When we went to pick up a pool noodle for Gracen’s marble run water slide, she originally fell in love with a flower-shaped noodle. While I knew it wouldn’t be the best fit for our marble run, at $1.25, I knew we would eventually figure out a way to put it to good use.
It was my first time seeing this sort of pool noodle, and all I knew was that I wanted to slice it up to create tons of little individual flower shapes.
So that’s just what I did. Just like when slicing a pool noodle in half vertically, I found that using a sharp, serrated knife and a sawing motion worked best. I sliced ours about an inch thick, but you could do them any thickness you like – even varying thicknesses would be fun!
As I chopped, Miss G ran the ready flowers over to her blow up pool and tossed them in!
It’s such a simple thing, but they looked so pretty and inviting dancing around on the water’s surface. (I’m already picturing them in bath tubs and sensory bins too!)
I think Miss G agreed, because she immediately jumped in {despite the freezing cold water} and started splashing around like mad!
When the splashing had subsided a little bit, Grandma Charlotte showed Grae how the flowers could be used as building blocks.
It’s definitely easier in still-ish water, but it’s equally fun when in or out of the pool. Towers can be built…
Pyramids can be built…
And ‘trains’ can be built too! Of course, the possibilities are really endless when it comes to building structures – even when they’re floating ones.
Now the only question is how I’m going to convince Brad that heaps of pool noodle flowers are a Kuwait necessity… I mean with the heat and the amount of time we spend in and around water there, they are, aren’t they? ☺
Top knots, ruffled bathing suits, backyard pools, and vacation time… These are the things summer is made of.
Gracen has been very anxiously awaiting this day since 
Surprisingly, the much talked about seal slide was not the hit of the day today… Instead, she was all about this much larger, much faster turtle slide over in the deeper end of the pool. The truth of the matter is that she loved this slide so much that very little swimming actually took place – it was simply slide after slide after slide for pretty much our entire visit, which was totally fine with me. Watching the anticipation as she climbed the steps and the absolute joy as she sped down and splashed into the water melted my heart and filled me with pride. I’m so, so glad our little lady loves water as much as she does.
The only slight downside to our morning was that it was chilly. Very chilly, in fact. Despite the fact that the pool is heated and it truly was a beautiful day, the wind off of the ocean sucked away the warmth and made you shiver the moment your shoulders left the water. And while Grae didn’t seem bothered in the least by it, at a certain point we knew it was time to get out, dry off, and warm up.
But that won’t stop us from returning very soon – Miss G’s already asking when that’ll be!
This was an on the fly idea that came about tonight during dinner. G was wearing her bathing suit (as you do when you’re 2 and a 1/2 and hanging out at home) and asked for a ‘special, special, soooooo special bath’ tonight. No go-to ideas came to mind, but my little doodle eating dinner in a ruffled polka dot bathing suit gave me one! … A pool party bath!
I filled the tub up nice and full and added a few drops of aqua gel food colouring to give it a pool feel, then collected a few pool/summer things – beach balls, a watering can, a pail and shovel, some water wings, and a water bottle. For extra fun, I loaded our little bubble machine up with solution and placed it so that the bubbles would flow down into the tub from up above. Gracen grabbed her sun glasses and her pool towel, and we were good to go.
Such a simple idea, but Grae just thought it was the best thing ever. Things did get a little wild when she began trying to pop every single bubble before they hit the water, but it was all good fun. Part way through, we took out our window crayons and added a ‘party wall’, which was just as much fun to splash off as it was to draw on. ☺
We’ve been back in swim classes now for a few weeks and Miss G is just loving it. The classes are upbeat, fun, and filled with songs and play, but teach beginning swimming skills at the same time. So far, we’ve been practicing most of the same skills we learned last session… Front starfish floats, back starfish floats, wall push offs (front and back), jumping into the water from sitting and standing positions, blowing bubbles, and dipping different parts of our faces in the water. 
Sprinkler fun with Papa.
Preparing a snack.
Straight from Grandma’s garden.
I’m not ashamed to say that we were back at 
In an effort to keep cool while enjoying the sunshine, we tried a new outdoor pool today… The outdoor pool at 
This afternoon we set out to visit another wading pool off of the 
Mama. Papa. Bubba. 