Haikus and Swimming

First of all, welcome to new Loyal Reader Rena! You can read Rena's aliyah story, and find out all the ways to be insulted in Hebrew, at http://www.mysocalledlifeinisrael.blogspot.com/.

Dadz - your poem was truly an inspiration to us all. Loyal Readers, let us know in the comments section what exactly Dadz's ode inspired YOU to do. There are still some KFP Poofahs left, but like the chocolate lollies, they won't last long...

In fact, Dadz's poem inspired the recently awakened poetry monster within me, so I present to you: Haikus

Chocolate Lollies

Chocolate on a stick
How I savor every bite
None left; ate them all

Here's another one,

Jelly

Too much jelly here.

Why do I keep buying more?

Someone stop me please.

And because haikus are supposed to be "seasonal" I will include a weather-related haiku as well:

Hail

Yesterday it hailed

When I took the kids to school

Ice went down my back

(I am not sure why blogspot is automatically double-spacing my haikus. Maybe I will write a haiku about that. Why the weird spacing/Wish I knew how to fix it/Will wait for Donny.)

Anyway, Ariella has started swim lessons. This is very important for her future well-being, because, frankly, she's scared to death of water. It's genetic; anyone who's seen Dadz gently lower himself into a (heated) pool with a pained expression on his face will understand. But it is important to learn how to swim. It's one of those things we're supposed to teach our kids, right up there with "Don't stick your fingers in the sockets," and "Marry rich." She took swimming lessons last year at the Riverdale Y! with her friend Dahlia, so at least she went into this whole thing with some prior experience. The group consists of Ariella, her friend Batya, and another little girl named Something Israeli. The teacher is Avi. My heart goes out to Ariella when I see her in the water. Even though she has more flotation devices attached to her than (I don't know; what's something that has a lot of flotation devices attached to it? More than that), she is terrified if Avi lets go of her. I mean, there is A LOT of coordination involved with swimming. Let's take a look at walking. You move your legs. Your arms are free to do whatever they want, and breathing is a simple, automatic process. Now, do the same thing in the pool. Your legs need to be performing "bend, open, close," while your arms are simultaneously making circles, and at the same time you have to put your entire face in the water, blow bubbles, but whatever you do, DON'T breathe in. Not so simple! But we are very proud of Ariella's progress. First of all, kappayim to Avi. Whenever Ariella seems hesitant, or flat-out refuses to do something, he makes her do it anyway. Jumping in, dunking her head, swimming unassisted (well, assisted by the myriad aforementioned flotation devices, but still...). And she does it! Today she actually swam all the way across the pool without clutching Avi's hand for dear life! Kappyim to Ariella! Maybe we should send Dadz to Avi for a few lessons...