It's a Love-Hate Relationship

That's the way I would describe the relationship between my 13 month old daughter and my almost 3 year old nephew. We used to say that James was Allie's favorite person, and he still is certainly towards the top of her list. She laughs at him when he makes silly faces, she chases after him at the park, and wants to be wherever he is. They play so great together....half of the time.

Then, there's the other half....the pushing, the fighting, the screaming. They're both guilty of these offenses. Today, it was my turn to carpool the kids to Grandma's. Soon after I picked up the boys, the fighting started. Allie was "touching" James' carseat and he let her know he didn't appreciate that. I heard him in the backseat, "No, Allie, No!" shortly followed by screams from her. I said, "James, did you hit Allie?" I could tell the wheels in his head were turning, "Did I hit her? noooo." "So, do you know why she's crying?" And in his sweet innocent voice he replies, "yeah, I bite her finger!"

Oh, but the fun didn't stop there. Just moments later, Allie took James' shoe. James tried to get it back from her. She clung to that shoe for dear life. Then, in typical Allie fashion, she began flailing her arms to try and keep the shoe away from James. 10 month old Ryan, who was sweetly sleeping in his carseat next to Allie, became the innocent victim in this cousin-rivalry and got hit in the face with the shoe and Allie's flailing arms. Needless to say, I now had 3 screaming children in the back seat.

Yep, it's a love-hate relationship and we wouldn't trade it for anything in the world.