Alan wrapped up the spring swimming session at Hawken today. It was test day, and Alan passed the test for Level 3! He’ll be swimming to Level 4 next fall. 🙂
Category Archives: Swimming
Alan’s Favorite Activities
Second grade — Part V — edition of the Top 10:
-Playing with Lulu & Rosie, of course.
-Drawing with chalk on the driveway after school with Cassady, Xavier, and TJ (who also lives on Iroquois).
-Bringing the green turtle stuffed animal into school whenever Blue House wins the weekly competition! Alan says that Noah and Kennedy especially love seeing it and playing with it.
-“Free swim” at Saturday swimming lessons this spring, which usually involves breaking out the fins.
-Lexia sessions. Alan officially finished all the levels on 5/6/19! Alan, Gabriella, Madeleine, Alyson, and TJ were the first to get certificates of completion.
-Playing at the Highland Heights Park. Alan convinced me to climb up to the slide on the 3rd level and slide down with him. He loves seeing me in agony on the way down. 😉
-Summer baseball. When we were practicing hitting at our favorite field (Dragga Field at the Mayfield Community Park), Alan told me he’s glad that outdoor sports season is back!
-Attempting to solve a Rubik’s cube. After we bought one, Alan now knows it’s harder than it looks.
-Ice cream parties. We bought an ice cream scooper, vanilla ice cream, and cones and we’re ready for ice cream and Indians games this summer.
-Marble run!
Speed Swimming
Alan still can’t get enough of using the flippers in the swimming pool. His favorite part of every lesson is the “free swim” at the end, when he puts on his flippers and swims as fast as he can.
In the picture above, his back pocket filled with water and created the illusion that he has a fin. He doesn’t, but it sometimes feels that way.
Fun with Flippers
After Alan put on his flippers at swimming lessons today, he requested a video to prove how fast he can move through the water!
Spring Sports
As of last Saturday, swimming lessons at Hawken are back on for the spring, and they run through May. Alan is still skiing on Sundays, too, for as long as Alpine remains open for the season.
And up next in the sports calendar: Baseball in April!
Fitness Center Games
On weekends Alan loves to go to the Wildcat Fitness Center. Recently he created a modified rules, 1-on-1 football game called “hallway football” that we both love playing. He also enjoys playing dodgeball in the pool. Tonight he got to play both!
Alan’s Favorite Activities
Second grade – Part III – edition of the Top 10:
-Reading Dog Man books! After Alan was so excited to buy one of the books at the winter book fair, we ordered the other four books in the series. They arrived tonight and Alan couldn’t wait to start reading them! Some are being kept in his reading box at school, and others are being kept at home.
-Decorating the apartment for Christmas.
-Setting NFL match-ups with mini-helmets. Similar to what Alan did with baseball bats, he’s now pairing up football helmets to reflect weekly match-ups. He’s learned all the teams this year.
-Finding Elfie every morning.
-Drawing pictures of race cars. Alan also recently bought “emoji” markers that he took to school to use with Brady to label race cars. He loves them. Both the Dog Man books and the new markers are a hit with his classmates!
-Browns games. Alan has enjoyed following the Browns in addition to Ohio State this season. The Browns played this past Saturday night against the Broncos in Denver for a special Saturday night game. Alan followed on Gamecast as we drove from Luke’s house to Grandma Debbie’s. After the game ended on a Jabrill Peppers 4th-and-10 sack, Alan called me to celebrate. I loved getting that call from him!
-“Lexia” sessions. Alan is up to Level 14 now.
-Swimming at the Wildcat Fitness Center. I’ve been meeting Alan at the pool more frequently lately.
-Christmas crafts!
-Science experiments at school. Gravity and motion have been two recent subjects.
Fall Weekends
Alan’s weekends this fall go something like the following: Friday night hangouts with Daddy, followed by Saturday lessons and Sunday fun.
On Fridays we’re likely to play one of our board games together (Sorry!, Mouse Trap) and arrange baseball bats by match-ups. Saturday lessons kick off with swimming at Hawken and are followed by piano and violin lessons back-to-back at the Music Settlement. On Saturday nights, Alan heads to Grandma Debbie’s to see his cousins and sleepover at Grandma Debbie’s house!
Sundays involve taking Tata to Giant Eagle for shopping and then stopping by the apartment to have lunch and play. We also usually play baseball or tennis too. Occasionally we stop by the Wildcat Fitness Center as well.
There’s not too much schoolwork to do on weekends this fall. Alan does do practice math problems though. And we participated in Millridge’s Read-a-thon for the first time! Alan logged 480 minutes while reading 22 books this month.
Best Saturday Ever
Today’s excitement included swimming lessons during the day and putting together Legos at night.
Alan had one-on-one attention at the pool this afternoon due to some absences in his swim class. He swam back-and-forth and back-and-forth, compiling quite a few practice laps.
In the evening, Alan put his entire Coast Guard Lego set together! The set, which he got at his family birthday party, came in 8 separate bags. Alan just kept going and going and assembled the entire set while we watched the Ohio State football game. Not only did Alan enjoy his Legos, but he also got to see Ohio State rally to make up a 12-point deficit in the 4th quarter at Penn State to win 27-26!
The first OSU game that Alan watched portions of was against Penn State in 2015. This game was the first that Alan watched the majority of the game. We were both ecstatic by the end of the night. 🙂
Swimming Lessons
Although Alan’s been in swimming pools since he was a baby, today he attended the first session of his very first swim class. He’s signed up at Hawken Lower School, and the Saturday morning sessions run through October. He was nervous when he arrived at the pool today, but it didn’t take long for him to start having fun. He loved it and can’t wait for next week!