William’s swim meets aren’t “little” things.

They are hours on a hot pool deck.

They are sometimes meets that we actually need to travel to and spend the night at.

And they aren’t the quietest places of all with comfy seating.

As a former swimmer, I know this… as a mom, I don’t mind it at all. But… William has 3 little brothers who get carted around to every USS swim meet.

This past weekend William had a swim meet at the Massachusetts Maritime Academy in Buzzards Bay, MA. We decided to spend 2 nights there so we wouldn’t have to wake everyone up at 5AM to make it to the pool deck on time for his 7AM warm-ups.

It’s not easy being the little brothers, I know this and I understand this. It’s a long meet and the races aren’t close together. William may swim once at 8AM and then not again till 9:30AM. Not to mention, the swim meets (the USS ones specifically) are all about William because my little guys aren’t “USS Swimmers” yet. We plan to sign Alex and Ben up next year, but thought it would be too much for them this year. With USS meets (United States Swimming meets), you swim more races throughout the season.

Back to today… when William swims I get so focused on his race, my nerves start pumping and I sit there laughing at myself as to how crazy it is that I’m THIS nervous! He always looks cool as a cucumber behind the block, I’m the nutty one.

After William swam his 4th race this morning, I had a fellow swim team mom come over and say to me, “You’ve got to see what happens when William swims. All of his brothers stand-up and video and time him! I had to snap some photos for you!”

And she sent them to me, and I gushed. I knew Alex was taping every single one of William’s swims, but it touched my heart to see how much they were rooting and cheering for their older brother. Makes me think we’re doing something right… very right. 🙂

It was a BEAUTIFUL thing to see and to be proud of… these boys love each other very much.