Pulling Hair

The past week has included a lot of picture-taking that just could not make it to this blog. One of the most exciting events, on April 20th, was the arrival of Kennedy Emma. Perhaps the most beautiful baby girl possible! As her proud doctor, I have seen her many times this week, including some late-night hospital and home visits to help Brandy with the standard breastfeeding challenges.

Tomorrow is Kennedy's first official photo-shoot, and my first official newborn photo-shoot. I have so many ideas, props, and several hours to create photos that suit such a pretty girl.

Also this past week, my beautiful girls have been getting into each other's hair... literally! The sibling fighting has commenced, with Mel usually being the one to "throw the first punch." Mel loves to scream super loud, whenever anything does not go her way. She is also fascinated by Syd's hair, grabbing it and pulling it out any chance she has. Poor Syd. I had a talk with Syd yesterday morning and told her to just say "no" firmly when Mel does that. About five minutes later, I overheard Syd say "NO!" I looked over and saw Mel with her fingers forcefully intertwined in Syd's hair. Syd's "no" did nothing to stop Mel. But my "NO!!!" caused Mel to release and look away from my disapproving gaze.

Ironically, yesterday I spent my morning talking to mothers at my church about their Pediatric questions, including how to stop a toddler from pulling her sister's hair. There is no quick fix, but for Syd's sake I hope that Mel gets this out of her system quick.

Mel has also been introduced to the concept of time-out. And as to be expected, she is not very happy when she is put into time-out. Last night she was so upset that once her 1 minute was up and I excused her from time-out, she kept sitting there screaming for another couple minutes.

Today's pictures show a different side of Syd and Mel. When asked to hug each other, they both dropped their toys and had a special moment together, with no hair-pulling.