Practicing with Mouse before baby is born.
Meeting baby Paxton for the first time. Two days before Paxton was born the hospital changed it's visitation rules excluding children from visiting because of the flu season. So Tavish didn't get to meet Paxton until the night I came home from the hospital, four days after he was born. The day after Paxton was born, we skyped from the hospital so Tavish could at least see me with the baby...we hadn't told him the baby's name until then and the first thing Tavish said was "can we call him something else?"
Our super-mom friend Jill made Tavish a big brother apron with his name on it and pockets full of things to help take care of the baby. Tavish must have carried the baby shampoo bottle around for a week. But he took his job seriously (at least initially!) and wanted to put the apron on whenever I needed his "help".
Tavish brings me the baby's bottles...he very efficiently carries some in his hoodie.
He shows us his muscles.
And shows baby Paxton the ins and outs of the playgym's toys.
When the baby fusses while we are driving in the car, Tavish puts the binky in Paxton's mouth and will sing him songs to help him calm down. For some reason though, he takes great offense at the binky that says Stud Muffin on it. He says "he is not a studmuffin!". I disagree.
Overall, he is turning out to be a pretty good big brother!
But in full disclosure mode...today he did pull Paxton's arm so hard he made him cry.
And it seems like we spend an inordinate amount of time saying "don't mess with the baby!"
But he's four, it's to be expected I guess.