Moving on Up

Bud has a new car seat. Officially, a booster seat, which uses the car's shoulder harness to secure the child (instead of the more confidence-inspiring 5-point restraints of a car seat). Even though the seat is much shorter than his old one, meaning he can't see much, he looks so grown up and loves his new car seat. He had finally outgrown the other seat.

Sis, however, hasn't grown out of her old one, creating this difficult carseat tension. She is in her old one, even though we purchased the new one to install the minute she grows a couple of inches (he is taller in his back, she in her legs, so that even though they are only an inch apart, her sitting height is almost 2 1/2 inches less). She has enough issues being small, knowing she is the littlest one in her class. She even told the big girl on Halloween that she might be small but she can run fast. I don't know what it's like to have a complex about being short, but Mama does, and we're trying hard not to make her feel like she is somehow lacking, that it is her fault that she isn't big enough for a new car seat.

While they have long reached milestones at different paces--she walked first, he talked first, etc.--they are only just now aware of it and bothered by feeling behind. So, while we celebrate his new car seat, we comfort her disappointment. It's a parenting tightrope walk. I imagine it will be ever thus.