This past week was a turning point in the Mellow household. Lara stopped her baby swimming classes and instead started her very first 'big girl' swimming lessons at our local leisure centre without me in the pool with her. This feels like an amazing step. I've been swimming in the pool with her every week since she was 16 weeks old and now, having achieved her 5 metre swimming badge with Aquatots back in July, she is ready to go it alone. I'm a proud mummy.
And so starts a different swimming journey with Holly. Holly and I started Aquatots baby swimming classes when she was 10 weeks old. I would say that 10 weeks is probably a little young - she was a bit floppy in the water and now, at 18 weeks she is a lot more smiley and is able to hold herself more confidently in the water. 3 years from now I expect Holly to be swimming unaided too.
To celebrate Holly's first dip in the pool, Splash About sent Holly one of their latest Happy Nappy prints to try out. And, if that weren't enough to celebrate, Simply Swim sent me a brand new swimsuit too (I'm celebrating the fact that I've now lost enough of my baby weight to fit into a non-maternity swimsuit)! We both looked fab in our new swimming togs last week!
We wholeheartedly recommend the Splash About Happy Nappy and have done ever since day one of Lara's lessons. The latest patterns of Happy Nappy include a union jack print, multi-coloured spots, pink frills and this star design which you can get in either blue/green or purple/aqua - a Happy Nappy costs between £7.50 and £12.99. We love the Happy Nappy because it fits tightly around the belly and legs to give you confidence that accidents in the pool won't leak out. We also love the fact that they are quite easy to put on and that once on, they are warm to wear as they are made out of stretchy wetsuit material. I wouldn't put Holly in anything other than a Happy Nappy.
With both girls I have put a disposable swim nappy (we use Huggies Little Swimmers) on underneath the Happy Nappy - Aquatots call this a double-nappy system. With Lara I let her wear just the Happy Nappy until she was nearly a year old at which point I added a tankini top and later a swimming costume over the top. With Holly I went straight for the swimsuit option.
My new swimsuit is a Speedo Endurance Plus Lanesprint Powerback from SimplySwim.com. A bit like Holly's swim nappy, I wouldn't wear anything other than a Speedo these days (unless of course I'm pregnant in which case I'll just wear anything that fits!). Years of swimming have taught me that Speedo swimsuits really are the best value for money and although there are lots of great-looking swimsuits in the women's swimsuits range at Simply Swim, the minute I saw this Speedo on the Simply Swim website I knew that I had to have it - the 'purple rain' is so much more striking than my normal plain black.
The Endurance Plus has a racer-back, my preferred style of suit because it holds everything in place and looks sexy too - sometimes a racer-back can make a suit hard to put on but this suit is really flexible and there is lots of room for movement while I'm putting it on. It is chlorine resistant which is important for giving the suit a longer shelf-life (I swim at least once a week so it gets a lot of use) and it is really quick to dry. The Endurance Plus costs £28 and Simply Swim also operate a price match promise.
All in all, us three girls are loving our swimming right now (and we look fab when we're doing it!) Note: these pictures are courtesy of SimplySwim... they aren't me! I don't look that glamourous in a swimming cossie.
