Your Request has been Denied

I look for ways to please my girls. If there is something they come to me with... something I have an ounce of control over...something I have the power to say "yes" to, I am really going to try to do that. One reason for that is it stops the "tennis match" of arguing it can lead to...and the other is, if I can't see any harm in it, I just see no reason to "veto" it. I must make it clear that I am not an overly permissive parent. No one in my life would label me that way. But it delights my heart to see my girls happy or excited about something. So this morning, it pained my heart, when I had to say "no" to Hopie, because there was no way on earth I could say "yes" to this request.

She wants me to change her birth order. You see, she is tired of being the youngest. If I have heard this once, I have heard it 1000 times. She feels that Faith gets to do everything before her. By the time she gets to do it, it is not as exciting anymore. She even brought up the "birth right" issue between Jacob and Esau. (She scored some relevance points there.) She has the smaller room of the two of them, and she feels that is not fair. And she is right! I can't argue with anything that she has said. What has pushed Hope over the edge is Faith's new "part time/part time" volunteer "job" at the library. I wracked my brain and the internet trying to come up with an idea for her as well, but honestly, who wants a 10 year old volunteering for them, no matter how responsible they are? I am having a hard time coming up with ways to encourage her out of her funk. As much as she wants me to change her birth order, I just can't.

I don't know how to make this up to her. Someone always has to be last. Someone has to be the baby of the family. I always felt like most babies coveted the role simply for the fact that by the time the baby reached puberty, the parents were too tired to parent "effectively" and let the baby get away with a lot of things the first born didn't. These words however, are begrudgingly coming from the brain of a first born.

I have petitioned my sister's help with this. She graciously wrote a letter to Hopie discussing the benefits of being the youngest. The letter made her feel special temporarily....but now she is singing the "Baby of the Family Blues" again. I honestly am stumped as in how to help her. So I am sitting here on the floor of the basement....blogging...because I am the oldest and I get to do whatever I want.