By early Sunday evening, I was looking forward to Monday. The weekend wore me out. It was full of people I love, but it was also busy and exhausting. We had a birthday dinner for my mom on Friday evening, and then I went to visit my aunt on Saturday, and on Sunday my granddad and another aunt came over for dinner after they went and saw my dad's most recent play. All good things, but it made for a lot of house cleaning and meal preparing, plus a good amount of driving.
I grew up with a full house, and so it seems only natural to fill my house now. On Friday, everyone came over to my house for my mom's birthday dinner, and there are certainly a lot of us, and the numbers are growing. Over the course of the night five of my parents' six kids came over, with four significant others. There were four grandkids running around or being passed around, plus my dad before he had to leave for curtain call. By the end of summer there will be another grandbaby
Among all these people there are hurt feelings and miscommunications and messes, both physical and emotional. It's damn near impossible to not be worried about one of them at any given time. But it must be pretty obvious that I think the big family drama is worth the price I pay, otherwise, I should probably have stopped having babies a couple of kids ago.
As always, I love your photos ... And I understand about how 'full' one can feel after lots of company/visitors, delightful though it is.
ReplyDeleteAlways seeking that balance between quiet and excitement. Thanks as always Alexa for your kind words.
DeleteTotally something I've been thinking about, as Emily and I talk about the possibilities of more children in either or our futures, the thing we come back to is...it's forever, someone more to worry about, to break our hearts, to love so much so beautifully and so scarily. I know there's plenty of love to go around of course, but it's intense to basically make another person you love as much as yourself or more. Parents who have big families and seem all casual about it impress me. My dad was just telling me that he has 23 grandchildren (I have two older half sisters) and six-soon-to-be-eight great grandchildren.
ReplyDeleteThat's so awesome that your dad acts in plays. I love theater so much and often wish it were a more pervasive part of modern life.
At a certain point you wonder how much your heart can hold. 23 grandkids! And he is so involved with your kids. All the sudden being a grandparent becomes a full time job.
DeleteI love theater too, though I haven't acted since I was pregnant with Sena. I think it's a shame that it seems like only kids get to do it most the time. We're lucky to have a pretty active community theater. My dad does lots of plays (sometimes he directs) and Tom joins in from time to time.
love what you said about big-family drama. My parents both come from big families and I grew up with so many cousins and aunts and uncles and squabbles. Now my kids have no first cousins and my husband comes from a very small family. So different!
ReplyDeleteI'm excited because as big as our family is, my kids have been the only ones of their generation. My sister who lives next door is expecting a baby girl in July and I am so excited to become an aunt.
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