Lillian wasn’t the most planned baby in the world, but when we found out she would be the newest McDermott and a girl, we were pretty excited. We said really stupid things like:

“They’ll be best friends!”

“They’ll play together and leave us alone.”

“We’ll never have to play babies again!”

Granted, Gabby hardly had a personality by the time we were expecting Lilly, but we couldn’t have been more wrong about their relationship so far. At four, Gabby is very imaginative and creative and OMG the most particular (read: OCD) kid on the planet. She is a stickler for rules and if you cross her, she will not only remember it forever, but she will remind you of how you wronged her for eternity. 

Lilly, on the other hand, is much more free-spirited. She bounces from one activity to another. She wants to do everything Gabby does, only she doesn’t want to hear about all the rules and intricacies of the game. She just wants to play. 

Therefore, as you can imagine, their sister-time goes something like this:

G: Lilly, come into my clubhouse (her bed)

L: OK!

G: NO! You have to wait until I set it up!

L: (Waiting to climb the ladder impatiently because she is two)

G: I’m not ready!

Me: You are torturing her. Hurry up and let her up there. 

G: Fine. Climb up and then balance (along the edge of the top bunk) and sit over here. 

L: OK

Me: Noooooo. Climb up and crawl over there. 

*1,000 minutes pass and Lilly is up in Gabby’s bed*

<Gabby screaming>

Me: What happened?

G: She’s breaking the rules!!!

Me: How?

G: We got into my sleeping bag to go to sleep and she is pushing me and taking up all the space and she won’t lay DOWN!

So, no. They don’t play together. It would be super easy for us to separate them and not even let them play together, but we do because we want them to learn how to get along. I just hope there is a day when I’m not forced to eat their fake cooking because they are feeding it to each other.