At the time it seemed like Kathleen grew up a lot after Victoria was born. Around that time she started speaking in sentences instead of a word or two at a time. I almost expect Victoria to start doing the same thing overnight. Which is a bit silly really. Although her vocabulary grows every day and her pronounciation is getting better too. Today she said "goggie" for doggie instead of her usual "dadu". She knows so many words, and she's getting pretty good with her colours and shapes too.
But at the same time I also look at Kathleen and marvel at how much she too has grown up in the last 21 months and struggle to remember her being Victoria's age. In my memory it feels like I've been having conversations with her forever but it has only been the last 21 months. She can now draw with ease and can write her own name and many other letters besides. She is learning to read simple words like CAT, DOG, HOT, etc.
Lately I have started hearing things out of Kathleen's mouth that I didn't think I'd hear for years: "Vic-TOR-rii-aaaa", "Mum, Victoria's being a pain", "Give that BACK".
What doesn't help is that they are very similar in their tastes, so if Kathleen has something, Victoria wants it, and (more often than not) if Victoria has something, Kathleen wants it (especially if that something is Mummy's attention). This gets worse on the days when we go to the Toy Library because they are usually both drawn to the same toy and both want to play with the best pieces themselves. This photo actually shows them playing nicely side by side. They both wanted the same horse toys to put in their Duplo stables, and it probably would have ended in tears if Mummy hadn't seen what was going on and made sure they both had two horses each. I'm sure part of the squabbling comes from the fact that any toy looks more attractive if it is in use - i.e. that doll moving around looks much better than this doll on the floor.
However I fear that some of it is also because they each know how to wind the other up - "She wants this? Well so do I". Case in point...
Last month I took the girls to the zoo. Afterwards we had a good browse around the gift shop and ended up settling on a bag of about 12 small, plastic zoo animals. When we got home they both wanted to play with the chimp. Fair enough, they both had their turn and then it got put away (actually the dog ran off with it).The next day they started fighting over the hippo. The Hippo. My apologies to any hippopotamus lovers out there ... but really? ... the Hippo? Of all the animals in the bag, they weren't fighting over the chimp (but you loved it yesterday?), or the lion, or the zebra, or any of the other cool animals. But the Hippo.
It was all because Kathleen was playing with the hippo first. Victoria saw her playing with it and then she wanted it too. Kathleen saw that her sister wanted it, so she held onto it even more. And when Victoria did get hold of it, it just made Kathleen want it back all the more.
And all I could do was stand there and watch thinking "Really? Really? But it's the HIPPO!".
Love Megz
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