My crew, shanghaied from the darkest and filthiest corners of our basement hang-out room (well, that's where I found the two littlest ones) are my wife Rebecca, daughter Killian (11) and son Matthew (8).
Also on board as cabin warmer, boat alarm and potential rescuer of any further lost hats is George, the lab/spaniel mix. He spent his first day napping below and showing no interest what so ever in his surroundings. But he didn't pee and he didn't get sick and he didn't fall overboard. What more could you possibly ask of a dog so big on a boat so small?
The kids treated sailing as just another dimension of riding around on Grandpa's power boat, with the exception of dad explaining the rules of how not to be knocked overboard unconscious by the boom, etc.
On our first day of sail, I only made a real effort to train in Rebecca on the very basics (push tiller opposite intended direction, boat will not go directly into the wind, and--should I be knocked overboard unconscious by the boom--keep the mainsail more or less aligned with the telltales, let the jib flog itself to death, and run it up on the beach.
She not only managed to steer a fine course, and tack a few times, she managed to master working the rudder and the outboard tiller in tandem while I got sail down. Definitely an A++ performance.
Now, to try and get the kids hooked. Forget the Captain Bly stuff. Just treat them the way I did when they were a 20 month toddler. If they're about to do something that will get them hurt, tackle them and drag them to safety, with judicious use of the bark of command (a tone which my wife feels may be appropriate for training dogs but not children).
The plan is to get them to take rounds on the tiller, and put them in charge of the jib (since the main sheet on this boat really needs to belong to the helm or you're liable to elbow the boat driver in the nose while trying to set the cam cleat).
Suitably nautical pictures of the crew will be available after we spend all of 4th of July week sailing, since I was too busy trying to get through launch day or first sale to bother to take any pictures last weekend.
They are working out rather nicely, thank you. Rebecca and Killian can handle the tiller (mother for longer periods than daughter, but daughter seems to instinctively understand how a tiller works, being uncorrupted by years of wheel-steered vehicles).
Our daughter Killian was able to take the tiller under power and keep the boat into the wind with the wind piping up in the high-teens and gusting well over 20--and after a scary knockdown--long enough for me to get the sails down. I was impressed with her cool. She is going to make a fine sailor.
Officially, as of yesterday, they no longer need to be told when to release and when to sheet the jib when tacking. Only a bit of coaching on coaxing the jib around in a gybe is still required. In general, they are working out quite nicely. Out of Hand, Steer and Reef, they do two adequately.
My son will steer if asked, and do a fine job for up to two minutes, until something else catches his attention. He is only eight, and I'm not going to push it. I believe was was two to three years older when I sent to sailing camp and got the bug, so that is fine.
At this point, I believe my wife and daughter could, together, run the boat up on a sandy beach if required (captain disabled) if they had to, and they're plenty of sandy beaches on our lake, and virtually no rocks that I've seen, so for this year, I'll take that.
I want to get my wife, who puts away the sails, to try and take ownership of getting the jib set up at the dock, and possibly ready to take the main sail down. That and getting my son to steer for more than five minutes would be a good first year for them.
And I have a week on vacation at home we plan to dedicate to sailing--should the weather gods permit--before we have to haul in early September. Remember, Detroit Lakes is about 45 miles due east of Fargo, N.D. We are far north and winter ends soon. I would sail through the end of September based on typical weather, but my marina shuts down in the middle of that month and all of the docakge is hauled out of the water. We could be driving on our sailing grounds up here, if we so choose, by January.)