Swimming with attitude

PuffyFingers can swim. She's been able to swim for quite a while. She's confident and happy in the water. She's had "swimming" lessons since she was a tiny. Bar a few bad weeks when she was 2 she's always got on really well.

LMI has had swimming lessons since she was a tiny dot. She's happy in the water. She's totally comfortable putting her face under. But will she swim? Will she hell. She sticks to the nearest adult like a barnacle and won't let go. If an adult is not available she'll hold onto a rail or the edge of the pool, but these are a marked second best.

This was the story until a 3 weeks ago, when LMI discovered that world wouldn't end if she didn't hang on as she could still touch the bottom. Hurrah! Great progress we thought. She will crack the swimming thing eventually. Give her another few months and perhaps she'll get it.

Then came last week's swimming lesson. LMI did her usual "I will do everything the teacher asks as long as he'll hold my hand at the same time..." until the last few seconds of the lesson. There are 3 children in her class. The teacher swam one of them across the pool to her parents, leaving LMI and the other child standing on a platform. There's a standing instruction, repeated every week, that they must stay on the platform until the teacher is ready for them. The teacher then came back for the other second child and swam her across the pool leaving LMI standing on the platform. As soon as the teacher turned his back on LMI she leapt off the platform and doggie paddled, head in water, after him, across the width of the pool. As the other little girl climbed out, LMI put out a hand to grab his shoulder giving him the fright of his life.

The teacher and I were then left with the dilemma of scolding her for totally ignoring orders by leaving the platform or congratulating her on finally swimming.

We both took the middle ground and did a bit of both.

Are British accents cute?

I'm bemused as to why LMI's daycare teachers think that imitating her Britishisms is cute or funny. She's 3 years old. She won't understand why they laugh. I don't think it's funny. The teachers would never so the same things to children where English was their second language. So what is the strange appeal of the British accent?

Welcome to Puffy Fingers

One more blog to read, and life is already so full. Does the world need this blog? Probably not. Will it help me to write it? Probably yes. Therefore, dear readers, I'm going to rattle on for a while and I thought I'd better introduce the cast of characters chez the Fingers Family.

There's PuffyFingers herself, a small child of the female persuasion. She's just turned 5, going on 15.

The temptation to nickname PuffyFingers younger sister "Snot Face" is quite huge, but I shall resist. After all, I could lumber her with it for life, and I am confident that she will at some stage grasp the intricacies of tissues and nose blowing. So, for the time being, she shall be known as Little Miss Independent, or LMI.

Then there's the grown ups: I'm Andy, and there's the Other Half.

There will no doubt be guest appearances, especially as when we get visitors they tend to be here for a while. No-one thinks it's worth coming all the way from the the UK to visit us unless they stay for at least a week, or, in the case of my parents, 5 weeks.