Family Stories

Healthy Families are Becoming the Stuff of Fairy Tales

As you can tell from this blog, my family is really important to me.

And not only is my family important to me, but every single family is important to me. I think that the family is something I think about so much because I can see how my family has really shaped and formed who I am and what I believe.

When I was in the airport this weekend flying back to school after being with my family for Thanksgiving break, I was sitting and reading my book, and I could not help overhearing the phone conversation the young women next to me was having with what sounded like her best friend.

I tried my best to focus on what I was reading, but my attention kept going back to what she was telling her friend.

What I gathered from casually listening in, (I know, call me a creeper), is that she was flying back from seeing the man who she had just found out was her father. She told her friend that she had known this man before, and this mans father, but she had know idea that he was her dad and that his dad was her grandpa.

As she was talking on the phone she was externally processing with her friend how so many things in her life now made sense to her.

She was saying how the man who was her grandpa, (who has since passed away), would always hug her super tightly, and now she knows why.

She said that she had always felt like she did not really look like anyone in her family; but after discovering who her dad is she feels like she knows where she gets her physical characteristics.

She said that she has always had a bigger temper then the rest of her family that she did not understand, but after talking with her dad and stepmom she realized that she and her dad not only have the same way of expressing anger, but they also have many of the same mannerisms and personality traits.

She was expressing how her life makes more sense to her now.

As I was listening to her speak and have had more time to think about the conversation I overheard, I have become overwhelmed by how thankful I am for my family, and that I have always known who I belonged to and where I came from.

I have never had to wonder who I looked like or why I acted the way that I did. I have always had a solid foundation in my family to turn back to whenever I had questions about who I was or who I came from.

And I realized that sadly, the story that the woman in the airport shared is not an uncommon one. What is becoming more uncommon are stories like mine.

Stories of families who love and support each other unconditionally, even in the midst of arguments and suffering.  Families where the parents have been happily married for 27 years and where the children feel like they can talk to their parents about anything going on in there life. Families where each person is cherished and accepted for who they are and not what they do. A family who is rooted in faith.

So I think that's why I am so proud of my family and why I want to share our story.

Families like mine are becoming the stuff of fairy tales and I want the whole world to know that it does not have to be that way.

Loving families can be a reality if we start living and viewing families as they were intended from the beginning.

A Day in the Life

A peak into the normal everyday workings of the Black Family residence.

I'm home for Thanksgiving break right now, and every time I get home I must adjust once again to how things work at the Black Family home. What the daily routine is, who is responsible for what, and where my place in the family is.

You see when I was the oldest child at home, I was the top of the pecking order. Maddie got to call the shots, and I was the one who liked to be in charge and in control of what happened every day. Call me mini mom. And that job slowing passed from me, to Sophie, to Helen; the three oldest girls. But now that Sophie, Helen and I are all out of the house, and Jonathan, my 15 year old brother is the "top dog", things look a little differently then they ever did before. And we all are having to adjust to a new day in the life. 

It's a Monday morning, at 8:00am, a school day, and Jane and Sam and Jon and Ava are all getting ready for school, or forgetting to get ready for school. 

One of us older girls home from college, wakes up and come to the kitchen and see that the kids forgot to eat breakfast and are still in their jammies and that they have 15 min to departure. Not knowing how the new morning routine works now, one of us girls starts barking orders at the kids. Mom then hears the commotion and comes down, all ready to go, calms the waters and then gets the kids out the door right in the nick of time. 

Then the three of us older girls take our time getting ready for the day, drinking tea and coffee, eating breakfast and doing our hair. We then kinda don't know what to do with ourselves because we are not in school and are not home long enough to work.

Mom then sees our lack of things to do and puts us to work deep cleaning the house. We grumble a little but are mostly happy to help out. 

We clean and then play 20 questions with the youngest, Josie, and soon it's time for lunch. We eat lunch, and maybe walk the dogs and chat among ourselves. Then before we know it it is time for the kids to be picked up from school. I will usually be the one to drive the big black suburban to pick them up and they are so excited to see me, their cool older sister. I then get introduced to all of their teachers and friends, we load up into the car and make the short drive home. 

We get home, and the kids plop in front of the TV and take a little bit of time to unwind. Helen and mom will work on dinner, and then call everyone when it is ready. 

