Kaitlyns A Dipolma

Kaitlyn has been in swim lessons all year and she has earned her "A Diploma". It is an exciting thing for the Dutch for their kids to get their "A Diploma" because it means your child is finally allowed to swim freely in what ever pool they want to at the public pools with out having to have their parents right their next to them.


We felt like Kaitlyn could swim well enough for that when we entered this country as she has had swim lessons since she was 2 years old.

However because she didn't have an "A diploma" she had to be in what ever pool we were in. So if we were in the little pool with Brooke she couldn't run off with a friend to play in the recreational pool with the water slide. Kind of a bummer.

So we put her in swim lessons so that She could have this magical "A diploma". I expected it to happen kind of quickly because Kaitlyn is such a strong swimmer already and has no problem swimming. However they didn't seem to see it that way. Apparently she has to be able to do more then just swim, float and puller her self out of the pool to get the diploma. She had to be able to learn all the swim strokes and learn to dive (which she has been a little afraid of) and a few other task like swimming threw a tunnel under the water. They also have to learn how to swim with their cloths and shoes on(I guess that is in case the fall into one of the many canals of water everywhere with their cloths on, they have some practice getting out.)

With so much for Kaitlyn to learn it took all year. However, with a big WAHOO! Kaitlyn now has her A diploma and can run off and swim with all of her friends freely while I deal with Brooke in the kiddy pool.

Poor Brianna is still stuck with me in the kiddy pool but she is in swim lessons now and hopefully sometime next year she will be free from my side!


Below is a picture of Kaitlyn kind of scared to do her finally test she has on her t-shirt, shorts and shoes, ready to jump in and show all that she has learned. To the left you see a few boys in full rain clothing. They are swimming for their C diploma. The higher the diploma the more clothing you have to be able to swim with. I was really impressed with these boys in rain jackets and pants. The were swimming well.