The Swimming Gosselins

This story appeared in The Star, the newspaper of Cleveland County, NC. I will let you draw your own conclusions about Jessica's comments and about the questions she was asked by the producer.


Local woman to appear on 'Jon and Kate Plus Ei8ht'
Saturday, Aug 16 2008, 5:23 pm

Want to watch? Jessica Barkley of Shelby will appear in several episodes of "Jon and Kate Plus Ei8ht" starting Monday at 9 p.m. on the TLC network.
SHELBY - Eight doesn't seem like that big of a number. As far as birthday's go, you're looking more forward to 10. Eight doesn't roll off the tongue like a dozen. Fingers and toes combined, you've got way more than eight. But eight children in a pool all looking to you for instruction ... well, eight gets some respect.
Jessica Barkley, better known in her hometown of Shelby by her maiden name, Koenig, is at home in the water. She's been a lifeguard, a swim teacher and competitive swimmer.
She was working her second summer in Ocean Rescue at Corolla Beach in the Outer Banks when she heard about some special visitors.
Jon and Kate Gosselin, along with their 8-year-old twin daughters, Mady and Cara, and their 4-year-old sextuplets Alexis, Hannah, Aaden, Collin, Leah and Joel were staying at a nearby beach house.
"Cool," Jessica thought. She had been watching a lot of the family's show "Jon and Kate Plus Ei8ht" on the TLC network.
Only a day or so later, her supervisor Sylvia told Jessica she'd been given the task of teaching the twins and sextuplets to swim.
"Sylvia told me, you know they're looking for someone to teach the kids to swim," Jessica said. "Then it was, and you're going!"
Jessica and Sylvia spent two weeks with the family. The first week, the television show's film crew was there to record all the action. The second week it was just the family. But the children didn't note the difference.
"The camera didn't make any difference. They acted the same when the cameras were gone. I thought they might have been more hyper being filmed ... but no, that's them!" Jessica laughed.
The producer asked Jessica questions as the children continued their lessons.
"What was the progress? Was there a difference between the boys and girls? Was it as crazy as we expected?" Jessica listed.
Just as Jessica had seen on the show, Kate was super organized while it seemed Jon would go with the flow.
"Kate had everything stacked ... each kid had their floaties, all the towels stacked up, everyone had their certain color, they each had their certain toy," Jessica said. "You'd see Jon bringing out this box of floaties."
After lessons (imagine a 4-year-old's energy times six) Jessica said she and Sylvia would be exhausted.
"We'd get in the car and look at each other a go 'we need a nap.'" she said.
At the end of the two weeks, Jessica left with more than a new and deep appreciation for the energy of 4-year-olds. "The family gave me this signed picture with 'thank you' on it," Jessica said.

You can find the story here.