Easter One: Styles of Play

I've just had five days off over Easter and didn't get around to blogging.  Certainly not because of a lack of Emberisms though, I can assure you!

One of my good friends, who has a little girl 6 weeks older than Em, came down to stay on Saturday night.  We'll call them the A Team :).  Little A and Ember have always been pretty similar in terms of their development - height, mobility, language etc - but it is now becoming obvious that they are very different in the way that they play, and this caused some very interesting conflicts.  Little A is very physical and likes to run, jump, slide, roll, etc, particularly on the beach, while Em is more of an imaginative/dramatic player.  An example - we were on the beach and Little A was throwing herself around in the sand as usual, while Em was demanding to be carried because "the sea is chasing me".  Em and I dug a hole and then Em started jumping over it, adding the incentive that there were crocodiles in the hole.  She was doing very calculated big jumps to make sure she cleared the hole and kept away from the crocodiles.  Little A on the other hand was throwing herself with abandon, in, on and over the hole.  Em was getting quite upset as Little A was getting eaten by the crocodiles!

I'm sure that as they get older and more able to accommodate they will play well together again.  But for now, tears and tantrums were the general result.  Although they did manage to share a (very small) bath with no physical violence!