birthdays and siblings...

Over the weekend my brother celebrated his 29th birthday. When my son asked him "how old are you?" my brother smiled and replied "not as old as your mom!"

Which is true. 

We are 21 months apart. He is the youngest, I am the oldest. My children adore him. They ask almost daily "when can Uncle Toby come over?" "what do you think Uncle Toby is doing right now?" "Uncle Toby is my best friend..."

When he visits they dive bomb him with show and tell and questions and watch this and watch me and talk to me and listen to this and oh did you know... 

I think he kind of loves it. 

But the other day I had to say "he's MY brother. I want to talk to him!" and then I thought it'd be a great teaching moment to talk about how we are siblings, and my two are siblings, and we get along, so maybe they should see that... oy. It went all wrong and we ended up laughing because I was making no sense. 

I want them to have what we have. 

We were best friends growing up. Confidants. Playmates. Yes, I might have tried to sell him a rock from our gravel walkway for his only two dollars... but mostly we got on just fine. I remember conspiring to stay up all night in sleeping bags on Christmas Eve, only to fall asleep just as I'm sure things got interesting around the Christmas tree. Riding bikes together to the library across town. Adventures when I started driving and we could go off the two of us for real. We crossed a state line and laughed like crazy, wondering what mom and dad would think. We were always in cahoots. 

This is the summer of getting along for my children. They are 5 and almost 3 {21 months apart...} and can spend hours either playing together seamlessly or they spend the day at each other poking and taunting and driving each other mad. 

I remember having those crazy at each others throats days with my brother as well... but they were the minority. 

But then, I don't really remember when I was 5 and he was 3. There's probably a reason for that. 

Watching my kids and their relationship unfold is fascinating. Complicated. And utterly silly and hopeful. 

{and now... I have to cut this short to end a stomping screaming match of wills upstairs.... oh yes there's a reason why we have selective memories from childhood!!}