Water Safety for Kids

My oldest son celebrated his 35th birthday last Sunday. While discussing how old he'd gotten, I asked him if he would be able to bring his family down during his vacation. My wife and I live in southwest Florida and he lives in Tennessee. His little girl will be 2 years old in June and I wanna make sure I'm current on water safety for kids so she can enjoy our pool.

While browsing thru various catalogs for child water safety, I realized my wife and I have quite a few swimming pool toys, but nothing about water safety for kids.


Each year about 300 children under the age of 5 drown in residential or family pools. Approximately 75% of these children are between the ages of 1 and 3 years old. Another 2000 children are treated in emergency rooms related to swimming pool accidents. Two year olds are notorious for disappearing the moment your head is turned and our granddaughter is no exception.

Now, all of a sudden my attention is turned toward water safety for kids and I could really use some baby advice. Probably, the best item to keep a 2 year old from wandering off into the pool during an unguarded moment is a swimming pool fence. I say probably because this will be our first experience worrying about a toddler falling into our pool.

Swimming pool fences come in various styles,materials, and heights. After looking into different types of fences, I like the removable mesh design the best. The fence is installed with removable sections held by safety latches at the top. This makes removal and reinstallation a breeze.

Floating pool alarms are a great safety feature to have for that little one that gets thru the fence. Underwater alarms are activated when anything weighing 15 lbs. or more falls into your pool. Perimeter sensors sound the alarm when a child or pet approaches the pool. There is a system utilizing a wristband for the child and a base setup for Mom and Dad. As long as your child is wearing the wristband it is on and will sound an alarm the second it enters the water.

My wife and I are looking forward to a visit from our granddaughter, but we want to make sure she will be safe while enjoying our swimming pool. All of these products will help to keep a child out of trouble around the swimming pool, but the only way to ensure water safety for kids around the swimming pool is, constant supervision from Mom,Dad, and/or the grandparents.

Water Safety for Kids

So, I decided to make a blog about where to find the baby's first toys.
Becoming a grandfather will do that to you. Naturally, my wife had to read my post when she got home from work.

"Honey", she said, that's real good, but what makes you think you know anything about buying the baby's first toys?
She then went on to explain how a newborn baby can't see past the end of his nose and the only toys he has right now are: Mom and Grandma.

In that order.

Who knew?

After not disagreeing with my wife, (always a good idea), I said I meant when they got to be around three months old or something like that. Threw that one out there just to see how it would float.

We both agreed I'm kinda clueless when it comes to buying anything for a baby, especially their first toys. What I needed were some baby gift ideas.
While pondering this significant piece of information, it hit me!
My wife and I have a large inground swimming pool at our house along with a hot tub right on the pool deck.


Let's get this kid in the water early and often. Her daughter's son is
three months old so that's the perfect time frame.

There's lots of baby products out there related to swimming. There's those little blow-up things you put around their arms to keep 'em from turning into a submarine. You can get a little toy boat with a rope on it so Mom and Grandma can pull the little tyke around the pool. Give the kid a sense of swimming and get one of those little rafts for him to lay on. They also come with a rope.
But, in my humble opinion, the absolute best toy is an inner tube looking thing with straps on the bottom running front to back and side to side. The baby sits down in this toy, held by the straps, while his little legs dangle in the water and he sits there all fat and happy.

Our local pool supply store carries all these baby toys. My wife and I never get out of there without picking something up for the grandkids.

Water Safety for Kids

When my son first became a father, he had no idea where to find the baby's first toys.

For one thing, he's a sports nut and his first baby turned out to be a little girl. Sure, girls love
sports too, but all he could think about was how would he know if his choices for the baby's first toys would be the right choices.

Fortunately, (for him & the baby), mom took the situation in hand and made the decisions for him, which is what all good moms do anyway.