Families and Relationships

This is part two of my post from yesterday.

I left off describing how we are slowly realizing that with the way the hub's job is, our most important priority is our family of 4. I'm sure some of you read my post and thought I sounded like a total B. I mean who doesn't want to make time for their parent's and so forth. That is not what I'm saying at all. My point is only that where once M's vacation time consisted of us going home to visit our families, we now added kids to this crazy military life style. And after they spend month's of not seeing their Dad it is important that any free time he get's he spends with them. That doesn't mean our family can't come visit, or we won't go visit them. Not at all. We both grew up close to our families, spending holiday's together, celebrating bday's and having family picnincs and bbq's during the summer. We want our children to grow up with the same sort of background and we obviously want them to be close to their grandparents. But it does mean if the hubs only gets two weeks off after being gone a year and will have to spend another 6 months away at a school or for a deployment, that those 2 weeks are reserved for our immediate family.

That being said there is a flip side to it. After watching last night's episode of Married to Jonas I was reminded of the fact that one day our kids will grow up. And they will move out of our house and start new lives of their own. When Kevin Jonas was pointing out to his mom some of the things she says that hurt his wife's feeling she said something interesting. She told him that it was easy for her to be a mom to little boys. That she was good at it and loved being their mom. But that she didn't know how to be a mom to a man who know had his own priorities and family to take care of. She explained that she spent her whole life knowing that the day would come when he would leave and start his own family, but that as much as she tried to prepare her heart she wasn't there yet.

That immediately got my thinking about my kids. I can't imagine the day when Gianna isn't snuggled up next to me on the couch. Or the day that I no longer have a baby to feed or get up with at all hours of the night. It makes me happy to think of Gianna and her brother growing up and all the memories and quality time we will spend together as a family, but it also makes me sad to think that one day they will leave the house and start their own families, possibly moving far away and only seeing us once a year. And that makes me understand our parent's even more. For I can't even imagine what it's like to see your child grow up and move away, and have to stay strong and handle only seeing your baby once a year. Because I know that when my parents look at me they see a 5 year old in pigtails playing house. And I know that I will always picture Gianna as she is now, hoarding all her stuffed animals and blankets and cuddling with me on the couch. I laugh at the fact that one day M will be the overbearing dad driving his son in law crazy and I will be the crazy MIL whose remarks may or may not be rude observations of my daughter in law.

So while the hubs and I are learning how to prioritize our family, kids, and relationship with one another, we also appreciate and understand where our parent's are coming from. After all it is their upbringing that made us into the people and parent's we are today. I only hope we can live up to the example that they set!

Hope this all made sense to everyone. I am a weepy, emotional pregnant person after all and have a lot of things running through my mind. I am however looking forward to next week's episode of Married to Jonas so I can laugh and cry with them about life as a newlywed. Who am I kidding? Although 4.5 years doesn't technically make us newlyweds some days it still feels like it. I know we have a lot to learn and I look forward to doing so for the next 80 years