variation on a theme

     

jumps continue around the house, and now he has taken them on the road, well, at least a 2 minute walk down the path.  we have a fabulous kiddie pool in our complex, is less than a meter high (i know, don't i sound high fallooting using the metric system?  seriously usa?  what is wrong with us?  most people BUT us use the metric system.  i need to get my head around it because it is so much more useful here than what i grew up with!), it goes up to around my knees, so it is perfect for the wee ones.  there is a little slide too.  it just opened about a week and a half ago.  it has been a bit rainy since it opened, so we have not been as frequently as we would like, but when the weather allows we pretty much go every day.

oli began this jumping all on his own.  parents keep asking me if i taught it to him, or if i am trying to teach him how to swim.  nope.  this is all oliver.  he tells me to back up (oops, i will show my true lack of metric system knowledge here) about 5 or 6 feet and then does an amazing bend of the knees launch prep, usually there is some instinctive animalistic yelling somewhere in here, and then a ginormous flying horizontal jump in to the air, pretty much parallel to the water, and then splash me in the face as he glides through the water, holding his breath, reaches for my hands and then stands up.



he is the wonder of the pool when he jumps.  all the people around are watching him (and they have ample time to watch because the first time he did it he did it for probably 30 or 40 minutes straight).  from the moms in the pool, to the old chinese grandpas on the side, to the grandma's guilting their grandchildren for not being as brave as oliver, people watch this kid in action.  it really is amazing for his age (2.5).  he has no fear, and he loves the water.  i guess it is to be expected from a kid born less than 5 miles from the beach :)  

but seriously, i think my favorite was the grandma.  two days in a row, she is yelling for her maybe 8 year old grandkids to come over and watch him (all in chinese of course).  she will say, "hey!  come over here.  watch this foreign kid.  look what he is doing.  he is so brave.  you should do this too."  cracks me up.


what also cracks me up is what he started saying before each jump.  he would say with such enthusiasm and huge arm gestures, "mom!  dis is going to be the biggest jump you have ever seen!"  where does he get this stuff?

thankfully my friend brittny was there at the same time as us, and i conned her into taking a few pictures (and thankfully she is a photographer, so she got some great ones even though the light was fading).  i wish i could go with clarke so that he could take some more, but that man is busy (even as i type this at 8:30pm he is not home and won't be for some time).  


anyway, the jumping continues around our house.  maybe this is why oliver has "papa pat calves," they are pretty cut for a chubby little dude you know.