Swimming Videos

So, we aren't sure if she will continue on with swim or not. She turns 13 soon and will age up, meaning her time standards are faster again. And between having basketball and track at the school she is quite busy. She is sad to think she might be done with competitive swimming as it has been a huge part of her life for 6 years. Who knows, she might still fit it in. She loves to swim.






This top video is at a home swim meet at the Frbo pool. The rest are from Regionals the first weekend in March.

Videos from Swim Camp

They had a relay swim meet at the end of swim camp. So, here are her 3 swims. She is so well for being exhausted after 5 days of constant exercise!

Minnesota Achievement Championship

Last weekend, she participated in the Minnesota Achievement Championship. We went to the Farmington location. Because she aged up from 9-10 time standards to 11-12 time standards she had some work to do to get those faster times.

At this event she placed in 5 of 7 swims. They place up to 8th place in each event. At this event there was about 40 swimmers in each of the 50y swims. She also got 4 PRs for time and one of those PRs was in her 50 Free, which she qualified her to swim in the Minnesota Regional Championship this weekend. However, because she just has one swim for it and it is quite expensive to swim in these championship meets I wasn't going to let her unless she had at least 2 events on one day, which she doesn't have yet. The MRC is a 3 day meet and even one day is a considerable time commitment as well. But don't worry, I am not a bad mom making her miss this. She just got in to the 11-12 time standards, so she will still have 2 winter MRCs and 1 more summer MRC that she could swim in with that time. So, the MRC is already on my calendar for March and hopefully she will pick up a few more swims for that meet in the meantime. She is really close on her 50 Fly.

Of her ribbons, she got one 2nd place, two 6th place, and two 8th place. The other 2 events she didn't place in, she just missed it by a few places. So, NEXT TIME!

Saturday she had 3 swims and got a PR in each of them and placed in 2 of them. Sunday, she only got one PR but 3 ribbons. She wasn't feeling as well on Sunday. Her brother had a stomach bug on Saturday and puked 5 times, so who knows if she had a bit of it or what.

That was her last meet of the summer. There is only 1 more week of swim practice left for the summer and then she has the month of August off. The whole team doesn't swim in August.

Not sure if she will swim next week at all, maybe 1 or 2 days or maybe we'll call it good for the summer. She is off to 3 days of camp at Eagle Bluff on Sunday. This year she is doing the Firearms Safety Certification Camp and will get to shoot a shot gun and a rifle and take her test for Firearms Safety and once she turns 12 she can submit her test results and her classroom time and field experience hours and get her certification. Then she will be able to be on the Trap Team at School once she in 8th grade. Not sure if she will do that, but she is open to considering it and it's just a good idea to teach kids about gun safety.

As for the rest of August, she still goes to rehearsals for the summer play 4-5 nights a week. It is quite a big commitment! And she has to really get to work on her 4-H projects for the County Fair.

And she's off......to swim camp

 Doesn't she just look to growing up here. She is in a college dorm for the first time spending 5 days here while she goes to swim camp at Gustavus. She was appalled by how land and blank the walls were, I wouldn't be surprised if next year she brings along some posters for 5 days there that is if she is going next year we'll see how this year goes..

 Here she is in front of the building where the pool is in and is ready to go swim her time 100 to put her in her group.

 She is the one diving into the water off the blocks. This is the pool she will be training in a lot 4 the next five days. Actually when I am posting this I will have just picked her up I didn't want to post where she was at while she was there because you never know what creepos are looking at stuff on the internet.

 This is one of the group's schedules. It may be the group she is in but I won't know that for sure until later. But at least we have an idea of what the schedule looks like for the most part. And can look at it again next year.

 She gave me lots of hugs before I left period I took her out for supper after her time swim and before she goes to start her training. We went out for Mexican food, which is her favorite.

Minnesota Achievement Championship

Isabel had a fantastic swim meet on Sunday. She got 2 B times, actually one was a B+ time and a C+ time, missing a B time by .98 seconds on her 50 Fly. Her B+ time was in the 50 Back and she got 1st place overall. Her 100 Free was the other B time and she got 5th or 6th overall for it. She got 3 ribbons, 1st, 5th and 6th overall. She did get 1st place in all her heats, but there was 3 heats for each race with 20 kids in each race.

This meet was for those with a C time or slower, which is what she had. This is the first time she had achieved B times. No A or B times could enter the meet. Her B times qualify her to be in the next Championship meet that is this weekend, but of course those events are all on the day we leave for Portland so she can't. It still qualifies her for that same Championship meet in March, so we will get that on our calendar.

Swim Team Pictures

The first 2 pictures are just of her on the blocks at team practice. The last 2 are of her at a team swim meet. The ones at the meet were taken by a swim-mom friend whose daughter is also in the group of 4 picture. The 4 of them were in a freestyle relay together.

They actually did have a whole group (mostly) team picture and individual pictures done at their holiday party for swim team. A professional photographer took those, so that takes a while to get the images back.

Northfield Swim Meet

This was this past Saturday. She was in a 200 Free Relay (10 & under) and was the first leg of the relay. 50 Free (8 & under) and 100 Back (10 & under).

200 Free Relay (she is in the white cap)

50 Free - She made a C time for this so she can do C Finals later this winter

100 Back

Brackett's Swim Meet (6/26) Videos and Pictures

Mixed Medley Relay - She swims 4th with 24 Freestyle
Her swim mates were ages 14, 12 and 10.

Getting Ready to Dive in for Freestyle

8 and under 25 Freestyle

 First to Finish 25 Freestyle

Hanging Out Between Swims

8 and Under 25 Back

Yeah! Two 1st Place Ribbons for 25 Freestyle and 25 Back. They also got first place in the Mixed Relay, which she swam a 25 Freestyle.

