My DC cannot play nicely together!

[weakestlink]

It's driving me mad!

I have 2 DS aged 5 and 2 and they are a total nightmare together.

The 5yr old winds up the 2yr old and teaches him annoying habits.

The 2yr old cannot share with the 5yr old and basically wants whatever he is playing with or destroys his play / lego etc.

They chase each other around in a whirlwind of destruction and it usually ends in tears as one or other falls over or bashes themselves on the coffee table / trips on a toy etc.

They often have to sit on the time out step to calm down or until they can share whatever is being argued over. Usually the one not on time out wants to sit next to the one supposed to be on time out so this makes it fairly pointless.

I sometimes send the older one upstairs to calm down if they are running riot but not ideal as cannot supervise him.

Please tell me this is normal and will pass...?

I might not make it through the summer hols if not!

Tips & ideas welcome!!!!

I should add that individually they are lovely and very calm... Play nicely without input from me and can share with other children. Just not each other

Can you sit the older one up to the table occasionally with an activity like the Lego/ jigsaw so the smaller one can't reach?

Mine won't play nicely together either.
One is nearly 17 and the other is 13

Drives me nuts!

Advice. Unless they are nearly killing each other or causing injury ...ignore.
They won't listen to you anyway so you may as well save your breath.

Unfortunately the smaller one is massive / monkey like and can climb everywhere!

flipchart you are right - they don't listen and they can go from laughing hysterically wrestling on the floor to tears when it goes to far. Maybe I should just let them get on with it!
Physically they are fairly even as my 5yr old is only just 5 and small and my 2yr old is 2.5 and huge.

2 and 4 here. The only way we have found to keep both happy is about a dozen balls in the garden, so there is always the size they want to play with!

We have also had some success with parallel play. So we split the lego into 2 piles, and set them both off building. I've also become a wizz at mating 2 identical train tracks from the bits of one train track!

I am glad it's not just me.

I know it's terrible but I am about to organise summer holiday clubs for them both on alternate days... So 2yr old goes Tue & Thu and 5yr old goes Mon & Wed! Fridays I will take them out which I usually find ok as they are quite well behaved out of the house.

My Dd's 2 & 4 are the same. I am always trying to keep the peace between them. They are both good for a little while and eventually turns into drama. As you say they are both good as gold on their own