Made for each other

If I had an iced mocha for every time someone asked me if they're twins, I'd be a very caffeinated mom.

When they're standing still, it becomes pretty obvious that Abby stands a head taller than Caleb, 17 months her junior. But most of the time they aren't standing still, so I can understand the confusion.

Because these two, it seems, are absolutely made for each other. Caleb usually wakes first in the morning, comes downstairs, sets up his trucks, then heads back upstairs to wait for Abby. He's never had much of an opportunity to play trucks all by himself, and doesn't really seem to want to. (Although the debate of whose trucks are whose is expected in any good round of truck-playing.)

Abby builds towers for him to drive under and garages for his dump truck. Caleb piles tea cups and plastic cake on the back of his tow truck and hauls them to whatever spot Abby deems appropriate for their next party.

For most of the day, they function as a unit, referring to themselves as a "we" or an "us" in their conversations.

"Let's go upstairs and play in our room!" Abby will suggest.

"We're gonna play with wooden blocks," Caleb will inform me.

The danger in this, of course, is that they've so fine-tuned their relationship that they can get into trouble twice as quickly, without the need to communicate all the minor details of how to set up a diving board on the bed using the couch cushions, or how to move the entire contents of one sibling's closet into the other's closet.

But the benefits of their friendship far outweigh the risks, and in general I find that they do each other far more good than harm. They're learning how not to tattle, and more and more I overhear them reminding each other that mommy said not to do that rather than seeking out parental intervention. They share well, for the most part, and are quick to recognize when the other is unhappy and retrieve a blanket or stuffed animal to cheer them up.

They can get on each other's nerves, to be sure, and as Abby inches closer to her fourth birthday she's desiring more and more time to herself, to play or look at books quietly in her room without her rambunctious brother glued to her hip. And I'll sometimes catch Caleb surreptitiously moving all of his trucks from the playroom into his closet to keep his sister from borrowing one. But it never lasts, and eventually I'll find them both in the same room again, Abby with her books, and Caleb with his trucks, playing separately, but needing to be closer to one another.

I really couldn't ask for more.