Brotherly Love

My daughter is 5 going on 15. She's into all things "grown~up". For example, Audrey bought a "priracy journal" (privacy journal, i.e., diary) with some of her Christmas money. It's very "grown~up" with a pen light and lock and key. My mom has written little love notes to her and she occasionally asks me to narrate her drawings but perhaps she ought to keep it locked and hidden away more often, as the other day I was cleaning up and found several pages ripped out and discarded on the carpet. I glanced at them to see why she would deliberately tear out pages in her precious book and this is what I found:

Entry #1:

Audrey

serelle

cheek your

panse I think

you problly

bumed you smell

Mom's translation:

Audrey

seriously

check your

pants I think

you probably

boomed you smell

("boomed" in case you were wondering is another word for "pooped" around Hosmerville, don't ask...)

The second entry was very similar to the first, but in slightly different sloppy handwriting. So I knew there must be at least 2 co~conspirators involved:

Entry#2:

Audrey you

smell like a

rutin egg

sereasly.

cheel your

panse. I think

you bumde.

I work with my son every nite doing homework and I know his writing, so I had a suspicion as to whom the author of entry #1 was. As a mother who knows who her sons "hangs" with (and also because entry #2 had capitalization and punctuation~ a dead giveaway this came from an older, more knowledgeable scholar) it wasn't too difficult to figure out his partner in crime. Sure enough, when confronted about the anonymous entries later, Austin immediately threw his cousin under the bus. And after some coaxing and prodding, eventually admitted to the other half of the "crime" himself. I actually thought the whole thing brilliant, (imagining the authors giggling to themselves as they wrote and Audrey's look of indignation as she discovered their work) but did my best to remain calm and serious as I tried to explain why that possibly wasn't the nicest thing to do. As for getting these siblings to get along and appreciate and love each other, I am at a loss. "This is all part of a normal brother/sister relationship", is what I keep telling myself. Right?