Still Best Friends

I love that my kids are so close. Last night, I was flipping through my scrapbook and stopped on a page that had a few of the crazy things I caught them doing with my camera this summer. I actually welled up with tears. I was so emotional about that fact that they enjoy each other so much. And that is completely by design.

When I was pregnant with Kaylin, I ran into a much-admired gal from church who was with her 15 year old daughter. Everyone gives advice when you're pregnant, but hers stuck with me.

She suggested that mothers can manipulate their kids into being best friends. From day 1, she did that with her kids and at 15 and 16 years old, they actually were best friends. I turned to her daughter, a little surprised, and said, "Really?" She looked sad and said, "Absolutely. My brother is spending a month in London right now and I miss him like crazy. I can't wait for him to come home!!"

I loved that idea. I want our family to be a tight unit. The kids can fight, disagree, get on each other's nerves, but at the end of the day, I want them to have each other's backs. So often, parents unknowingly pin their kids against each other.

So very early on, I started in with the brainwashing. "You can't hit your sister, she's your best friend!" "Remember to share your book with him...he's your best friend." I say that often and it seems to be playing out! (for now, anyway...) I intentionally make sure they show the other love, respect and kindness.

I recently gave up on the idea of the kids successfully sleeping in the same room together. It's worked a few times, but they just have so much fun together, chatting, whispering and giggling, that they fall asleep really late and everyone pays the price the next day. So last week was it...no more slumber parties for a while. They just can't handle it.

And when I was looking at the pictures in my scrapbook last night, I realized that I should be thrilled that they are so close, even if it means that they're so excited to be in the same room that it takes them hours to fall asleep.

The icing on the cake was this morning...they were playing in Ryan's room and Ryan came running out to tell me, "Kaylin just said, 'Ryan, I love you SOOOOOOOO much!'" (that's her new thing...saying how much she loves everyone and kissing people on the arm all the time) I said, "Wow, buddy! What did you say back?" His face dropped and he raced back to his room and I heard him say, "I love you, too!" He was so excited that she said something sweet to him that the first thing he wanted to do was share the good news, and in the meantime he left her hangin' with no response!

My heart is full.