Little Swimmer

Bath times have had their ups and downs. Initially, as I believe with almost all babies, they were a thing of horror. I was taking my vulnerable little newborn and unceremoniously dunking him in a container of water with the inevitable result of much screaming. Still, it really doesn't take much to end up with a newborn screaming, just changing his nappy could do it.
Suddenly he learned to smile and bath time began to be fun. By now bath time was Daddy's job and I would often find myself sat downstairs wondering what was going on, whether between all the splashing and giggling any bathing was actually taking place. I often wondered if any of the bath water would actually still be in the bath by the end of it all.
If I had to take over bath duties, usually because Daddy's back was playing up, it never seemed to be as fun, Joseph preferred Daddy and that was that.
Well, I've been on holiday again. Yes, again. It was an accidental holiday, I was never supposed to be going originally, my Mum and Dad had invited my brother, his wife and their son but they couldn't make it so rather than waste the spare room in the cottage I was invited.
Poor Andy couldn't make it due to the fact that all his annual leave was used up so Joseph and I went without him, poor chap. I was envisioning him pining away and spending a week curled up mournfully in the dark subsisting on takeaway kebabs, but actually he  managed quite well and even had a rather nice home made fish pie waiting when we got back. I bought him some whisky and some hand made fudge, you can't go much wrong with that.
But back to the subject in hand - baby vs water. The cottage had an indoor pool available for use in an outbuilding and as we were currently the only holiday makers on the site (in October that's hardly surprising) we had full unrestricted access.
My last proper swimming experience was at senior school, quite a long time ago now. I did have a bit of a dip in the sea at Weymouth this year, but it hardly counted and it was too cold to really enjoy it.
This pool was warm, small enough to not be scary and wasn't over chlorinated and it really surprised me how quickly I felt at home in the water, the ability to swim appears to be something not easily forgotten.
The pool had a small area on one side that was warmer than the rest and had the option of Jacuzzi bubbles. So, one morning with Joseph in his special swimming nappies and wearing a cheap baby wetsuit I found in Tescos I prepared him for a dunking. I was rather nervous, I had bathed him the day before and he had screamed from start to finish.
He screamed and screamed and screamed. I braved the experience again two days later and we discovered that if I bounced him on my knee and Grandma pulled enough silly faces at him then he forgot where he was long enough to not hate it.
On the third and last occasion we realised that the seating area around the Jacuzzi was just the right height for him to stand on and hold onto the side and he at last began to enjoy himself, even splashing the water. My heart did skip a beat when he managed to sidle up to the button for activating the bubbles, but he couldn't press it hard enough. The thought of what his reaction would have been if he had......!
I'll miss the pool, it was rather nice. I'm not sure Joseph will cope with time in a public swimming pool yet, he didn't like it when I tried floating him on his back, he screamed and lifted his legs fully out of the water which made it quite hard to keep hold of him. Well, we'll see. If an opportunity comes up then I'll take advantage of it, but for now I'll just look forward to the new coffee mornings starting this week at my church for Mums of littl'uns. I believe cake might be in the offing....