Holding on

Xander is a really good big brother. In fact, he keeps surprising me with how kind and loving he is toward his sister. I'm sure you've already seen how he sings to her when she's crying (the ABC's, of course), and I've already told you that he likes to bring her a pacifier and put it in her mouth, too (which leads to a lot of pacifier washing, since sometimes it takes a detour on the carpet as a car before it makes it to Amelia). This morning he blew me away, though. I had just finished feeding Amelia, and was getting up off the couch when Xander reached for his sister and said, "I hold baby sister, Mommy. I hold her."

He went from sweet in the morning to sour in the afternoon, though. We tried to go to the playground since it was such a nice day, but the slides were really wet and had a lot of mulch on them. I'm not sure how that much mulch accumulates on the slides, but it was probably done by a child who likes to pick it up by the handfuls so it can rain mulch like mine does. Anyway, he just walked around the playground area for a few minutes, picking up rocks, and then we moseyed back home. Where he proceeded to act very strong-willed and dramatic (i.e., 2 1/2). Amelia was fussy, too. I'm not sure if she was picking up on the mood of the house or if she had her own reasons, but I was trying to calm either one or the other for the rest of the afternoon. Tomorrow's forecast is for rain all day, so I hope we're all in better moods to deal with the dreary weather.