A Milestone I Would Have Rather Avoided

Phoebe is now four months old and has changed quite a bit since birth. Her hair fell out and grew back a lighter color; when the sun shines on it, there is a hint of red (I've been trying not to get my hopes up, but I'm afraid they are). She has the cutest dimpled chin, thanks to Scott. She has been smiling a lot more and even laughed yesterday.
We still get a lot of comments from people who ask, "How old is she?" It's hard to tack an age on her because she's too small to be a four-month-old, but too bright-eyed and aware to be a two-month-old.
Bruce reached a milestone last week that I would have rather avoided altogether. He hit Phoebe.

I know siblings hit each other all the time (I do have plenty of brothers and sisters and have left a few dents in them - sorry Karyn!), but Bruce was being so good with her. I just didn't think it'd happen this soon, when she's so defenseless.

It happened on Sunday morning. I was making some phone calls and looking up phone numbers on my laptop. Scott was shaving. Bruce went from trying to get Scott's attention in the bathroom to trying to get my attention in the bedroom. It must not have been working. Phoebe was laying on the bed next to me. Bruce looked at me as I chatted on the phone, wound up and punched Phoebe in the gut while looking at me, and then started to run away when I got that crazy look in my eyes.
Amazingly, Phoebe didn't even cry. But I was furious (and that is a serious understatement). I'd just spent all night at the hospital with her for an overnight sleep test and didn't get much shut-eye myself with the nurse coming in to adjust Phoebe's electrodes occasionally. Seeing Phoebe tethered by about fifty cords made me think she was just a bit fragile. And then Bruce hit her.

I wrapped up my phone conversation in about two seconds and jumped up to grab Bruce, who had already high-tailed it to his room and was climbing into his bed. I picked him up, carried him to time-out, and gave him a solid yelling that echoed off the walls - something about "don't ever do that again" and "don't you ever hit your sister." That's about when Scott put the shaver down and rescued Bruce to a time-out chair in the bathroom. He emerged a half-hour later very apologetic and scared because - as he told Scott - "mom yelled in my ear."

This is the first time I've really raised my voice and yelled at Bruce, and the second time I can recall that I've ever yelled like that (the last time I yelled that loudly, it was at two guys who were beating each other up about 10 feet away from me, Bruce, and Bruce's friend; it's a long story, but we were trapped into watching these two guys just about kill each other). Scott has never heard me yell. He said he hopes he never hears that directed at him "because it's scary" (his words).

Beware the Mama Bear.