Big brother

Logan was absolutely not amused when we brought Luke home. Especially when he realized that this wasn't a temporary thing.

Once that settled in, he showed some typical kid reactions: sucking his thumb more and carrying his blanket (a Taggies square, which we call Blankie. Very original, I know.) I don't fight it, because it gives him comfort. We just bought two additional ones so we can wash them without him freaking out and trying to get into the washing machine.

He carries that thing everywhere now. He's often chewing on it, so it gets filthy pretty quickly, particularly as it doesn't bother him to chew on it in the middle of meals, when he very often has food smeared all over his face anyway. As noted, though, we've thought ahead and have back ups.

Nearly four months after Luke's arrival, he's come around...a bit. He will put his fist, usually very gently, on Luke and look at us for approval. We'll say, "What a good big brother you are!" and he happily walks away. So, he isn't really doing it out of love for Luke but praise from us. Whatever. As long as he isn't attacking Luke, we'll take it.

His current favorite thing to do is come and stand by me or on my legs when I'm nursing Luke, so he can watch videos of himself. He's fascinated by these videos, and he starts to act out his own actions in them (because, as anybody with kids knows, watching something ad infinitum is a childhood specialty. He knows all of these videos second by second at this point.)

It's a nice way to include him in the nursing, because when Luke first arrived, and I was nursing, Logan would very often come up to me, take my hand and try to pull me up to go and do something with him. This way, he's pretty content when I'm nursing, and I get to spend time with both of my boys. I miss them terribly when I'm at work each day, and I rush home as soon as my day is done.

We've just started construction, two weeks ago, on an addition for the house, which will provide us a fifth bedroom, and expand the downstairs bedroom. Hopefully, it'll be done in October or so, so Luke can move out of our room. We'll have to see where we shuffle the boys around, although ultimately, our goal is to have them in the same room. At least for a few years, until they demand their own spaces.

Finally, Logan has been attending Speech Therapy for the past month or so. He's made some nice improvements recently, mainly with sign language, not so much speech. But that's the stepping stone to speech, so this is a great thing. I think Luke will be helpful for this as well, particularly once he starts talking himself.

Hopefully they won't be too competitive with each other...but I'm guessing there will be times of great conflict.  And fights. And bruises. And broken things.

Boys.