Mums of girls close in age, advice & tips appreciated

[YummyMummybee]

I'm soon to be a mum of 2 girls 17 months apart. I want to give dd2 all the love & attention dd1 has had until now & I'm wondering how I'll manage. As they grow older is it easier as they will both have the same interests/activities? I know there is alot of pros to having 2 children of the same gender so close in age, hopefully they will grow up to be best friends!!!

My first 2 girls were 15 months apart and to be honest it was fine, oldest loved her baby sister and I found they got along great, helped that 2dd was a bloody angel so I had plenty of time to give oldest.

They are now nearly 9 and 11 and to be honest it's harder now, they bicker and bitch at each other but the main thing is they love each other desperately and are actually very close even though very very different personality, they can't even bear to be apart at bend time and pretty much most the time share a single bed!

I went on two years later to have my 3rd girl and the worst thing was the amount if dolls in the house, I counted once and found we owned 32!!!!!

They are individuals. You will find they develop individual interests. It's really fascinating how different they can be. I had three in five years. It's noisy.

DDs are 5 and 6, 16 months apart. When DD2 was born we made a point of making a lot of fuss of DD1 as she was a bit too young to explain what was going on and we didn't want her to feel left out. It's great as they have very similar interests so choosing activities/holidays/movies they'll both enjoy has never been a problem. For a long time they pretty much shared all their toys, I don't think they even noticed but it stopped them arguing over whose was whose and if anything got broken they were never precious about it (apart from special teddies etc which are sacred, obviously). Over the past couple of years they have had more defined things but never really argue over them. I love the fact that they have each other to talk to, so if they're having meals without me and DH they're not on their own, and any classes they've ever done they mostly do together. As they get older I'm sure they'll want to do different things, and if they expressed an interest now that would be fine but while they're happy to do things together I'm gently encouraging it as DD1 can be really shy and DD2 gives her the confidence to do things, and also it saves me sitting outside 2 lots of ballet/swimming classes!

I'm also expecting that at some point they'll decide they're not friends at all (possibly when DD1 goes to secondary school?), but that's really normal and they should hopefully come through it and have each other as friends as adults. I'm close to both my sisters (I'm a twin with an 18 month older sister - my poor mum!) and so always sort of imagine the same for my girls.

Good luck!

Mine are 18 months apart.

It's great when you get them going to Rainbows, Brownies etc together!

I'm always careful dd2 has no more hand me down clothes than dd1.

Mine do fight like cat and dog at times -shared interests can also mean shared rivalries.....

At the moment DD2 still likes the idea of having clothes that belonged to someone else - they've had so many hand me downs (DD1 gets loads too off her cousin) that it's just the norm around here. I'm trying to be more discerning as they get older and DH gets a bit cross when they accidentally look like urchins.