Joseph's Summer of Growing Up, Part 2

Together with my parents and brother we rent a house we love on Smith Mountain Lake.  The house has a swimming/ party dock that is huge and the water at our dock is deep and clean.  Abigail has always loved to run and jump and swim in the deep water.  She was fearless (even when she thought there were sharks in the lake) because her Uncle Jim was there.

Joseph has preferred to sit on the dock and watch or wade into the shallow water up to his waist.

This year, before the car was even unpacked, Joseph was down at the dock jumping off the ladder to his grandmother.  We were all saying that maybe he'd be brave enough to jump off the dock by the end of the week.

Ten minutes later:

And shortly after that, he yelled "Cannnnnoooooonnnnnnnbaaaaaaalllllll" while running for the length of the dock before launching himself into the deep water.

But that wasn't all.

By the end of the week, he was riding piggy-back style into the lake on Larry's back.

We went to the community beach for the lake so there was a zero-entry swimming situation for Joseph.  He decided it was time to start swimming both under water and on top of the water, teaching himself how to come up for air without touching bottom.  And then, as soon as we got home, he announced he would be swimming in our pool (where he can't touch  bottom) without his life jacket anymore.  Okay, kid.  You got this.