Brotherly love

Before having kids I would never have imagined that at 7 weeks and 19 months there could already be sibling interaction and brotherly love between brothers. But my boys have proven to me that there is! Judah continues to be interested in Levi sporadically throughout his days and Levi basks in any attention Judah will send his way. When Judah pays attention to Levi, it is usually in one of the following ways:

1. Levi is crying in his car seat once it has been put on the ground somewhere, and Judah goes to rock it back and forth while saying "ya, ya, ya" (Spanish version of "there, there, there")

2. Levi has lost his pacifier (when he decides to take it) and Judah rushes to put it back in his mouth. However if Levi does not take it in 2.5 seconds flat, it becomes property of Judah and goes straight into his mouth full of teeth where he enjoys chewing on it.

3. Whenever I have Levi in my moby wrap, Judah notices and loves to point out his body parts that are showing through the moby wrap-he especially likes to pull on Levi's legs as they hang.

4. The minute I put Levi on the play mat to play, Judah is right there with him. He lays down and joins in on the fun. As you can see from the picture below, he also likes to hold Levi's hand.

5. Not all of Judah's interactions with Levi are exactly positive however. When Levi cries in the car, sometimes it makes Judah sad. He sticks out his lower lip and whimper somes.

6. Judah thinks it is OK to throw some of his toys to Levi when he is in the swing. Not safe and not appropriate! We are working on this lesson right now...

7. And as you can see from the picture below, Judah feels the need to sit on Levi's lap when he is in the bouncy seat. This, although also not safe or appropriate cracks me up for two reasons. For one, Levi looks almost as big as Judah when he does this and two, Levi doesn't seem to mind! But we are also working on getting to Judah to stop this as well!

Levi, on the other hand, may already have picked up something from his big brother to my surprise. As many of you know, Judah LOVES Mickey Mouse (see the pictures below). Lately, he has decided that his stuffed Mickey needs to go most places with him. He goes on our walks with us in the stroller (not sure how Judah will handle it once Levi is ready to occupy his spot in the stroller) and he also naps and goes to bed with Judah. He wanted him to take a bath with him the other night but Mickey is not waterproof!

We discovered the beauty of Mickey Mouse last summer when we had to start giving Judah regular hair cuts. We needed a way to easily distract him and Mickey Mouse Clubhouse did the trick. Well little did we know what we started. We now use Mickey for other hygiene related rituals as well, such as nail trimming. If it weren't for Mickey Mouse I swear Judah would have hair to his waist and nails so long you'd want to paint them. Well, although I am not a big proponent of television, I do admit I use it for my own sanity at times as well. Since I am at home many nights during that hard to deal with "witching hour" I sometimes put Mickey on if Judah is irritable and Levi is inconsolable and I need a way to distract Judah for a few minutes. Well, last night I did just that. I put Levi down for a moment on the Boppy lounger so I could readjust and get ready to do some more walking around the living room with him. He was crying when I put him down but as soon as he turned his head towards the TV and saw Mickey, he stopped crying. I know it sounds crazy but he stopped crying and didn't start up again until after it was over with and I picked him back up.

Just like big brother!