FIRSTS CONTINUED

the day we got back from riding the horse, we got to go to a birthday party for max. one of the things they did there was get in the pool and swim around. well, jeriah has never been in a pool before and we tried to talk it up before we got there. taylor jumped in and then held jeriah as they walked around and floated, played with toys, and tried to have a relaxing enjoyable time. jeriah was fine until a few minutes after he got in and realized how scary it was. he began clinging to taylor for dear life and crying out, "no!!", "all done! all done!", and more "all done all done all done!!!!!" taylor tried to keep him in the water for a while and help him see how fun it was, but he didn't buy it. it was one huge scary bathtub to him. he ended up sitting with his feet in the water and a few pouring toys to play with. all the other mothers there with kids that loved the water kept saying it took a year for their kids to get used to it, so maybe there's hope. also, notice taylor's and jeriah's identical farmer's tan lines. like father like son...

after taylor forced jeriah into the huge scary bathtub, he wasn't all that popular of a dad. when taylor would swim over to jeriah, he'd start in with his "all done!" thing again and cower away from him. i think he was possibly afraid of daddy throwing him in the water to teach him to swim, like people do with dogs. well, daddy never did get him back into the water. (that'll show him.) but then taylor got into a macho duel with max's grandpa to see who could make the biggest splash from doing a can opener off the diving board, and taylor was suddenly the coolest dad there was. jeriah saw him jump off that diving board and make the biggest splash he'd ever seen, and since he's obsessed with things that splash right now in his little two year old world, he just squealed for joy and clapped his hands and bounced up and down and daddy was AWESOME!!! he talked about it all the way home and told grandma and grandpa all about it when he got home even though they had no clue what he was saying. all of a sudden, swimming was FUN!