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Raising boys isn't . . . well, it isn't exactly easy. But it is straightforward. Expect grousing when it comes to chore time. Expect noise, dirt, underhanded pranks, bashing siblings in the ribs, and off-colour jokes. Expect a bottomless appetite, especially between the ages of 11 and 17. I remember the time I had a half of a leftover beef roast which I had calculated might be enough for a dinner for nine, barely, if I stretched things a little with potatoes and side vegetables.
Bill and Charlie carved it up, made into sandwiches and ate the entire thing. As an afternoon snack.
Girls are more of a mystery, perhaps. (And I was a girl myself; you think I would find it easier!) Ginny is just on the outskirts of the difficult years, or so I've been told by neighbours who have suffered through raising two or three female offspring. Nothing too daunting yet, really: a certain moodiness, once in a while, especially in the mornings. Occasional flashes of temper (well, all the Weasleys have that, I'll admit.) A thirst for any and all magazine articles about certain boy bands featured on the Wizarding Wireless network. I know I'll have entered the next stage when she takes to monopolising the bathroom in the mornings.
But Luna, now . . . Luna is an entire other world. I am continually surprised by what she's thinking. I don't know how much of it is due to being raised by someone as eccentric as Xenophilius (poor motherless girl!), or perhaps it is those strange books she loves to read. Or how much of it is just . . . her. She's a dreamer, that Luna. I'll catch her staring out the window, her sums forgotten on the parchment in front of her. When I ask her what in Merlin's name she was thinking about, I'll get the strangest answers! She was wondering why hinkypunks' eyes are never green. Or why vampires are so allergic to kneazles. Or how chickens get inside of chicken eggs--why don't they reproduce using seeds, like plants? Ginny laughs when she says things like that, thinking it a great joke, and Luna, fortunately, doesn't resent that. I worry a great deal about how she will do when she gets to Hogwarts, however. Even if she wears school robes like everyone else's, no one would ever mistake Luna for someone who fits in well in a crowd. Much, I think, will depend upon which House she is sorted into. I hope she manages to make at least one or two friends besides Ginny. She'll either be the class pariah, odd girl out . . . or perhaps she'll go on to make a name for herself somehow, someone who will be famous for years afterwards. I just have no idea which way it will go.
One thing I can say: she's certainly never boring!
Bill and Charlie carved it up, made into sandwiches and ate the entire thing. As an afternoon snack.
Girls are more of a mystery, perhaps. (And I was a girl myself; you think I would find it easier!) Ginny is just on the outskirts of the difficult years, or so I've been told by neighbours who have suffered through raising two or three female offspring. Nothing too daunting yet, really: a certain moodiness, once in a while, especially in the mornings. Occasional flashes of temper (well, all the Weasleys have that, I'll admit.) A thirst for any and all magazine articles about certain boy bands featured on the Wizarding Wireless network. I know I'll have entered the next stage when she takes to monopolising the bathroom in the mornings.
But Luna, now . . . Luna is an entire other world. I am continually surprised by what she's thinking. I don't know how much of it is due to being raised by someone as eccentric as Xenophilius (poor motherless girl!), or perhaps it is those strange books she loves to read. Or how much of it is just . . . her. She's a dreamer, that Luna. I'll catch her staring out the window, her sums forgotten on the parchment in front of her. When I ask her what in Merlin's name she was thinking about, I'll get the strangest answers! She was wondering why hinkypunks' eyes are never green. Or why vampires are so allergic to kneazles. Or how chickens get inside of chicken eggs--why don't they reproduce using seeds, like plants? Ginny laughs when she says things like that, thinking it a great joke, and Luna, fortunately, doesn't resent that. I worry a great deal about how she will do when she gets to Hogwarts, however. Even if she wears school robes like everyone else's, no one would ever mistake Luna for someone who fits in well in a crowd. Much, I think, will depend upon which House she is sorted into. I hope she manages to make at least one or two friends besides Ginny. She'll either be the class pariah, odd girl out . . . or perhaps she'll go on to make a name for herself somehow, someone who will be famous for years afterwards. I just have no idea which way it will go.
One thing I can say: she's certainly never boring!