Ten Fingers and Twelve Toes

Is it just me or has my blog been a bit of a downer lately?

Leave it to my daughter to brighten my world with a laugh.

If you are a regular reader, you know that during a recent visit to my hometown, Olivia took her first plunge from a springboard diving platform.

She had not been able to transfer that bravery to the city pool down the road from where we live .... until today.

I can't hang out in the water near the boards at our city pool like I can at the pool where she first started jumping, so that had been throwing her off. Even though she doesn't need me to be there, she just likes to see me waiting in the water before she takes the leap. Plus, our city pool is very busy, with dozens of kids lined up at the boards at any given time. It was a bit overwhelming for her.

But today was the day my four-year-old decided to join all those big kids jumping, diving, and cannon-balling their way into relief from this &%#@ 105-degree-heat.

She was VERY proud of herself.

As she told me, "This is the awesomest thing ever. I am going to do this all day."

After the second or third jump, she climbed out of the pool and asked me:

"So Mama, how many toes is that?"

Say what???????

I am trying to cheer her accomplishment, while keeping my eye on Daniel, who is a great distance away and who is capable of doing any number of things to cause grief -- swiping some kids' water toy, swiping some kids' sucker, swiping somebody's water bottle, you get the idea. Oh, and there always is the possibility that he might disappear from view and head out on his own to the nearby playground, and I simply don't have the time to be having a heart attack these days. So, I was a bit distracted .... what did she just say??? Something about toes?????

"What, Olivia?" I ask her, "What did you say?"

"You know, mama -- deep. How many toes deep is it?"

OOOHHHH!!!!!

"Oh, FEET! Olivia, that water is 12-feet-deep! You are jumping into water that is 12-feet-deep, which is a WHOLE LOT OF WATER!"

Oh, thank goodness for the little things that make us laugh.

Thank goodness for my daughter.