Underwater Family Fun While on Vacation in Tulsa, Oklahoma

Recently we took a trip to Tulsa, Oklahoma to visit my wife’s side of the family to celebrate father’s day. While we were there the weather was rather warm, so needless to say, we spent most of the time swimming, diving and snorkeling in the swimming pool. Since our children already knew how to swim and that summer had arrived, I decided that it would be a good time to teach them both how to snorkel and dive. Being a native San Diegan, I’ve had the pleasure of being able to swim, dive and bodysurf in the pacific ocean… I wanted our children to be able to share that same joy. I figured the first thing that needed to be accomplished was to teach them to overcome their fear of diving into deep water and what better place to start than a swimming pool. So before we left for this trip, I made sure both children had a mask and snorkel that fit their face properly.

Teaching my daughter to dive to the bottom of a swimming pool to retrieve a dive toy. Photo created by using a Canon Powershot G9 in WP-DC21 underwater housing.

After teaching my daughter to overcome her fear of breathing through a snorkel, I felt it was time to teach her how to dive to the bottom of the pool (which was 13 feet deep) to retrieve a dive toy which I held in my hand. At first I tried instructing them to dive to the bottom on their own, but for some reason that seemed too far for them. So I decided to go to the bottom of the pool and hold the dive toy and wait for them to dive to get it out of my hand.

Underwater Canon G9 photo looking up at my son learning the basics of swimming on the surface of the pool.

Since my son is younger, I wanted to teach him to overcome his fear of deep water. To do this I felt he first needed to swim in the deep end of pool with swimming goggles before we moved to snorkeling gear.

Underwater Canon G9 photo in the swimming pool looking up at the white puffing clouds floating by.

Being one who’s passionate about diving, I enjoy spending time underwater and while I’m down there I soak in the peacefulness of the water around me. It always fascinates me how the water constantly changes it’s form and in doing so, it creates the most amazing shapes. It’s like watching a painting change itself right before your eyes. Always new and never repeating itself. While I’m down at the bottom, I like to look up while blowing bubbles to see how they rise to the surface mixing and changing the form and shape of the water.

Underwater Canon Powershot G9 photo of my son holding some treasure he found at the bottom of the swimming pool.

Thirteen feet can seem like a long way down if you’ve never dove that deep before. I needed to find a way to motivate my son to want to go that deep. So I told him that there was all sorts of treasure to be found. We started in the shallow end looking for lost “treasure”… and low and behold we found some. From that point on he was excited about exploring the pool more. After he had overcome his fear of deep water I had to teach him how to pressurize his body by holding his nose and closing his mouth while he breathed out. We would dive to about 8 feet, pressurize then continue down. This took some time to figure this out, but they both realized that without doing so, it hurt to go deeper.

A Canon G9 photo of my daughter learning how to do a flip off the diving board.

OK, I didn’t want to bore them the whole time with learning to dive, so after my daughter saw me do a flip off the diving board, she was interested in learning how to do one herself. So I told her the best way to learn was to start by doing a “rolling flip” off the side of the pool into the deep end. After showing her how to “tuck and roll” into the water, she was ready to try this off the diving board. On her first try she was doing flips better than mine… keep in mind, I’m 6′2″ and a but older. Anyways, I was pleased to see her overjoyed by the fact that she had empowered herself by learning something new.

G9 photo of my nephew working with me to do some underwater portraits.

Canon Powershot G9 underwater portrait of my nephew.

I’ve always loved how the water seems to create underwater paintings as you look up at the surface. With the help of my nephew, we worked together to create these underwater portraits while incorporating how the water constantly changes the light and color of what is above the surface.

A Canon Powershot G9 black and white photo of my brother-in-law penetrating the surface of the pool as he dives head first into the water.

I love watching the sun shine it’s rays of light into the deep blue water as it mixes with my bubbles as they rise to the surface. Being underwater has always inspired me in one way or another to create. And now that I’m seeing my children take their own interest in learning how to dive and spend time underwater, it fills my heart with unexplainable joy. I know that once they overcome their fear of what lies beneath the surface, they too will be inspired by the all the wonders of life that lives in the fresh and salt water of the world. Seeing both of them enjoying themselves in the water was the best father’s day present I could receive.