big strides!

I took the girls to the pool this afternoon and they were swimming champs!! Emma has always been a really strong swimmer and is now practicing diving, doing flips underwater and swimming the length of the pool. Madeline pretty much taught herself how to swim today in about a half hour. It was crazy! She started off with her floaties on jumping into the pool. Then she started jumping and making herself dunk underwater. Then she started jumping and swimming to me underwater and back to the wall again. She was terrified to take the floaties off of her arms even though she wasn't using them at all, so I just kept letting the air out until finally she realized they were useless and she got brave enough to take them off. I couldn't believe it...she must've jumped in and swam back to the side about fifty times. She was so proud of herself that she absolutely did not want to leave. I bribed her with a stop at 7-11 to pick out her own pack of gum as a reward for taking the floaties off :) Poor little Claire sat in her stroller the whole time like a little orphan child...luckily strangers always want to stop and talk to her:) The pool wiped them all out pretty good-I have a feeling that all 3 of them will be asleep for the rest of the afternoon. I am not complaining!