Sisters by chance, roommates by force

"It's my room." I have heard that phrase about a hundred times from my sweet 2 year old in the past day and a half. We recently made the mistake, er I mean decision to put both of the girls in the same room. I have no reason to give for doing this and have wondered many times why my husband and kids felt the need to punish me this way, but I was outnumbered. We have had many nighttime wakings, very early mornings, tears and yelling when one was keeping the other up and even an arm slammed in a door at one point. Again I have no reason...But one of the strangest things was to watch as Berkley's territorial nature became threatened and to see how she has reacted. The first things was her need to shut the door at night just because Braelyn didn't want her to, and when I would go in to break up the fight, she would giggle uncontrollably under her covers while Braelyn yelled about it. Then she started locking all the doors in the house. Most of the time she would go into a room by herself and lock the door so she could be left alone, but many times she has locked the door as she was leaving the room, which stinks when you really need to use the bathroom. And a few days ago when I stepped out the front door to take the trash out, my family watched her bolt down the hall then run back. When they heard a knock they asked Berkley who was at the door. "My Mom." She had knowingly locked me out of the house! And yesterday she began to utter the phrase "My room" whenever that bedroom was mentioned. I told Brae to put her coat in her room and from across the hall I heard, "My room." Kevin mentioned that he was going to put the space heater in the girls room that night. "My room" Berkley corrected him. "Where are the scripture stories?" 'Under Brae's bed.' "In my room." We aren't even talking to her and she tells us that it is HER room. Maybe because I am an oldest child, who married an oldest child, I am not totally sensitive to the younger sibling's need for possession, but I do remember sitting at the top of the stairs watching my usually mellow and soft-spoken little sister cry and complain to my Dad, in near hysteria, that I had gone in her closet and taken her white shirt. She had cute clothes and I honestly could not understand what the big deal was, but after it went on and on (and on) I do remember thinking, "Maybe this is about more than a white shirt and perhaps I should just ask next time." Maybe this is why Berkley tucks hoards of stuffed animals in her bed, or why I find random household objects hidden in her closet. I think I have learned two important things: everybody, even 2 year olds need a little respect when it comes to their space, and always take a set of keys with me when I take the trash out. I fear I may end up on the evening news as the lady who is stuck on her front porch in her bathrobe while the firemen break into my window because my kid's won't let me back in, or that Berkley will be on that show about the people who find cats under their mountains of dirty laundry and can't get to their beds because they don't get rid of anything. "MY pile of trash!" Maybe we shouldn't have moved them in together just yet...

And now just because it is cute, I have to share the Christmas lists we made this afternoon. We are trying to keep it simple and only do 3 gifts this year so I wanted to make sure and get the right ones so I had the girls sit down with me and write out what they wanted. I wrote word for word what they told me, and then I made Kevin do one because I have no idea what he wants, and he asked Braelyn to write his out. It might be hard to decipher from the picture but she wrote out Dear Santa, Pair Running Shoes, and the only part I had to help her with was the last 4 letters of "running." She looked at the other letters and then sounded out the parts she didn't know! Heck yea, who says they don't learn anything at preschool!

Braelyn's- She drew a pic of Santa holding her hand. Super cute!
Even after much prompting this was all Berkley would say. I guess she will be easy to please.