Big Sister

Megan is absolutely the best big sister I have ever known. Her patience and willingness to do the same thing over and over (and over) again with her baby brother is astounding. The kindness she shows him is tremendous and even when she gets frustrated or whiny at him, simply asking her what we can do to help usually fixes the problem. Now, I understand that Evan is lucky enough to have two big sisters and Erin does spend some time with him, but she is quick to abandon him to play with kids in the neighborhood or find a new friend at the beach--while Megan rarely does that. She loves building sand castles for him to knock down, she loves "reading" to him with all kinds of made up stories to go along with the pictures she knows so well. Her new favorite thing to do? Baseball--that thing I told you about the other day? They have been doing that every morning.

What does Megan get out of this deal? The undying love and complete devotion of one small toddler. And I mean complete devotion. Often "Megmeg" is the first word he says in the morning and he looks for her as soon as he is done nursing (assuming she isn't in bed with us already!) When she needs some time and space, she often has to ask us to literally detach the toddler from her shirt! It is not uncommon to find her playing with Legos or Lincoln Logs in a closet somewhere with the door shut. But all kids need their space, right?

All of this is the backdrop to the quote I'm about to share with you. See, Evan is learning to talk--a lot. So often words and phrases will be said and then Megan will say, "Evan...can you say [whatever it was]?" Usually this pretty sweet, like "Evan...can you say 'baseball'?" and will be rewarded with a toddler saying, "baaayball" Then Megan claps for him, he claps for himself and everyone laughs. Today Megan had Evan in the chair with her as she "read" to him from a lift-the-flap dinosaur book.

"Evan...can you say 'herbavore'?" "hbvowre" (I'm trying to spell toddler-speak here, not easy!)

"Evan...can you say, 'carnivore'?" "cnnvowre"

"Evan...can you say, 'flesh and blood'?" "feesh booood!"

Yeah! (clap clap!) Good job!

I'm so glad he has his big sister to teach him stuff!



Here they are together in their "Meguin" pjs (which is Megan and Penguin put together, in case you missed that)