Their first challenge was a very active infant. Their second came five years later with one who wouldn't speak. And their third, four years later, was one who was both lactose intolerant and too picky to want to take formula, who they feared might either starve to death or run them out of their home after covering every surface in the house with... well. Shiloah Siego was that last challenge, although you'd never hear her refer to herself as such. In fact, she jokes their parents stopped having kids after her because "they know they're never going to have a better one."
Despite being the youngest of three, Shiloah spent a lot more of her time with her father than with her older sisters. This was no fault of their own, simply that there aren't many things that appeal to toddlers that also hold the interest of people nine and four years their seniors. By six she was insisting she "was a big girl too." and tried her best to follow her sisters out the door when they left. But she was always caught and brought back to the house, where she'd sit and mope. Having seen quite enough of his youngest daughter getting her feelings hurt, Vinny began trying his best to distract Shiloah anytime her sisters went somewhere without her. He started giving her guitar lessons, and soon she was so wrapped up she hardly even noticed when her sisters left, just thrilled to be getting exclusive time with their dad.
After only a couple of weeks she started giving "concerts" for anyone who was home. Terrible, too loud, wrong note concerts, but concerts all the same. Her family humored her, and even better- they helped her. Every concert ended with one or all giving tips and pointers, trying to make her better. Or maybe they were just trying to save their own ears, but either way they got her to improve. It was in these sessions she really began feeling close to her older sisters, and as such tried to get them to happen more and more often, sometimes to the point of annoyance. She bugged Izzy to teach her songs way above her skill set, and bothered Ari to recreate her piano lessons once she was home. Most of the time her sisters were happy to oblige, but Shiloah didn't always make it easy for them. She had a bad habit of getting easily frustrated when she couldn't do something they could, even though they'd had more time to practice than she had. And worse wouldn't acknowledge it was her lack of knowledge and practice, and instead tried to place the blame on them being poor teachers before storming out. It wasn't until she was a pre-teen and enrolled in classes with teachers that she realized they hadn't been the problem. She finally realized she had to work to be as good as her sisters, so work she did.
Something else she worked hard for, oddly enough, was a Miss Teen California title. It started with a dare from a friend after a conversation about how beauty contestants were vapid and that "any idiot could win." Never one to back down from a dare, she approached her mother that very evening to request pageant training. In retrospect, Hannah might have been a little horrified at the sudden interest in pageants, but she'd made a promise to herself many years before. Anything her children wanted, she'd give her full support, even if she didn't quite understand it. Shiloah threw herself into training so hard even the friend who had issued the dare told her she'd done enough, but she wouldn't be swayed. The dare was to win. After two failed attempts, the third was the charm and she took home the title at seventeen. The whole thing was a real Miss Congeniality moment. She'd gone in to prove the girls were dumb and their interests were dumb too, but left the experience being more "girl power" and defensive for other ladies than ever before. She completed her appearance requirements for winning, but was thankful to have an excuse to never compete again after losing Miss Teen USA. Ari had come home, and she wanted to start a band. The rest, as they say, is history.
