Peer Pressure at its Finest

Today, you probably heard the shrieks of joy, amongst all the splashing, and wondered what was going on.  Yeah…sorry ’bout that. That was me.

So, what happened?

Well, at the end of Claire’s last swim class, she was *this close* to doing a back-float unassisted in the “deeper pool.” *This close.* This was the one item not checked off of the “you get to move up to the next class” list. We decided to do another go-round, to see how she’d do.

I mean, she can float all day by herself in the shallow kiddie pool…but she panics in the big pool.

Today was the second class in that session, and guess what happened!?

She was a little clingy with the teacher, but to the outside world she appeared rather calm…and was *this close*…again.

Then, when we were playing afterward, we saw one of her preschool friends. This little girl is a year older than Claire and is in her same Preschool Class. “Emma” is an excellent swimmer and already in the next swim class. Emma can back-float all by herself.

I know this, so I decided to use Peer Pressure to my advantage.

“Hey, Emma!” I said. “Do you want to show Claire how you can back-float all by yourself in the big pool?”

“Sure!” she said.

“Yeah!” said Claire. She wanted to see it, too.

So, we went over there, and sure enough Emma, can do a back-float with the best of ‘em.

“I wanna try!” Claire said. “I wanna do it BY MYSELF, MOMMA.”

And, she did!! All it took to get over that hurdle in her mind was watching her friend do it. What made it even better was that her Swim Teacher saw her do it, and cheered for her!

I am SO proud of Claire for coming this far.

In other news, my face hurts from smiling.