Sisters and Brothers

“The wonderful thing about brothers and sisters are
Sisters and brothers are wonderful things.
The thing we love about brothers and sisters is…
Just about everything!”*

The other day I heard Pumpkin Girl say, “Boo-oo-wa.” To get a full appreciation of what this sounds like, you have to remember that she is 6 years old and angry with her older brother. It’s sort of a half-whining sound and has three distinct syllables. (Ok, as she’s reading this over my shoulder, she wants to say it’s more of a quiet “wa.”)

So “Boo-oo-wa!,” she says. “Stop giving me the Big Eye. ”

I looked up from what I was doing. “Honey, what in the world is the ‘Big Eye’?”

“It’s when he looks at me like this,” and she proceeds to scrunch up her pretty face into something both comical and menacing at the same time. “It annoys me,” she added.

My children make me laugh, each one of them on their own. But they really, really get me going when they are being siblings. You see, I’m an only child so all this sibling stuff is new to me. The bickering I could do without, of course. It’s the other stuff that’s golden. The things they come up with together – The Big Eye, The Pit of Never Return, “The Adventures of Bear, Sock Monkey, Super Cat and Lola” – having a sibling as your best friend really adds a certain dimension to their play.

It goes beyond that, too. Like the commercials say, some things really are priceless. Like an older brother and sister who invite you into their room “because we aren’t playing with any choking hazards.” Or a sister who makes your breakfast, or a brother who saves a spot for you in his bed in case you have a nightmare. Now that’s love!

And here I was thinking that I didn’t have anything interesting to blog anymore! So I present to you my children at their finest – giving you the Big Eye.

*from “Franklin and the Green Knight“

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