"Sisters" – Baby Shower Speech – Part 2

This is the 2nd part of a speech my sister said at my baby shower. If you didn’t read Part One, it would make more sense if you read it first.
The years passed and I fell pregnant with my second but still no joy of babies for my sister.  I was so sure this baby would be another girl because my sister had always wanted a boy first and surely she would produce the first grandson/nephew.  To my surprise our little boy was born and I beat my sister to producing the first grandson as well.  Out of deference to my sister we did not use my Dad’s name, because we knew she wanted to use it as a 2nd name if she had a boy.

{Small side note from Caitlin: In the end, we didn’t use Dad’s first name, but rather his 2nd name for Toddler T’s middle name. And we didn’t use it for J Boy because we realised there was a tradition in the Accountant’s family of naming first born son’s after their father. So in the end, Katrina was able to use Dad’s name for the middle name of her fifth child.}

I remember crying my own tears over this terrible road of infertility my sister was experiencing.  Suddenly people started to think I was the older sister as I had the kids and she was still childless.  It just didn’t seem like a victory having people think I was the oldest anymore.
Eventually my sister and her husband gave up on their desire to fall pregnant and moved over to England to pursue travel and career.  After 6 months over there I can still remember the phone call from my sister – she was pregnant at last!  We were all so excited.  A few months later I found out I was pregnant with my 3rd child and it was nice to experience pregnancy with my sister.  Especially considering my other two pregnancy’s I couldn’t really share with her because of the emotions of pain and hurt that my pregnancy’s evoked on her
She had a boy – I had a girl – A cousin for my kids at last!  Her little boy and my daughter are the best of friends (and foes) even now as two little 4 year olds going to kindy together.

Katrina with J Boy and his Pocket Rocket cousin as babies

The years continued to pass and soon I was in hospital having my 4th child and on the very same day my sister was a few doors up in the hospital going through the IVF procedure in the hope to have a sibling for J Boy.  9 months later my second nephew arrived!

When I fell pregnant with my 5th child
People started to marvel…
“I don’t know how you do it!” they would say.  I would always look them in the eye and tell them that being a mum was the best job in the world and I don’t have 5 babies.  I have all different ages and really it is quite manageable!  You see I have  9, 6, 4, 2 year olds and a baby,
They are all different ages and stages…
My sister and her husband started to tease us…  They have never been keen on vans and they would giggle at us and say WE WILL NEVER BUY A VAN>
To tease them back I taught my nephews to love driving with us in the tarago and I even taught them to say Tarago amongst their first words dad, mum, bub, twargo!
We all seemed to settle in to life knowing that I would have the larger family full of kids and my sister would have the nice neat smaller family. 
After another round of IVF in hope for their final child – hopefully even a little girl and some disappointments along the way February this year my sister finally had success – she was pregnant again!  The big surprise was that this time there was not one but two babies!  How exciting twins!
Another early scan brought the biggest surprise of all….
Not one, not two but 3 little babies inside.  (2 identical and 1 fraternal!)   My sister was having triplets.
After all those years of teasing and vowing to never own a van, after all those years of me being the one with the most kids, after all those years of infertility and pain….
I can now say with a giggle and a grin….
How do you do it with 5 children – 5 years and under?
I did 5 one at a time and had a chance to adapt with each new addition…
I have one child for every age group….
After all those years of competing, teasing and bickering I can now most sincerely say….
You are a legend sister dear!  I say it with a giggle and a good luck too….
Sister you have won!

