Lullabies

Jeremy and I have been watching Grace and Emmy learn to love each other. It’s so comical and sweet and endearing. They shriek with joy at each other morning, noon, and night. I had to go back to having them nap separately because they would just stand in their cribs and laugh at each other until they got cranky and overtired and started screaming. If either one is hurt and cries, the other one usually starts crying, too.

The other night in the car, after we’d stayed at the restaurant a little too long, Emmy was working herself up to a rage fit on the way back to the hotel. Grace leaned over, stretched out her hand, and said, “Hey hey hey,” the same way I do when Emmy falls and bumps her head, and I’m bending down to pick her up.

I’ve made up bedtime songs for both girls. Not really intentionally. They just sort of happened. Neither one is sophisticated or even terribly original, but each daughter has one of her own. Grace’s is markedly more interesting and melodic. If we have a child or two more, the last one will be stuck with grunts and jazz hands.

But it goes like this: “Emmeline, Emmeline, I love you, Emmeline, you’re so sweet, Emmeline, I love you.”

Tonight Emmy was fighting sleep harder than usual. There was more fussing after we put her down than there has been in a while (they mostly just laugh until they pass out an hour or so later). Jeremy came running into our room a few minutes ago and gestured me over. We leaned our ears against the door to the girls’ room to hear Grace singing (tunelessly), “Emmeline, you’re so sweet, Emmeline, Emmeline, you’re so sweet, Emeline, love you, you’re so sweet, Emmeline,” over and over. She kept it up for at least twenty minutes, maybe half an hour.

They say kids don’t learn things like (real, unselfish) love and empathy until they’re much older, but I don’t buy it. These two are nuts about each other.

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January 14, 2011

This made my heart grow two sizes. We did similar things. The boys songs are long gone (though I have hope that some day, some weird aural prompt might bring them all streaming back), but we still sing the one for K. Porgy and Bess, for babies: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OttqxEVAp-M Change the “Clara, Clara” to “Kemma, Kemma” Kemma, Kemma, don’t you be downhearted, Kemma,Kemma, don’t you be sad and lonesome… Jesus is walking on the water… Rise up and follow Him home…

January 14, 2011

Oh, and the boys both sing it to her still.

January 14, 2011

That is so, so sweet! 🙂

January 14, 2011

i don’t believe that either. my sister and i are “irish twins” and when she was learning to walk, i used to push her down. when they asked why, i told them i didn’t want her to fall and get hurt and that i was worried about her. lol – noah p.s. that is ridiculously cute!

January 14, 2011

That was the sweetest thing I’ve heard all week! Thanks for sharing that story.

January 15, 2011

Aww that’s so sweet. We made up songs for Madelyn but I don’t know if I can remember them now. I generally resorted to other songs. I often sang “Strong Tower” b/c Maddie has a plague her Auntie made her with her name meaning “strong tower” and the verse about God being a strong tower. But mostly I sing Amazing Grace to her.

January 15, 2011

That is so sweet. I want to squish them both into a hug.

January 15, 2011

This is the sweetest thing I’ve read in forty forevers. <3 <3 <3

January 15, 2011

So so sweet! It amazes me how siblings can connect to each other. My oldest isn’t very nurturing at almost 13 but my other two-5 and 2 are so incredibly loving towards each other. They never fight and are always loving on each other with hugs and kisses and if one is sad the other is right there to comfort without any question. :o) Love it!

January 15, 2011

That is the cutest thing EVER. (:

January 15, 2011

This just made me smile and my heart glad. Thank you for sharing it!

January 17, 2011

Oh my, thank you for your timing in posting this one. I was just today freaking out about how Linnaea is going to hate having a little sister and it is very cruel of us to do this to her. Reading this makes me feel all better. xoxo

January 17, 2011
January 18, 2011

That is so sweet!

January 19, 2011

Aw! I think I just got a sugar high from this. 🙂

January 19, 2011

aha, that’s sweet. but wait until the teenage years when they’re b1tching incessantly at one another and stealing each other’s hair straighteners and boyfriends.