The swim marathon went swimmingly!

Calvin’s last swim marathon with the team went very well. He had a lot of fun and the kids collected a lot of money for Children’s Hospital and for their team. You can read more about it from our paper here.

Pool decorations

Calvin is still having a lot of trouble organizing and prioritizing his time which is mom shorthand for “he spends way too much time at his girlfriend’s house!” So the night before the marathon he came rolling in sometime after midnight. It gave Mr. Pete great incentive and joy to set the alarm clock for 5:30 so that he could get up to rouse Calvin from blissful slumber so that he would be to the pool by 6:00 a.m. It seems we can moan and complain and lecture all we want about how he should come home earlier, but that 5:30 a.m. wake up sort of takes that reasoning to a whole n’other level!

Calvin had something like 170 laps during his hour from 7:00 to 8:00 a.m. and he also swam for 30 minutes in the afternoon. They were happy with his efforts.

Calvin getting ready for his laps.

Sharing a joke with a teammate before taking the plunge

Getting out to see how he did!

Keeping track of everyone’s laps.

One kid swam the entire 12 hours! Someone offered to pledge around $400 if he could swim the whole day and he did it! He swam something like 25 miles.

When the kids weren’t swimming they went in shifts to the local grocery stores to solicit money. Calvin was there with a sweet girl from the team and I was called up on to go be the adult chaparone.

I took Izzy and Noah with me because I thought they might be good for marketing. Calvin was reluctant to let them try but when I explained to him that it was harder to turn down a cute freckled face little boy than a big strapping young man with a 5:00 shadow, he let Noah have a turn.

The first time Noah said, “Excuse me ma’am. Would you like to donate to, er,..I mean, um” and he got so overwrought he smacked himself in the forehead. That lady gave him a five spot and Noah did a little happy dance.

“Yea, it’s for the retard wing,” said Calvin, and he and Noah cracked up.

Nonetheless, Izzy and Noah soon had their little buckets full of cash and the next team wanted to borrow them for their shift. Unfortunately they were pretty cold by them so I had to take them home. They were so successful in fact that some people who had seen them when they went into the store were looking for them with their money when they came out. And one lady told the swimmers, “I’m sorry but I promised that little boy that was here” and I guess she didn’t donate!

The whole family went to cheer for Calving at his afternoon swim. We were proud of him and the entire team.

Rosie cheering on her brother!

I’m looking forward to seeing their grand totals next week!