I have to give it to Liam for the stunt he pulled today. He is definitely asserting his independence these days and Leif and I are constantly having to reming ourselves that if he doesn’t go through this, he will never leave home when he is 18! But today’s move should have been on a sitcom. We were at the Columbia Fitness pool for swimming lessons (he is getting very close and is convinced that he already knows how to swim). After his lesson, I let him free swim with his life jacket on. I gave him a 10 minute warning that we had to go and then once the 10 minutes was up told him to get out of the pool. He yelled “no” and swam right into the middle of the pool. Ok moms – what would you do? I am dressed and there are no adults in the pool and he is yelling “not yet” at me from the middle of the deep end. I put on my best “angry mom” face and told him to “get over here right now!” He yelled “no” and it when on like this for a little bit. At first I wanted to jump into the pool fully clothed but then I actually started laughing at how absolutely helpless and powerless I was! Finally the lifeguard got one of the older kids to drag him to the side kicking and screaming. Liam and I had a talk and we left the gym happy.

Speaking of swimming – like I said, Liam is totally overconfident in the water. He really does believe he knows how to swim. With a life jacket on, he maneuvers all over the place. However, when we were in Lake Chelan last week, he ran full speed ahead with no life jacket on and jumped right into the deep end. I had to go jumping in after him and once we got to the surface, he told me he thought his life jacket was on! It is so scary how vulnerable the kids are around water – you really have to watch there every move!