The evolution of tattling

This morning on the way to church my youngest daughter tattled on my oldest daughter.  At first I rolled my eyes.
Then I realized ... "wait... she's tattling!"  She's 10 years old!   Her sister will be 14 in less than two weeks!
When is tattling EVER going to stop?

Answer:  probably never.....
Here is the evolution of tattling starting from the time Maddie was born and Katie was two months shy of four years old.
Katie (3 years 10 months):  "Mommy... Maddie won't stop crying!"

Katie (4 years 1 month):  "Mommy!  Maddie pooped!"

Katie (4 years 7 months):  "Mommy!  Maddie is crawling to me and making me mess up my picture!"
"Mommy!!  She is eating my banana bread!"  (Katie finally shared her banana bread...)



Katie (5 years old):  "MOMMMMM!  Maddie woke up from a nap and has lotion ALL over her and her bed and dresser!"


Katie (5 years):  "Mommy!!!  Maddie just jumped in the bath with me!  She still has HER CLOTHES ON!!!  GET HER OUT!"

Katie (5 years 4 months):  "Mommy!!!!!  Maddie just tore my book!"  "Mommy!!  Maddie tore my homework!  What am I going to tell the teacher?"

Maddie (1 year 4 months):  "Mama.... blavle blaklerj oisd alafds"  (pointing at Katie == she was talking in complete gibberish but I could tell she was tattling)... this went on until she was three.

Maddie (3 years old):  "Mama!  Mama!  Mama!  Katie hair!"  (Katie cut the hair off on ALL of her My Little Pony horses ... and ALL of her Strawberry Shortcake dolls)
Maddie (Kindergarten):  "Momma!!  Tell Katie to stop following me at school!"
You get the idea...

One time a three year old Maddie woke up early, found her chocolate covered birthday cake that was leftover from the night before, took it DOWN from the kitchen counter, and proceeded to dig her hands in to the cake.  She was in heaven (actually, I would be too ...)  Katie comes and wakes us up and tattles. "MADDIE GOT IN THE CAKE!!!"  It was still 6:00 a.m. 

Here are some more of the tattles I've heard over the 10 years of sisterhood:
"Mom.... (so and so) didn't flush the toilet!"
"Mom!!  It's MY turn to sit in the front not HERS!"
"Mom!  She cut her dolls hair!" -- I have heard this from BOTH of my girls
"Mom!  She took her markers and wrote all over her sheets!"
"Mom!  She's wearing MY clothes!"
"Mom!!!  She's purposely ignoring me!"  (that was said this morning...)

::sigh:: 
We went from tattling about baby dolls, and tearing up books, knocking down blocks .... to tattling about clothes ... tattling about so and so and how she didn't do what I told her to do ... tattling about how yesterday the girl who sat in the front was wrong b/c it wasn't her day to sit in the front.  Finally, I am hearing tattling about clothes.  "So and so is wearing my shirt!  My boots!.."  Yes, we have now hit the stage where the girls can actually share some clothes.  It's amazing, really.  If you think about the evolution of tattling between siblings -- we've come a long way.

But one thing I know for sure... I do think deep down inside, they do love each other.  :)