Where's the Sugar?

"Sugar and Spice and Everything Nice. That's what little girls are made of."

Or so they say. I think someone put in a little extra spice and skimped on the sugar when mixing up Alora. Oh, don't get me wrong. She can be the sweetest little girl in the world...as long as she's getting exactly what she wants the second she wants it.

I think the thing that surprises me the most is the jealousy though. While pregnant I worried that Corbin would be jealous of the new baby. No worries there. He is the most caring big brother in the history of big brothers. Well, most of the time. Not when slamming his sister's hand in the door to try to keep her out of his room. But really, he loves her so much and knows we have plenty of love for both of them so he never acts jealous of her.

Someone forgot to give this memo to Alora. Not once when I was pregnant did I think "What if the new baby is jealous of Corbin?" I just assumed that since she'd be growing up with a big brother that sharing would come along with the second child role. Not so. In her mind it's Alora against the world and she's determined to win.

Don't be fooled by those innocent eyes and that sweet little smile. Beneath that cute little girl exterior lies the heart of a tiger going in for the kill. Last weekend Corbin took some toy Alora wanted. She threw a little fit and then appeared to get over it. Really she waited a few minutes until he was unsuspecting and then put a metal Matchbox car in a plastic bag and started wailing on him with it while laughing like a mad woman. I kid you not. Poor Corbin didn't know what hit him. We did manage to pry it away from her but a few minutes later she skipped the bag and just started throwing the cars at him instead.

And it's not just toys. She thinks everyone in our family belongs to her and only her. I should have seen this coming about a year ago when she was just learning to walk and shoved a little girl in Corbin's class away from him because she didn't want the girl to hug him. Things have gone downhill in that department since then. If she sees Corbin on my lap, even if she had no interest in me 2 minutes before that, she will come running across the room crying and screaming and try her hardest to knock him off my lap. If she's trying to cuddle with Daddy and me or Corbin tries to get in on the hugging action it goes over about the same way.

This all leads up to my very rude awakening in the middle of the night last night. Alora still sleeps with us all night every night. She nurses to sleep but outside of that rarely has any interest in actually cuddling either of us while sleeping. Corbin on the other hand sleeps most nights in his room but occasionally comes over to our room in the middle of the night because he's a very cuddly boy. Last night was one of these nights. First he came over saying he was cold. Pat took him back to his room and gave him extra blankets (he already had 3 on, the child has no internal heat source at.all). A few minutes later though he was back saying he was having a bad dream. I could see this wasn't going to end so I had him climb in bed on the other side of me.

 I cuddled up with him and fell into a deep peaceful sleep....until Alora woke up to nurse an hour or so later. She gets up, saw me cuddling with Corbin and grabs a fist full of my hair right by the roots and yanks as hard as her little body will let her pull. I wake up in pain and looking into the glaring face of an angry toddler. She leaned over me, gave Corbin a little shove and then gave me a look that could only mean "What the hell do you think you're doing?" Oh my. For the rest of the night every time she woke up she'd try to get over to the side of me Corbin was on and push him away until he finally gave up and moved away from me.

I used to worry about how the boys would treat her when Alora starts dating as a teenager. Now I kind of feel for the poor sap she lays her claws into someday. LOL!