They unfortunately will do some of this (not to quite the extent) when with each other in public. I hesitate to send them to someone else's house together (they have some friends where this makes sense because the friends have a "matched pair" of sibs), which is too bad. I don't want another parent to have to referee this.
I definitely agree that they are allowed to have their own interests and not be together all the time. As I say...I think some of this may be related to DD pulling away as a natural consequence of her age. She is always allowed to decline him if he wants to play and their rooms are sacrosanct--if they want to be alone in there, I protect that space. DD just requested a lock for her door and I plan to get her one, although it makes me a little apprehensive. However...both are extroverts. So they have a tendency to drift into community space and interact even when I really encourage them to have down time/alone time. Also, though they are 4 years apart and different genders, DS is mature for age, DD is young for age, and nobody is very gender-typed here. They still have common ground, though it's diminishing. I admit, I'm sad about it. But I also recognize it as appropriate and inevitable.
