cousins

Growing up, I never had a friend relationship with my cousins.  Now that we are all adults, we are friends on facebook, follow eachother on instagram,  and have more of a relationship than I remember having when we were younger.

We got a picture in the mail this week, it was sitting on the counter when David came home from school.  He picked it up, looked at it and said "who are they?"  It was a picture of his cousins that live less than 10 miles away.  I was so sad to have to tell him that it was his cousins!  We have absolutely no relationship with half of the family.  My kids miss out on 16, almost 17 cousins that are right around their same ages, and not because of distance, they are mostly within 10 miles from our home. It makes me sick.  Family is supposed to be able to be such a strength in life and be people that you can lean on and turn to no matter what.  To have so much family so close and not be able to recognize who they are in pictures....  

I am SO thankful for the relationships that my boys do have with my siblings kids.  They all have at least one cousin that is their same age and they love to play and do things with.  We are looking forward to a quick Disney trip next week with our Washington (& local) cousins.