Copying

G and I are both the oldest, so we know the annoyance of having younger siblings do what we did when we were growing up.  Apparently I wasn't all that cool because my siblings didn't copy me anything close to the way that Sambo copies and idolizes his big brother.  I have no way to articulate they way that Sambo looks at Buddy.  The way he follows him all over the house.  The way he is always tagging along when they are playing at the park or riding bikes.  The way he stares at Buddy instead of the camera when they are posing for pictures, so he can make sure he's doing exactly what Buddy is doing.  (see above) They way Buddy makes a homemade card for my birthday and Sambo replicates it exactly.

 Sitting in church today. 

Today we looked over at the two of them during church.  They were dressed the same for starters:  blue shirts, khakis, and glasses.  They both had their pads of paper and pencils.  Buddy was drawing Shaun White symbols and Sambo was precisely copying him.  It was so cute.  It was just a perfect snapshot of how they are.  My heart grew in my love for them, watching Sambo look up to his brother, and watching Buddy {mostly} allow it.

Here is some of their artwork.  Buddy's on the left.  Sambo's on the right.

Here is more artwork.  Buddy's are on the ends.  Sambo copied both of these onto one drawing in the middle.

In somewhat related news.  Yesterday Buddy invented a game, complete with written rules.  The boys played this game for at least three hours yesterday.  It was so darling. 

And in completely unrelated news, G made meatloaf all by himself for dinner tonight.  He does not enjoy cooking, so I was completely shocked when he printed off a recipe for Pioneer Woman meatloaf the other day and informed me he was going to make it for dinner on Sunday.  And he didn't want any help.  Sambo did help him.  Although I had a twitch the first 10 minutes of the cooking experience, I eventually let go of the need to control/help and let him do it.  It turned out perfect.  It was delicious!  I was sincerely impressed. 

P.S.  How proud of me are you that I figured out how to do these photo collages in Picasa?  I'm extremely clueless about stuff like this, so yay for me!  First G stretches himself by following a recipe.  Then I follow a tutorial online.  All in one evening.  What is going on here?!!!!!