How old for a sibling to carry a baby?

[camprunner]

I have an 8 year old and a 5 year old. Eight year old is very careful and responsible and the five year old is...well finding the words to decribe someone so sweet and wild all in one are hard :)  I am due in May. Both girls keep asking  if they will be able to carry the baby around.  I keep telling them "No, that is Mommy's job."  In reality, at what age would you trust an older sibling to carry the baby?

[Knitting Mama]

 I have an 11 year old niece, a 7 year old niece and nephew and a 5 year old nephew. I don't let any of them carry my baby around; however I do let them sit and hold her, as long as they sit in a chair with arms so their arms don't have to bear all the weight. It works pretty well as a substitution for carrying the baby. I probably would have been ok with the 11 year old doing it except that she's not a very responsible girl.

[greenemami]

Depends on their maturity level, but for a newborn, i would say in the 12-13 range.  Dsd was almost 9 when ds was born and I did not let her carry him around.  Dd (3.5) kind of drags him around now (he's 9 months) but he's not too far off the ground and is pretty sturdy so I dont' worry as much, lol.  They were both allowed to hold him on their laps while sitting.

[MJB]

My boys are the same ages and I let them carry my 5 mo. old around. When she was a newborn I only let my oldest carry her anywhere. When my second was a baby I let my then-3yo carry him places (like from one room to the next) but I definitely wouldn't have let my middle son carry a baby around at 3. My 8yo is awesome at walking around and bouncing the baby when she is fussy.

[tzs]

no siblings here but i let the 8 year old daughter of close friends carry dd around once she became fairly stable...holding her head, bigger, not so tiny-scary. they just moved but she was the best "babysitter!" she also was very mature and "motherly." my 8 year-old niece also got to carry her but with less freedom since she would get more easily distracted.

the 8 year-old's 6 yo brother could move her while i was there otherwise it was holding her while seated. 

[elmh23]

My dd just turned 6 and the baby is almost 10 months old.  She's been able to carry him since he started crawling (at 6ish months.)  I figured then he was stable enough, she doesn't hold him long (usually just to get him out of something or hold him while I chase down my 3-year-old and I can't put him on the ground.)

I let my nephew carry around dd when she was a noob.  He would have been 11ish.  He was great with her actually!

[Plummeting]

I let my 6yo start carrying the baby as soon as the baby was able to hold her head up, as in totally stable neck, not just for a few seconds. It's not like she's carrying her on long walks or whatever - just to move her if she needs to be away from something or to take her from one room to another. Really, in non-industrial societies this is pretty normal. (Not that I think whatever happens in an undeveloped part of the world is automatically better, but I just don't believe children in America are that much less strong and/or coordinated. lol)

[ProtoLawyer]

My then-7-year-old stepdaughter carried her brother just a little, with very close supervision, in the hospital, when he was 2 days old. She didn't want to do it after that--she thought he was too fragile.

Now, she loves to carry him (for short periods--he's gigantic), but he's sturdy and she's strong.