Dive Dudes for Cool Dudes

This is going to be a Fun Summer. I know all summers are fun, but this is going to be a Big One, and the reason I know this is that All. Three. Kids. Can. Swim. Not that this means I can leave them alone, of course. Basically I've traded my fear that they will drown for my fear that they will slip and hit their heads when they're jumping into the pool, and then drown. But this opens up a whole new world of summer play! No more clinging to mama or being afraid of the deep. Now there's lots of jumping and diving and touching the bottom and retreiving stuff that people throw.

We received a pack of Dive Dudes from Swimways to try out a couple of months ago, and yesterday we finally got a chance to try them out. 3Po, Jammy and The Pea loved them! These dive toys have a unique twist -- literally. They have little twirly propellers on one side, so when you throw them into the water, instead of just plain sinking to the bottom, they twirl. And each stick is painted and molded to look like a cool dude, so each of my kids can pick one that they "own". And the sticks have "points" printed on them (25, 50, 75, 100) which give the simple "fetch the stick" game a more challenging twist. The one with the most points wins, so of course everyone swims after the 100-pointer (see how we've snuck in some simple number comparison and addition practice for the boys to prevent their brains from rusting in the water).

Unfortunately I don't have a fancypants waterproof camera, so I can't take a photo of the Dive Dudes underwater, or shoot a video of them twirling to the bottom of the pool. I tried to shoot a video of Jammy imitiating the twirling motion, but he's five years old and not exactly a synchronized swimmer, so the video shows mostly splash and not much twirl. So I'll just post this photo of Jammy with an earsplitting grin (or maybe he's just gasping for breath) after retreiving his Dive Dude.

Seriously, dude, if this photo doesn't convince you that Dive Dudes are a blast, nothing will.