Stranger Danger

Transferred from my other blog: The Adventures of Sisterhood. 
First published: 3-5-12 at 7:42 PM PDT
 
I'm not qualified to assess the accuracy or precision of Kylie's StrangerMeter, or even how active it is now. When she was only a few months old, Kylie was extremely wary of strangers. I imagine any baby would be. I mean, when you're that small, and the world is that big... I'm a dedicated athlete. I'm at gymnastics practice 13 - 15 hours a week, plus six or seven competitions per year that require us to stay on the premises for sometimes up to 6 hours. Kylie loves coming to the gym to pick me up after practices. She really likes one of my teammates. A while ago, she started high five-ing all the team girls. After that, she started giving them hugs or patting them when prompted. But before she was comfortable enough with all of that, she let the teammate that she likes hold her hand and walk her to come find me at the back of the gym.

Kylie likes kids. My dad says that all little kids like other little kids. I suppose it's because the size is less intimidating. Even at 14 years old, I still prefer being around kids my size (on the short side) than towering giants, gentle ones included. This past weekend, I had a gymnastics competition. During the awards ceremony, Kylie was struggling to climb out from mommy's arms to come sit with my team and I. We finally convinced mom to let her down, and she came and sat with us. My level was called up first, so while I was on the award podium, Kylie sat in my teammate's lap. The teammate even got her to clap for me!

Obviously, in my little sister's naive baby's mind, her favorite teammate is no longer a stranger. But she waves bye bye to people she's never met. She high fives anyone who asks. If you tried to hold her, forget about it. Sit next to her in the car? Fat chance. But her StrangerMeter stops there. She's a friendly little social butterfly.

-Chichi