Sisterly Love

Over the past several months, Abbie has been pretty possessive of her toys and will take almost anything away that Leah picks up to play with. Leah is now old enough that she cares and is starting to fight back or have a tantrum when she doesn't get what she wants. It's getting to the point where I'd rather they be in different rooms or levels of the house so I won't have to keep separating them and hear them fighting and crying.

So recently I've been working with Abbie more to share with her sister and teach her to take turns. Also, to let Leah join her when playing with something and that it's more fun when they can do something together. I've been trying to get Abbie to teach Leah how to do something instead of doing it for her or taking it away when Leah does it wrong. Anyway, by some miracle, it's working!


Here's a picture of them enjoying some time together outside, not fighting or crying. Abbie used to take the wagon away from Leah and not let her touch it or put anything in it or get inside but after some coaxing, I got her to give Leah a ride in it and now it's one of her favorite things to do, pull Leah in the wagon. She also has a piggy bank with a bunch of fake coins that go in it and now she will yell for Leah to come put some coins in the piggy bank and she happily gives Leah a few. Also, when Abbie wants to go downstairs, she asks for Leah to come too because she doesn't want to be all alone down there.

Another example is Abbie has a bed for her favorite blue dolly that has never been out of her room because she didn't want Leah to touch it. But just a few days ago, Abbie brought the bed out into the living room and let Leah put her yellow dolly into it with her blue dolly and then proceeded to read some books to the dolls, sing them some songs, and put them to sleep, all while Leah played with them too. This never would have happened a month ago. One last example is that Abbie doesn't freak out as much when Leah gets into her room and plays with her toys and she even wants to get Leah up first thing in the morning so they can play together instead of be apart.

I don't know if it's the age or what, but something we're doing is finally working and it's much more fun to see the girls playing together and being happy instead of fighting and us always having to separate them. I mean, they are siblings and still have their moments but at least we're making progress and this gives me hope that maybe someday they'll even be best friends!