Team Sibling – This Mom’s Conspiracy Theory

Today I took my dad to meet my friend’s new puppy. She mentioned that originally they considered buying both Brady and his sister. I oohed and ahhed, but my dad shook his head and said,

“If you want your puppy to follow your lead and learn how to behave, it’s best that you train him by himself. If you have more than one puppy, they key off of each other instead of you.”

Ah, yes, grasshoppa. So it is with children.

Somehow God blessed me with the most obedient little girl to ever walk the face of the earth. Perhaps this was all a trick, an elaborate ruse so that I would be fooled into having more children, but while she had more than her share of issues related to her premature birth, in general she followed our every word. So we let our guard down and bought a second puppy.

Yesterday I walked outside to check on the kids who were playing on the backyard playset. What I found was two very happy children playing nicely together. What I heard was, “Psst! Emma! Mom is here. We can’t push each other on the slide until she can’t see us anymore.” Emma nodded enthusiastically and I swear I saw a sly wink from my otherwise obedient six year old.

I’m pretty sure that my friend is happy with her decision to buy just one puppy. And we are, of course, thrilled and blessed to have both of our children. But now we’re on warning. Gone are the days of one child who bends to the will of her parents. We are now in for a lifetime of challenges from…Team Sibling.