John M's 23 month old meme

One little month from the big two-year-old mark. Already.

Here you are washing your grandmother's car. You love the water, that's for sure. Wa-la, as you say. You love it so much that you fell into the pool earlier this month (with nothing to keep you afloat) and scared the ever-living-shit out of me. Don't do that to your mama; she's old and anxiety-stricken as it is. Anyway, you decided you were going to swing on the railing for the steps going into the pool and your hands slipped and next thing I knew, you were under water flailing about. I jumped in, clothes and all, and scooped you up and you just looked at me as if to say, 'What'd you do that for? I was trying to teach myself to swim'. In fact, that's what your sisters said, that it looked like you were trying to swim. You never cried, coughed, anything. Maw-Maw and I were having nervous breakdowns and it looked like you were ready for an ice cream or something. No fear, I tell you.

On the flip side, Anna decided to paint your fingernails and toenails last weekend. Blue. Because otherwise, it would be too girly, right? You loved it. Daddy didn't so much. You went for your first boat ride this summer the day the painting took place, and I looked at you at one point to see what you were thinking of the rough, bumpy ride. You were sitting up straight in the 'co-pilot' seat of the boat with your little hands in the air, nails toward you, just admiring your nice freshly-painted blue nails. You love them. I need to get a picture, huh?

I love the way you jumble up your words into little JohnM-sentences, something like this.
'I ride Daddy tows', translated to mean 'I want to ride with Daddy to see the cows'. I try to make you string together big, long sentences just to see how you will phrase things. One of my favorites is 'I wan hold Mama'. I dread the day I don't hear that anymore.

I love you Mr. John M., with your almost-two-year-old self.