California
I was able to come on my planned visit because Trish and Paul so kindly accepted my offer of a free Florida vacation. Grant is getting around just fine with his walker. He was able to cook bacon to add to the Cobb salad I’d left him when I went to a garden club event a week after he fell. Just needs the right motivation. Now 3 weeks in, he would have been fine home alone, but it was nice to have time for a long visit with his sister and bil. This will be the longest Grant has gotten to see them since 1989, when we rented a house together at the beach in North Carolina Outer Banks.
Bella and I are committed to watercolor this week. Tuesday we got a double dose. First she painted 4 panels of negative painting which we turned into postcards for grandparents and Patten. I practiced leaves. Then, at the library, we painted butterflies/moths by splitting apart small triangles of 2-ply paper towels, placing them like a bow on our paper, and saturating them with watercolor. The paint bled through, and when the paper towel was dry, we peeled it off to reveal mottled wings. Really cute. We added bodies and antennae with markers. The rest of the week, she worked on her watercolor notebook, while I practiced different techniques.
One day we had lunch at Liberty Station (lobster mac ‘n cheese for me), then walked along the shore to see the western grebes floating in the bay. An extra treat were 17 marbled godwits poking along the edge, fattening up before flying on to their nesting sites in Canada. They evidently stop at Bear River in Utah on their way.
The project of the week was swim lessons with Coach Andrew. As Remi says, you can be scared and still do it. He wavered between abject terror and enjoying it. Bella was more relaxed, but still apprehensive. A half an hour lesson Monday through Thursday for 2 weeks. The first Thursday ended with their having to retrieve a Tootsie Pop from an underwater step. Payday! By the end of next week, I am sure Bella will be swimming like a fish; Remi may too.
Friday, we went to the big Navy pool on Coronado. Since they haven’t passed the pool’s swim test, they each had to be within arm distance of an adult. I staffed the side where Remi played in the shallow water on the wheelchair entrance ramp while Mary had Bella do kicks. Once in a while they traded places. California gulls enjoyed the far swim lane, barely moving when a man swam past. First time I’ve seen birds in a chlorinated pool.
I took the red eye home Friday night. Visits are always too short. Mary called me Saturday and said Remi was disappointed they couldn’t go to the pool because Ryan was on call, and she couldn’t supervise 2 non-swimmers by herself. Now that he has the idea that swimming = good, the lessons next week will be easier.
As the print I bought in Sydney says, “You never regret a swim.”
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