My darling Mopsy has decided it’s time to sort out the pecking order in our household :-(  It’s not much fun.  She’s not being awful to Cotton-tail, but she completely ignores me when I ask her to keep being gentle and occasionally hurts her.  She’s always sticking her feet in Cotton-tail’s face, or dragging her around the room, or prodding her.  It makes me crosser than anything else the children do…which is probably why she does it!  Parenting a 2.5year old is SOOOOOOO demanding!  Constantly trying to ease frustrations for them, helping them cope with meltdowns, supporting them while they try to do everything themselves and trying not to get cross when they get angry at you if you dare to try to help.  I love her to bits, and her total and utter cuteness more than makes up for the tough bits.  She has a great sense of humour, is a very kind and generous person and, most of the time, really looks out for Cotton-tail and Flopsy.  She removes things that Cotton-tail shouldn’t have (stray pieces of paper, small toys etc.) and kisses her if she gets upset.  She sings to her and if she happens to do something that makes Cotton-tail laugh, she’ll keep on doing it to please her.  She copies everything Flopsy does, to the extent of trying to say what Flopsy’s saying to us at the same time as her, resulting in a kind of mumble, while looking sideways at Flopsy and then repeating the last word of the sentence - a little echo :-)  However, she also will often snatch whatever Flopsy’s playing with, unless there is one each, just because Flopsy’s got it.  Flopsy’s so patient with her but often eventually snaps and hits her.  When I come to sort it out, she says to me “I tried to sort it out with words, Mummy, but Mopsy just hit me” - I have to stop myself laughing out loud, of course.  And when Mopsy’s in her frustrated-two-year-old mood, I just get crosser and crosser.  I try to be patient and understanding for as long as I can, but when her behaviour is upsetting one of the others I just find it so difficult to deal with.  I know all the theory.  I know what I ought to be saying and doing, but keeping my temper in check so that I actually do it and at the same time placating Flopsy or Cotton-tail (whichever one has been the brunt of Mopsy’s 2.5-year-old-ness), is so, so difficult.  This is not to say that Flopsy is perfect…far from it…but Mopsy’s the hardest work at the moment.  The other trouble is that she’s so bright for her age, and her speech is fantastic, that it’s very easy to forget how old she actually is and expect too much from her…being advanced can be a real hindrance in some ways.  Poor Mopsy…her frustrations are totally understandable, it’s not her fault, and she is a very lovely girl.  She offers other people her food, cleans up mess, cuddles people when they’re upset, sings beautiful songs, and helps build ikea furniture:

and is very, very good friends with her big sister: