Sibling bliss

This morning, I had gotten out of bed to get my morning cup of joe, leaving Esme, Emil and Cleo all sleeping peacefully in bed. As I was finishing my coffee I heard signs of life from the bedroom, so I sneaked up to the door and listened in before slowly peaking at them. Esme was singing the ABC song to Emil, who was lying next to her and grinning ear-to-ear. Cleo was asleep under her blankie.

Those are the moments that my heart just stops. It's absolute parental bliss to see the two children, so young, and so adoring of each other. Not all sibling relationships go so smoothly, and I'm not sure whether nature or nuture plays a bigger role in how it shakes out, but I suspect it is a combination of both. I recall my mom telling me about her trip to the hospital to meet the first of five little brothers. She was steaming mad, sitting on the floorboard of the backseat with her baby doll. Esme's experience was so very different. She walked into our bedroom, where I was lying in bed with Emil in my arms, and exclaimed, "Baby brother out!"
Her tone of voice was sheer joy, like a little kid looking at presents under the tree, proof that Santa Claus had been here. She jumped onto the bed, nestled into my side and planted a big, gentle kiss on Baby Brother's cheek.

Esme has a super loving temperament, anyway, so I don't know how much credit I get to take for her behavior. That said, I did work hard to prepare her for baby brother. She got her own little boy baby doll before Emil was born. We talked about how there was a baby in my belly, and that Esme used to be there too. We discussed how she and her baby brother would be the only people to ever come out of my belly (yes, I'm pretty confident we're not having another).

And after Emil was born, we continued working to keep her enamored of the little baby. I included her as much as possible in taking care of Emil, which made her feel special. And when she couldn't actually help me, she often took care of her baby doll right alongside me and Emil, imitating everything that I did.

What's strange is how she seemed to understand that her position in the family had changed right as Emil was born. She wasn't resentful about it, either. Before Emil was born, she had this habit of referring to herself as "baby" in third person. For example, she would say, "Baby want juice" if she wanted juice. But literally the day that Emil was born, she started using the pronoun "I" and speaking in first person. It was like flipping a switch. She recognized that there was a new baby in the family, and that she wasn't the baby anymore. She had a new role as big sister, and she takes that role very seriously.

For the first few weeks that Emil was here, Esme would constantly check on him. If he wasn't in Mommy's arms, she got worried. She would ask where he was, and if she didn't see him anywhere, tears would well up as she started to panic. I quickly learned not to joke about Baby Brother disappearing. (I confess, the first time she asked where he went, I threw my arms up and said, "I don't know! Where'd he go?" I had no idea she would get so upset!)

I'm not kidding myself. I know that they will fight. And yes, there are times already that Esme gets a little jealous. She has told me on more than one occasion to "put him down!" so that I can pick her up. But overall, I think that they are off to an excellent start.

One of the reasons we had our children so close together was that my brother and I were only a year and a half apart, and we are best friends. We have always shared experiences and friends, and I wouldn't trade that relationship for the world. I wanted Esme to have someone close to her in age and close to her in genetics growing up. My brother and I were notorious for fighting, I'll admit it. Those closest to us (i.e., Mom, Dad and our older sister) called us the Brat Twins, a nickname that we earned with our behavior. For all the spats we went through (and the occasional all-out brawl), he is still one of my favorite and closest friends.

So I am prepared to cringe and bear it when Emil and Esme go at it. And in the meantime, I'm doing everything I can to encourage them to love each other. It's a good thing they make my job so easy.

The Mixed Blessing of Extended Family

We just said farewell to the last batch of family in the parade of Emil's well-wishers. It's been non-stop since he was born, and with today's divorced and remarried set of parents, it just extends the family further and further. Where there used to be two sets of grandparents, now there are often four. We have three sets of grandparents, and I am thankful for all of them.

But I'm glad they're gone for now. The problem with living so far from all the grandparents is that getting time with them becomes a big ordeal. You have to interrupt your daily routine to spend time with them. If we lived close by, we could have more casual, spread out visits. A dinner here, a lunch there. But as it is, it's morning, noon and night with ne'er a break between.

They come with the claim that they are here to help. And they are. It's been wonderful having someone help cook and clean. But our house is small, and with four adults and two children, the chaos quickly gets out of control. So their additional cleaning doesn't always outweigh the additional mess.

My office is my living room, and frankly, I haven't gotten much work done. My house is now returned to me, and this morning in the space of three hours, I have managed to research an article I'm working on, communicate with two of my editors via email, meet with a house painter, do two loads of laundry, and clean out the fridge. Somehow, doing any of those things with people sitting around hanging out seemed very difficult.

Emil is sleeping peacefully in his swing, and Esme is at daycare. There is not a sound but the hum of the fridge, and that is beautiful. There are days that I think I will never be able to balance this parenting life with my own career, but then there are days like this that are smooth sailing.

I wish that we lived closer to our extended family. Then maybe I could see less of them. ;-)