Our Little Sunshines: First Seahawks Swim Meet

Yesterday, Cassidy, Lily, and Finn swam in their first meet with their homeschool team, the Seahawks...the Wacky Tacky Meet. Finn was very nervous when we arrived - even a little teary - but Coach Matt told him to imagine he was swimming at the beach and have fun...and that's just what he did! The meet was very different from our summer league meets (some of the events were even mixed where boys and girls swam head-to-head) and it was really fun to see the kids try some new events. In keeping with the theme of the meet, rubber duckies were given to heat winners and the very last race was a silly relay where teams had to move a ball down the lane without using their hands. Although it was obvious that all the swimmers had been training hard and were eager to perform well, the ultimate focus of the day was enjoying the sport and having fun! We all had a wonderful time and all the kids improved their best times (for events they'd swam in summer league) by leaps and bounds. Finn dropped about 20 seconds from his best 25 Free time.

For my own memory, here's what they swam:
(Age groups were 8&under, 9-10, 9-12, and 13-18.)

CASSIDY
25 Mixed Freestyle
50 Mixed Breast
4x200 Free Relay
25 Mixed Backstroke
50 Mixed Butterfly

LILY
25 Mixed Freestyle
25 Mixed Breast
4x100 Mixed Free Relay
25 Mixed Backstroke
50 Mixed Freestyle
4x100 Silly Relay

FINN
25 Mixed Freestyle
25 Mixed Breast
4x100 Mixed Free Relay
25 Mixed Backstroke
50 Mixed Freestyle
4x100 Silly Relay

Lily warming up with a lap of breastroke. She said her favorite race yesterday was competing in her first breaststroke event. She was disappointed that there were no butterfly events for her age group, but seized the opportunity to work on improving all her other strokes.

Finn diving in....his dives are improving and we were so proud of how well he swam so many events yesterday. His favorite race was his 25 freestyle because he made the biggest time improvement in that race!

Cassidy swimming her favorite...breaststroke. Her favorite race was the 4x200 Free Relay, which she swam beautifully, including a flip turn. :)

Waiting patiently in the hot, hot, HOT observation deck for our swimmers to be finished.

We're number 1! Go Seahawks!!!

Waiting to race each other in the 25 Breaststroke.

Lily giving Finny some last-minute encouragement.

Sitting like a lady before her race

Daddy's Girl
(Joey had not seen the kids swim since summer league, so he was blown away by how much their technique had already improved and how strong they've gotten in just a couple of months!)