My good friend Ben has a 13-month-old son, Luke. He and his wife, Amy, and 5-year-old step daughter Anna live in Wilmington. This year Ben is a stay-at-home dad while his wife teaches middle school. Last week Dean and I went down to stay with them for a few days and see how other at-home parents do it. We had a really great time just sitting around and watching the boys play, seeing how an older siblings interacts with them, watching another couple tackle the joys and hardships of marriage, one parents staying home, and all that is involved in parenting. Truely a wonderful time.
One thing that surprised and frustrated me was Dean's odd behavior with Luke. Let me set the stage but saying that Luke is an incredibly gentle, quiet baby. He is obviously used to being man-handled and rough-housed with, and can hold his own. He would sit quietly for hours just babbling and playing in his own little world. Dean, on the other hand, was quite disurbed by his presence. But not all the time. That was the weird thing. They would be playing just fine together, Luke would say some nonsense word (notice I said "say" not "shout") and Dean would just start bawling. Then 2 seconds later he'd be back to playing. This was the worst at meal times. We'd strap the two little guys in, and the back and forth babbling then crying would begin. I have no idea what caused this behavior. Dean has been around plenty of kids and never reacted this way. I can understand the crying while playing thing. He's so used to it just being the 2 of us all day and him being the one to make most of the noise. But why so bad during meal time?
Other than that the trip was wonderful. Watching Anna and the boys made me eager to have a second. It was so great to watch how much she loves her brother and how, even though they are more than 4 years apart, she really enjoys playing with him. She pulled the boys around in the walker wagon, picked them up and carried them around like humongous baby dolls, and insisted that the kids all sit on the floor to eat meals together.
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