Playing together

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How old were your twins when they started consistently playing together nicely? I get that there will always be times when they don't get on but when could you leave them both in a room and trust them not to sit on each other/bite each other/pull hair/steal toys off each other?

My OP was going to be longer but I had to go break up a fight! My boys are 2 and 4 months and just manager 8 mins of drawing nicely together before there was a fight over a pen.

Mine will be 4 in september and can play together for a long while now, i would say this started around 2.10.

My girls have been pretty good from being around 2 and a half, but I still break up fights on a regular basis. As well as going through phases of not getting on, there have also been phases of being totally obsessed with eachother, but in the last year or so (they're 4 now) it's been pretty steady.

Thanks! Hopefully they will get there eventually, it's exhausting having to constantly break up fights. Sometimes I'm a bit jealous of friends with singletons who can cook a whole meal whilst their child entertains themselves. Everything takes so long here because it's always interspersed with twin supervision.

About 3. Age 1-2 was horrendous!

About 3 here too. It's a revelation the first time you realise it's been a whole half an hour since you've been called to referee and you've managed to do everything thing it used to take to all day to do in that time. It is frustrating and so exhausting until they get to that stage, but the tables will turn :-)

Mine are 2.9 and are okay. Occasionally I need to wade in and referee a round of 'my turn now' but these are helping a lot...

Unless they really hurt each other, I tried to avoid sorting out every dispute. It's kind of the same now (8.5!) I don't think they start arguing less, but you can leave them to it a bit more 3+. It is frustrating, I see my friends with their toddlers now, with none of these problems!

11 - still hoping!

Love the egg timer idea! I'm going to get some. They understand the concept of taking turns, it's just that as soon as it's one twin's turn, the other one immediately decides it's his turn. I try not to intervene all the time but it nearly always ends in biting/pushing at the moment so I can't really leave them alone for more than a few minutes. Thanks for the sympathy - it's nic to hear from others in the same position.

I gave up on sharing bought 2 of every toy. Never in different colours... Just in case.

Yes bobbinpop the whole 'own clothes, own shoes, own toys, own identity' thing goes out of the window somewhat in the pursuit of domestic harmony!

Mine were keen on different clothes, so that was never a problem (thankfully!) Always a panic when friends bought them different gifts... Which would be the one they'd both want?!

They're OK about clothes, they have definite ideas about whose clothes are whose (and tell me loudly when I get it wrong), toys though are the main source of conflict. I will definitely be getting/asking for two the same from now on. The worst problem though is that they constantly want to play rough with each other and it always ends in screaming with one twin sitting on the other. It doesn't matter how many times I separate them, they're straight back on each other like magnets!