blessings of family

reading some of my friends' blogs, as well as an experience i had today, remind me not to take our proximity to family lightly. i grew up living 14 hours from my grandparents; hubby grew up within minutes of his, for the most part. we currently live about 35 minutes away from my parents. close enough to visit, not too close. we don't take advantage of them enough, we have yet to have a date night.. other than the double date night we took in indy with crt and computer guy. at the same time, all of us have our privacy. hubby's parents live about 3 hours away. a little too far, but close enough for weekend trips.

while bear and i were in line at the post office (behind just one other person- not bad for the post office at Christmas), the clerk and the woman in front of me saw my daughter and started talking about how far away their only grandbabies are... between 5 and 7 hours. they reminded me to be grateful that baby bear clung to her granwendy at the beginning of her cousin's birthday party, as she soaked in the excitement and checked out the new faces around her. she didn't know everyone, but she knew her grandparents! in fact, she's seen her cousin's other grandparents enough that she is starting to recognize them as part of her extended family, too.

yes, the 6 hour drive to my niece's house is a little too far, but it's close enough so that we don't have to wait a whole year to see them.