4th of July Videos

Isabel and Blake Jumping

Uncle J Jumping
 
 Isabel on the Big Slide at Bay Beach

Swim Videos from LF Meet

50 Freestyle



50 Back Stroke

First Swim Meet

This was taken while she was watching other teams warming up. She had not found me yet, but I was sitting just 4 rows up from her. This was her first swim meet and some of it was overwhelming, but we have some stuff figured out now and will approach things differently next times. She had a good time is excited to do another meet. She got a ribbon for "Personal Best" for each of her races (100yd Freestyle and 50yd Back).

Now she found me! She is wearing her new swim cap which is a team swim cap. They get one when they swim their first team meet.

She is in the water there somewhere. This is the 8 lane pool that the meet was at. This is warm-up time for the second half of teams. They all get in the water and do their laps and drills. She had to do a meet practice on Friday night before the meet and she looked so little out there with all the other team members swimming. When I read the program for the meet and saw all our swimmers, it is no wonder she looked so small. She was the youngest girl on our team swimming, the next youngest girls were age 9. There were a couple 7 year old boys swimming too, but they were standing in groups of boys & girls so I didn't really notice how little the boys were. Both of her events she swam were for 8 & under (& they separate by gender too.)

This is her on the starting blocks getting ready to dive in for her 100yd Freestyle. I am unsure why there are swimmers in the water holding on to the bars for backstroke. She told me that made her nervous having to jump over someone.

She really wanted to swim 2 events and really wanted to swim Back. And I only wanted her to swim one day (it was 2 days of events) for her first meet, so this was the compromise we came up with that she was happy with. I would rather have seen her swim two 50 races, but that wasn't in the cards for this race. She knows she can do faster in the back but she said she was pretty tired by that race and when I watched the video of it you can really see her slow down the last half a length. Next time she'll get the C time. :)

Here she in the Freestyle race. You can't really see her, just barely a splash of her. She is the swimmer in the lane second from the top. Her time for the 100yd Freestyle was 2:41.02. She needs it to be under 2:04:39 to have a C time for Regionals. I was impressed with good she has gotten at her flip turns. She is strong off the wall on her flip turns. She just needs to work more on swimming technique for this as she turns her body too much and that uses too much energy and takes time. So, she definitely has a time to improve from.

I watched a 9 year old girl swim before her in this same race and she took almost 3 minutes and was over a pool length behind the 2nd to last swimmer. She swam the same way Isabel does (with too much upper body movements) and I was so nervous for her. I didn't want her to be in the pool so long after everyone else, but she wasn't. She was only about 5 seconds behind the person in front of her. Next time I think she will try 50yd Freestyle. We didn't do that this time because it was day 2 and we just wanted to simplify things and do just one day.

This is Isabel in the 50yd backstroke. This is the race she was most excited to do. Her time was 1:07.03. She needed it to be under 1:04.99 to qualify for C Regionals. Only 2.04 seconds off!!! She's get it next time! Even her coach thought it was really good for a first meet time to be so close to C Regionals qualifying time. Next time we will plan out her races differently so that hopefully she isn't tired for this one.

Below you can watch her swim the 50yd Backstroke. I was interrupted by a woman who wanted to walk in front of me and then I was trying to watch her in real life and not through a little screen, so I end up taking the camera off her a couple times. She was one of 5 swimmers in this heat. She was in 4th. The person who came in after her was in a closer lane (to me) that she was not in my camera and she was further behind Isabel so she never got in the view either.

Water Park of America - Flow Rider

These are pictures a video of Isabel doing Flow Rider at the Water Park of America on the last Sunday in April (trying to play catch up on some blogging stuff for the kids). I didn't take many pictures on this trip there, but she had a ton of fun and is tall enough to go on everything there by herself now. She is getting quite tall and will probably go through this size quickly.

George's Pond

Pictures from going to George's Pond with grandma & grandpa S. Isabel went swimming & fishing. Although the fish she is holding is one that mommy caught.

Faribault Waterpark

Beaver Lake Beach

So, I have been having a heck of a time with brother's blog. I have 2 things as drafts that are not posting, so we'll see what happens with this one.

This was our first time to this beach. Isabel played in the sand most of the 2 hours we were there she played in the sand.

Swimming Videos

2 Videos

Isabel Swimming

Laughing & Swimming

Super Saturday

We started out our day with a trip to a (new-to-us) park for playtime & a picnic. Then to the barber shop for haircuts for daddy & Henry. Then the kids got to go to the candy store for a treat.

Then we came home and watched Gnomeo & Juliet while brother napped.


Then it was tim to play in the pool that we blew up & filled in the morning.

And in between all of that Isabel would play in her box house she made up. She had a "couch" and "bed" in it, some snacks, and a small couch & bed for baby dolly. This was all of her own creation.

And the day ended with roasted marshmallows. FINALLY! Isabel had been asking for about 2 months to have a campfire with roasted marshmallows and we have just not had good weather when we have been home, until now.

Beach Weather

These top two collages are from when we went to the beach as a family on Memorial Day. The water was a bit chilly for swimming, but the kids had a blast playing in the water and sand.

By 4 days later, the water was much warmer and we met one of our playgroups at the beach for some fun & the sun and water fighter. We brought some water balloons to share with others and have a water balloon fight. The water was warm enough to swim in. We thought about going back to the beach today, but have filled up our kiddie pool (larger size rectangle one) and have it warming in the sun to use this afternoon.

Pool Birthday Party for a Preschool Friend

One of Isabel's friends from preschool had a pool party for her birthday. This was the third birthday party for precshool friends that she has been to in a month. I know there will be one more next month, as well as her own party with her friends, which we have decided to limit to a specified number of preschool friends that she will get to pick out.

Level 2 Swim, RBNC, Open Gym, Shades