November 7, 2007 | Mama Smith

a tender brother moment...

Driving home from errands in the car today, the following conversation ensued as Levi began hacking wildly in the back seat…

“Levi, are you okay, buddy? Brighton, is Levi okay?”

Brighton glances over and replies enthusiastically, “Yeah! S’okay, Mama.”

“What’s he doing?”

“Choking. Levi’s choking”

Right. And to the older brother, choking classifies as “being okay”. Never depend on a toddler’s point of view.

We have had a wild week around here, with Matthew’s weekend fishing trip, another ear infection for Levi, and Brighton’s sudden possessive panic attacks in response to Levi’s new crawling abilities (aka: the ability to now threaten Brighton’s territory and toy ownership).

To Brighton, everything in our house now needs defending from the drooling, crawling terror known as Levi. “NO, Levi. MY book. MY chair. MY leaf. MAMA’S shoe. PAPA’S shirt. Stop Levi!” Poor Levi. He just sits there looking confused and defeated. Wondering if this crawling business is really worth it if he’s only confined to a one square foot radius where he’s not being yelled at by his older brother.

A little one-on-one B time while Levi sleeps seems to calm his jitters somewhat. Although he’s still testing the waters with me in a new way regardless of our buddy time. Today I went outside to find him playing with the ant trap stake we had stuck in the ground.

“Brighton, you know that’s not a toy. Please stop playing with the ant trap.”

“Okay Mama. Bye-bye. Shut door please. Bye-bye now”, shoving it back in the dirt and waving at me to head back inside.

I do so, then immediately turn around to see him pulling up the ant trap and tossing it in the air.

Oh, he has his mother’s stubborn, manipulative genes.

Thankfully, a little fresh air at the park this afternoon helped calm all our spirits and they were both conked out by 6pm without a peep. Leaving Matthew and I with our freshly baked calzones, a glass of margarita and a good movie to end the evening.

“Hmm, which one to share with Levi…how ‘bout neither“

The look of terror in Levi’s eyes as B comes tearing across the tennis court screaming, “NO, MY ball, Levi!”

“Guess, I’ll chase leaves instead…”

“I’m gonna jump. This big brother thing is just too stressful!”

Brighton’s fat, juicy caterpillar…

Unlike his father who is terrified of caterpillars, Brighton adored this little guy. Poking him and tossing him around, until he shrunk up and played dead.

Tuesday we head to Colorado to spend an early Thanksgiving with Matthew’s family and to visit friends we haven’t seen since I was 3 months pregnant with Brighton. It should be an adventure flying with two boys instead of just one. Although the last flight we took was the overnight to London last Christmas, where Brighton stayed awake a total of 25 hours. Insanity does not even begin to describe it. A 5 hour flight across a few state doesn’t sound so bad right now.