Post-Christmas togetherness

We’re still in Georgia which is why I haven’t posted for several days. It seems a bit anti-social to be typing away when I could be visiting with relatives I haven’t seen in a while. My commitment to not be on-line all the time has caused me mental anguish which leads me to believe I might have a touch of an email addiction. Oh, hahahaha! Like I didn’t already know that…

But tonight I’ve turned in early and through the magic of my father’s wireless network, am typing away in the guest bedroom. We’ve had a lot of family together time and the need to have a bit of not-together time is weighing heavily on me. This strikes me as comical because when we’re at home the kids and I are together a lot thanks to our home schooling situation. But there are ways to have breaks from each other, like sending the kids to their rooms or me running to Meijer. But that’s not happening here. The five of us are together all the time. In the car. At my sister’s house. At my parents’ house. At my in-laws’ house. At church. At every meal. Everywhere I turn I see my three little people and my husband and frankly, I could stand a few moments without them right about ten minutes ago.

(Even now Sean has made his way in here and is going to bed. Oh my word, now he’s got the blasted sound machine on – it has a constant loop of fake waves and I can always hear when the loop starts over. Ugh, I hate that thing. How does that help anyone sleep?)

We have had a great Christmas here in Atlanta, my current condition of family-too-muchness aside. We enjoyed Christmas Eve with my twin sister, her family and my parents. Christmas Day was spent with Sean’s folks, his sister and her family. We were able to see two families we’ve been missing and are looking forward to a visit with another family friend tomorrow for dinner. Plus I ran into a friend and faithful blog reader at church this morning. She looked wonderful but her son has gotten so big! Of course, he was only one when we moved so him simply standing upright was big change… As usual we have crammed a whole bunch of visiting into what feels like a week on speed.

(Now Sean just turned out the light. Fabulous.)

Coming home has not gotten any easier. There are too many people to see and not enough time to see them all. And there’s never enough time with extended family. And now we have the pull of missing what’s going on in our new home in Michigan… the upside is we have a great group of friends and relatives. The downside is, well, can there be a downside to that? Nope, I don’t think so. How can having a loving family ever be a downer?

It's not, just so long as the immediate family doesn’t have to be together 24/7.