Water Baby

James's fondness for water (first evidenced by his love of baths) has been cropping up all over the place lately.

We visited my parents this summer, and he went crazy for their pool -- we have several photos (which I swear I will learn how to post one of these days) of him wallowing around in the water, happy as a clam.

At bathtime he has cast aside both the groovy Ocean Wonders baby tub and the handy bathtub kiddie-safety ring and now sits upright on a bathmat, leaning back to have his hair washed. (He still fit in the safety ring just fine. I had to stop putting him in it because he'd learned to jackknife his legs in the ring and then go rigid, effectively preventing me from taking him out of the tub. He's a sweet, mellow guy, but one thing I've learned about him is that, if he's not interested in doing something, he is flat not going to do it.)

His greatest water-related performance to date, however, was at his christening earlier this month. Most babies freak out at the touch of the water and scream through the ceremony. James...didn't. When we carried him over to the font to be baptized, he took one look at the bowl of water and obviously figured he was in for a treat. The next thing we knew, he had performed a complex barrel roll/swan dive maneuver and flung himself into the font, where he gleefully splashed water all over himself and the priest. (Mind you, this was in the middle of morning services in a packed church.) Whoops. She was very nice about it.