{Another side note from Caitlin: The Accountant is still resistant to becoming a van owner. Despite the fact that we do not have room to put a pram inside our current 7 seater car that we had bought when we thought we were having twins!}

My sister and my best friend.
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"Sisters" – A Baby Shower Speech – Part One

I had a baby shower recently. My sister did a really lovely speech during it that I thought I would share. Here is part one.
My sister with Toddler T when he was a wee one.
Sisters!
Having a sister is like having a best friend you can’t get rid of.  You know whatever you do, they’ll still be there.  ~Amy Li
Hi I’m Katrina Caitlin’s oldest sister!!!!
Well at least I always thought I should have been the oldest sister.
I know my older sister loves me because she gives me all her old clothes and has to go out and buy new ones.  ~Author unknown
Let me tell you about my oldest sister Caitlin. She was always getting in the way, taking some of the attention. Bossing me around.
Yes, admittedly she taught me lots of useful life skills.
Like how to hold the guinea pigs
Like blowing bubbles in my drink
Writing on walls
Picking all Dad’s carrots out of the vegie patch!
And climbing the Cupboard that held the Christmas presents.
More than Santa Claus, your sister knows when you’ve been bad and good.  ~Linda Sunshine
The Christmas Present Cupboard wasn’t all she snooped in.  She was always reading my diary and would even write a message back at me in my diary starting an argument – in my very own diary!
Things didn’t always go to plan.
I still remember the day that she was helping me escape from the cot and she tipped the whole thing over on top of us both.
The last I remember was waking up to an ambulance officer standing over me and then I had to get my chin stitched up.  Apparently she knocked herself out too!  Mum wasn’t too impressed.
If you don’t understand how a woman could both love her sister dearly and want to wring her neck at the same time, then you were probably an only child.  ~Linda Sunshine
Alas the years of fun and games began.
We were the best of friends and the best of foes all at the same time.
When it suited us we got on very well.  But truth is it just didn’t suit us all the time!
Dad used to say, you two need to learn to get on.  Your sister will be the best friend you will ever have!
I remember she used to get so jealous of me some days.  Why does Katrina get to go to bed at the same time as me or why does Katrina get this or that too….
It was always easy to get a bite out of her on these days!
The years seemed to fly by so quickly and soon we were teenagers.
My sister used to hate me coming up to her in high-school and talking to her when she was with her friends.  So much so I used to seek her out – after all aren’t we meant to be best friends for life?  Well so Dad says anyway.
She used to pretend she didn’t know me on the school bus and I used to annoy her by talking to all her friends!
We attended youth group together and some days we got on really well and other days I used to annoy and embarrass her.  We seemed to be always competing with each other. 
Sisters is probably the most competitive relationship within the family, but once the sisters are grown, it becomes the strongest relationship.  ~Margaret Mead
In fact our whole life seemed to be competitive…
She learnt to ride her push bike – so I got Dad to take my training wheels off and took off.
She finally got her driver’s licence after a delayed start, a couple of failed tests and being a very nervous driver.  And so it happened that the government changed the law and the day I turned 16 ½. I went straight in and got my learners and licence 6 months later.  Now we had to share the car!
Boys – she got a boyfriend and suddenly a very nice young man begins to take me out as well!
You guessed it.  The Weddings came.  She was married in January 1998 and I was married in September the same year.  ( I wasn’t allowed to marry a day sooner either because my parents made me wait to give Caitlin a chance – not to mention give their bank balance a chance.)
This is when Dad’s prophesy actually started to eventuate.  We enjoyed a friendship   once we were married.
After a few years of married bliss my sister began to desire to start a family.
Then suddenly out of the blue the shock announcement happens!
I was expecting my first baby….
But it was now apparent the “Pain of infertility” was my sister and her husband allotment. That was  followed by the pain of a miscarriage.  My preganancy only inflicted more hurt on my sister and only emphasised the pain she was feeling.  It didn’t help that she miscarried twice during my pregnancy with my first born.  Suddenly all the years of competing and sibling rivalry were not important, suddenly I wished that my sister could experience the same joy as me.  I think this is the one area that we were never competing yet somehow, strangely it seemed like I was the winner and she was the loser.
At first my sister didn’t know how she could love my child but once my little girl Emily was born neither of us can imagine how she couldn’t love her little niece.

Keep reading for Part 2

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