When Hayley was born, I got to spend so much time with her. George would leave for work before 7 am and get home around 5:30 or 6 pm, which left me with full days where I could just watch her and play with her and observe her as she grew.

When Breanna was born, I didn’t have that same luxury. Hayley wasn’t in pre-school or daycare so I didn’t get to have the same constant alone time with Breanna. I still got moments here and there but it wasn’t the same because I had two people who relied on me and I was kept pretty busy – and that hasn’t changed.

On the weekend, George’s sister was out this way and Hayley left here at 12:30 on Saturday afternoon. She was whisked off to the shopping center and then back to his parents’ house for supper. I wasn’t very surprised when I got a call asking is she could sleep over so I packed an overnight bag for her and his sister picked it up. It wasn’t the first time she had spent the night there.

I missed her. I always do. But the one nice thing about it was that I got a lot of time to just hang out with my youngest daughter. She has such a funny sense of humor already and we had fun. I played the new Justin Timberlake CD (it’s really starting to grow on me, it has some pretty good songs) and she danced happily, then she kept on dancing when I switched over to the country video channel. I wish I could have gotten her on video while she was dancing wildly to Jason McCoy’s “Born Again in Dixieland”.

She enjoys playing with anything Little People-related so we played with the school bus, the ark, all the people and animals, and a house and barn set. She played her own little game where I hunch down on the floor in a ball, and she comes over and smacks me on the back. Then she pulls my head up by my ponytail and I bark at her like an angry dog; this causes her to run away laughing. Then we do it all over again and if I don’t get back into a ball fast enough, she’ll impatiently push me down.

In between that she napped quietly and then woke to play some more. Sometimes we just hung out on the floor together and relaxed.

I know it’s sort of obvious that people are different, that siblings are their own people but it’s still so strange sometimes to know that the same two people could produce two different children. They have many things in common but they are definitely each their own person and I love seeing their personalities grow.

I’m glad I got to see Breanna’s personality up close this weekend.