with her courage.

And then we had chocolate sundaes with smarties on the porch (which I regretted two minutes after it was done because of the sugar madness), but it was still felt like an important thing to commemorate and celebrate.

Lindsay
Tuesday, August 28, 2018

The momentous days

badges

My son learned how to blow bubbles last week. In the bathtub, not a pool, because who wants to haul a kid to swimming lessons and back home again when it’s -20. It was momentous and we cheered and cheered, all four of us clapping and high five-ing in our tiny bathroom. It is already one of the highlights of my year. (Also, he's currently reading "Swimming Swimming" to himself, though he really just skips through the swimming pages until he gets to the page where the characters eat ice cream).

Though he just figured out how to blow bubbles, he somehow passed swimming lessons in the early days of December. It was the first time I didn’t take him and, I admit, it was a relief, not having to confront my deep love of swimming with his ambivalence that teetered on a full rejection...but he went, every week with my fella and they’d sing songs and dunk themselves under the water to varying degrees of upset and they’d come home and we’d all eat grilled cheese sandwiches with pickles for lunch.

My comfort is that I also was ambivalent about swimming as a young kid. I distinctly remember the claustrophobic heat of Memorial Pool, the sheer terror of having to make it all the way across to the other side of Park Lawn Pool, my complete inability to tread water (I failed Red at least 3 times).

In fact in 1985, I "could not muster up enough endurance to complete the distance requirement", and baaaaaarely passed Pre-School 5 with, and I quote: "Lindsay must continue to work hard to further develop her endurance on her front."

Look at me now, Andrew Solomon (who is probably now in his mid-50s), I want to say as I spend every free waking minute I have swimming. Look at my hours-long front crawl!

And so, instead of celebrating check marks on a report card, I remind myself that blowing bathtub bubbles is far more important...

Related: a high school chum promised her daughter a badge for this round of swimming lessons, only to learn there aren’t badges! (GASP, THE HORROR!) so she commissioned me to make a penguin badge. I can’t wait till report card day!

Lindsay
Monday, January 29, 2018

Grown-up Swimming Badges: Part Three

all the swimming holes

Summer has returned, at least in weather form, though the outdoor pools are depressingly empty. Those pale blue painted bottoms, water-less, fill me with a deep sadness. I wish I was exaggerating, but I am not.

But before fall takes hold and the heat and the humidity disappear, it's time to commemorate the Summer 2017. Here are this year's grown-up swimming badges:

Rhya got one for her summer of incredibly cold swims. Seriously, there were no temperatures too low to keep this one from swimming this summer. (Maybe it was this dip that inspired her non-stop chilly swimming?!)

Laura got the Most Incredible Bathing Costume Badge for her 70s-tastic Charlie's Angels wetsuit that started off the summer swimming season.

Patrice got her Newfoundland Swimming Holes badge for some epic east coast dips (including one at La Manche, one of my very favourite Newfoundland dips!)

And I got a badge to commemorate The Fouling - the cocktail invented to commemorate the most depressing, and in retrospect hilarious swimming day I had all summer...

Farewell Summer 2017! You were fickle and chilly, but still carried memorable dips...

Past badges:

Grown-up Swimming Badges Part I

Grown-up Swimming Badges Part II

Lindsay
Monday, September 18, 2017

The last day of swimming lessons and (unofficial) swimming badges

badges

The last day of swimming lessons always loomed large. There would be no treading water or long swims, no head-tilt-chin-lifts on the deck, just diving for nickels and gold coins in the deep end and playing frozen tag in the shallow end. All fun and games until the last few moments where you'd stand, shivering on the deck, waiting for the instructor to call your name and hand you your report card, thick with a badge stapled to the inside corner, or crushingly thin if you hadn't passed.

It has been years – 20 to be exact – since I passed my last swimming class, and I was surprised to feel that same rush of equal parts excitement and nervousness on Tuesday for my son's final class. Granted, he's not even 2, we only made it to 4 lessons (which, just so we're clear I see as Victory x4) and it took him a while to get comfortable in the water each time, but he did! It was incredible how much his comfort level grew – he jumped in more than once and went all the way under water! He learned to blow bubbles! And kick! Now, when he sees illustrations of pools, he says "I jump!" And when we talk about swimming, he jumps. "Swimming! I jump!" Huge wins. All of them.

So imagine my disappointment when not only did he not get a badge, he didn't even get a report card. Bah! Not cool, instructor, not okay (and yes, I'm following up with the facility...!)

He might not have gotten an official badge, but he got a badge – a handmade one to go with the one he got last fall – because jumping in and blowing bubbles need to be both commemorated and celebrated!

(Pssst: If you know a kid, or adult, who needs an LZV-embroidered badge, head over here. I love nothing more than making badges to celebrate accomplishments big and small!)

Lindsay
Wednesday, November 30, 2016

Grown-up swimming badges: Part II

all the swimming holes

I must begin with the caveat that summer is not over. I REPEAT, SUMMER IS NOT OVER. But as it's the last week the outdoor pools are open in Toronto, I figured it was time to celebrate some of our swimming accomplishments in embroidered badge-form:

This summer's grown-up swimming badges (clockwise):
- Laura Queen of the Docktail's Swimming Sommelier Badge (featuring a perfect vinho verde, a boozy watermelon rosemary lemonade, an aperol spritz and an epic red).
- Patrice's Swimming Sustenance Badge (featuring her roadtrip clambake)*
- My Jumping-In Bravery Badge (because this summer marks the first I haven't hung off the ladder for HOURS)
- Rhya's Director of Underwater Photography Badge (because of her hauntingly beautiful river photos!)

And I couldn't let our epic Swimming Holes We Have Known collective cliff jump go unrecognized! CLIFF JUMPING BADGES FOR ALL!

Check out last summer's badges here!

* please note the French knot shrimp. THEY KILL ME!!

Lindsay
Wednesday, August 31, 2016

Grown-up Swimming Badges: Part One

badges

Clockwise: Rhya's flip turn badge, Patrice's nightswimming badge, Laura's roadtrip-to-swimming-hole badge and my remembering-to-pack-post-swim-snacks (namely swim biscuits) badge.

I can still remember the last day of swimming lessons, where, after we finished the final game of frozen tag in the shallow end, Jennifer or Rebecca or Mark or Andrew would hand me my report card, towel wrapped around my shoulders, my mom waiting on the other side of the fence. I can still see the blue-ish photocopy of the girl swimming on the front of the Canadian Red Cross report card.

But even before opening it up to the the checkmarked boxes, or the empty boxes (damn treading water!), there was the thickness of the report card. If there was a badge stapled to the inside, you passed! Onto the next colour! But if it was thin, no dice.

(Now that I'm thinking about it, it's kind of like receiving grant acceptances/rejections in the mail these days...)

But badges! Rhya mentioned badges the other day on our months-long swimmers text thread and I literally dropped everything and started stitching.

Flip turns? TOTALLY A BADGE!
Nightswimming in the nearby river? BADGE!
Driving, finding a different swimming hole, missing ice cream, the finding the right swimming hole? BAAAAAADGE!
And my own humble badge, celebrating when I remember to pack a post-swim snack so I don't turn into a monster on the bike ride home.

But it's no fun to just have one badge to sew to your bathing suit! So I made docktail/rocktail badges too!