Water Babies welcomes Scotland’s youngest swimmer

Water Babies has always welcomed young babies into its classes – but little Oriana Austin might be the youngest student they’ve ever had.

Water Babies has shared some adorable images of its youngest ever Scottish swimmer. Tiny Oriana Austin was less than two weeks old when she took part in her local Water Babies class. She was joined by mum Pamela Mackie, who got to witness Oriana’s magical first strokes in the water.

The baby franchise welcomes little swimmers right from birth, meaning mothers and fathers can take their newborns along as soon as they feel ready to. Thanks to babies’ natural confidence in water, which comes from the fact that they’ve spent nine months floating in amniotic fluid during pregnancy, the classes allow parents to teach their children to swim as early as possible.

Swimming Tutor Wendy Lambie, who is in charge of the Scotland Central Water Babies franchise, expressed her delight at welcoming such a tiny tot into her class.

“Most of our swimmers start with us between the ages of 12 weeks and 12 months, so it’s always magical to have younger babies in the pool.”

Pamela explained that the first session went really well for little Oriana.

“I think when babies are not long in the world, water is very familiar to them. Oriana is a settled baby anyway but she’s very comfortable in the water. In her first lesson she swam underwater no problem at all.”

Water Babies was set up in 2002 by a young couple who wanted to teach their baby to swim. Soon after, they branched out to teach other local tots and realised that the business lent itself well to franchising. Now, Water Babies teaches more than 50,000 children across the UK every single week and has even taken its concept to other countries around the world.