Small steps. Giant leaps.

In a matter of moments my five-year-old grew older by a giant leap. We bought the family pass to the pool for the summer. Kind of cool - pay on the front end and it feels like you get in free the rest of the season... Anyway - for several weeks now, the most fun my youngest could imagine having at the pool would be to climb up on the side and then jump in, splash around, climb out and do it again. She would do this literally for hours. To jump and be caught by me was even more fun in her opinion. Two days ago, however, I moved her to the deeper water where she had to jump in and swim to me. Again, trusting, trying, hurtling into the unknown, ultimately into my arms. Suddenly she had a new request.

"Can I go off the diving board?"

She was super-excited when I said, "Sure!" We got the lifeguard's attention, just in case, and she didn't hesitate. She leaped in and came up smiling a huge smile. "I want to do it again!" were her only words as I applauded her from the edge of the pool.

She never went back to jumping off the edge and into my arms, which only moments before had been the ultimate experience. One small step off the diving board, one giant leap toward growing up.