With all the craziness that is my life, I have to take a step back sometimes and realize how lucky I am the oldest of 8 children and I love it! I do have a couple of siblings that currently don’t live locally, the rest of us get together quite often for dinner, dessert or just playing around.

I am lucky that my children love their grandparents more than they love me. I think it is awesome that my littlest brother picks me up and cracks my back every time I see him. I love that my brothers come by for lunch a couple of times a week and bring their girlfriends by to say hi as well. My dad calls me a couple of times a week to just chat and gives me that best hugs imaginable. My mom makes everyone feel welcome and makes a special effort to make sure that everyone is taken care of.

It is great that when we go out with my family, I can sit back and relax a bit because there are so many people there to play with my kids. I have wonderful brothers that will spend hours playing “hospital” with Kyra, jumping on the tramp with Kaeson and lifting Toad up to make a basket.

Although no family is exactly perfect, I would say that mine is pretty darn close. Yesterday we went to the park as a family. We all had lunch, exchanged war stories (my brother’s girlfriend has the best stories that I have ever heard,) played ball, rolled down the hill and ended up throwing pine cones at each other. Even my brother that was dying in pain from a kidney stone made the best of it and was laughing with the rest of us! I just gotta love my family!