We all gather around the island in our kitchen and dig in. We talk about our day, and laugh at funny stories and clean up spills. It is not a dinner at the Black 's house without someone spilling something. 

Then about half way through the meal, dad gets home, and once we hear the door open, everyone screams "dads home!" and run over to give him a big hug. Dad then comes in and eats the rest of the meal with us.

Everyone disperses, to get the little ones all cleaned up and ready for bed, and it is then my self proclaimed job to clean up the kitchen. I turn on some music, wash the dishes and sweep the floor. Usually a dance party with whoever is around soon starts. 

Mom and dad read to the little ones, us older kids are around reading, talking, doing homework and watching TV. 

Dad comes down all sleepy from putting the kids to bed, and mom soon follows. Mom checks her email, dad makes tea and popcorn, and then we all settle in to watch a movie before going to bed. 

I love being home because everything is as it should be, even though our family has changed in some ways as the years have done by and we have grown up. But regardless of all the changes there is always a constant knowledge that we are all loved and cherished for who we are. So, that's a normal day in the life, and I would not change it for the world. 

Dear Josie

A Letter to My Baby Sister

Dear Josie,

As your oldest sister and (fairy) Godmother I want to write you a letter to tell you how much I love you and to share some things I want you to know.

To be honest little Tootie, when I found out that I was going to be a big sister (for the seventh time), I was kinda mad. At first.

I was going into my senior year of high-school and I was afraid that Mom and Dad were not going to have enough time for me. I was worried that when you were born all of my needs for moving on to the next stage of my life after graduation were not going to be met if there was another baby in the house. I was very selfish. I told Mom how I felt and she hugged me and cried with me because we were both scared for what it was going to be like to have one more little one around the house. Mom assured me that it was all going to be OK, and that even though there may be hard things that come with new babies, the life of a new child is always a special gift and blessing. After this talk with Mom, I felt much better and I slowly started to get more and more excited for your arrival.

I spent that next nine months waiting for you to come, working hard at school, applying for and visiting colleges and trying to decide what the heck I was going to do with my life. It was kinda a stressful time in my life, but I looked forward to when Mom's midwife would come over to talk with us about how you were doing growing inside of Mom and I especially looked forward to hearing your little heartbeat. The day that you were born was an exciting one; what I blessing it was to be there for your birth and to get to hold your tiny little body just moments after you took your first breaths. When I, (and the rest of the siblings) met you it was such a joyful moment! We were so very happy that you were the newest addition to our crazy family. I remember crying because I was so overwhelmed with joy to meet you.

Soon after you were born, Mom and Dad asked me if I would be your Godmother. I was so honored to be asked because I know that being entrusted to care for you and pray for you in that way is very special and important. I felt really proud that Mom and Dad would trust me with that role in your life. The day that you were Baptized and became an adopted daughter of God and a member of the Catholic Church, I got to hold you and pray for you and commit to helping Mom and Dad when it came to teaching you about how much Jesus loves you. What I beautiful moment that was. I want you to know that I pray for you every single day, that God loves you and is holding you and has a wonderful plan for your life.

The summer after your Baptism, I packed up my bags and left home to go be a missionary for a year. It was so hard to say goodbye to you and to not be with you for the first full year of your life. I missed the whole family a lot, but I missed you the most. I remember coming home for a week during Christmas time and you did not remember who I was and that you did not want me to hold you. That broke my heart because I wanted to be so much a part of your life and to have you know how much I love you. That taught me a good lesson though: that it was going to take more effort on my part to make sure that I was still apart of your life even though I would be so far away from you geographically.

I am basically a professional at being a big sister, but with you it is different, you are 18 years younger then me, and I am not physically in your life as much as I was for our other siblings. I wonder sometimes what it is like for you growing up only having me home during breaks from school. You have never known what it is like to have me around all the time, and sometimes that scares me because I want to be apart of your growing up. But I know that this is a natural part of life, and I am so grateful that you are my little sister and that I am your big sister. I am always so pumped to tell my friends (and even people I barely know) about you because I am so proud of you and I am so excited to see what great things God has in store for your life. It is gonna be kinda fun to see what our relationship will become.

Josie, know that I love you with my whole heart and that no matter where I may be, or where our lives may take us, that I will always be there to pray for you and to support you and that no matter what I will always be your big sister.

Love,

Maddie