Several years ago, my mom’s parents decided that they didn’t want to spend their time traveling between our house and theirs, and so they made the two houses one in the same. They added an addition onto our house and moved up from their apartment in DC and I have learned a lot from living in a multi-generational house.

It’s difficult to adjust when your family has its own habits and patterns, but if you live with someone long enough, it generally all blends together and works out fine. It can also be harder, as a kid, having two more adults in the house telling you to do your homework and clean, especially when you had already figured out how to get away with things under your parents watch.

However, despite these cons, there are so many more pros to living in a house with your grandparents. For one, they are always there to help my parents out with driving and cooking, two very important parts of our lives. Not only are they good cooks, but they are always wanting to teach us their signature recipes or have us help them out in the kitchen, which can be fun. My grandpa is partial to baking bread, and so the house either smells like fresh bread or there’s a warm loaf on the counter when you come in.

They also don’t work and so are always around for a walk or a talk. Your grandparents can have really good and interesting stories that they are willing to share with you, and lots of solid advice they can give. They’ve been around the block a few times. Listen to them sometimes. They want to be involved, they wouldn't have moved in with us if they didn't, and so they're really interesting in hearing about our lives and helping us out, which is really nice.

Despite how hard it was changing habits and patterns to have more people come to live with us, I can’t imagine what my life would have been like if my grandparents hadn’t come to live with us. There would have been a little more scrambling to get kids where they needed to go, a few less fresh meals, less life lessons, and less laughs. They have taught me a lot about the person that I want to be when I get older, how to live and be successful, and about what it means to truly love and give to a family (enough to move into a house that already has six people living in it).