final thoughts

One last post about my time at home, then I'll move on to fun things.

My sister's wedding did two very important things. First, it brought together many families into one big happy. The groom's family welcomed us into their home with open arms and plenty of alcohol, our father's family showed up and didn't start shit (they are not fond of my mother or me), our mother's family kept the crazy to a minimum, and I was able to meet our stepdad's family for the first time. That's not even including all of the friends that showed up to celebrate. It was truly a good time to be in the company of all those new and old faces.

The second, and arguably even more important thing than one day of family unity, was that this marriage ushered us into our own generation. When I think of our family, my siblings and cousins who are (still and probably always) relegated to the children's table at holidays, we were always our own little group. But this has made us a functioning group of our own. We spent more time together than we did with our adult relatives. We've all been "adults" for a while now (the youngest having just celebrated her 21st), but this really solidified that, and we added a brother-in-law to the mix! It'll be interesting to see how this changes the family dynamic, how we interact, what holidays are like, the ways we choose to celebrate milestones in the future. Now that our mother is moving to a different state, we'll be even more torn about where to celebrate holidays and who to spend them with. Perhaps we'll celebrate as our own group once in a while rather than going to our parents' homes.

It's exciting to me to see this happening, all over the course of a week. :-)