Family is a very important part of life. Your family is the people in your life who love you, support you, stand by you, and care for you, no matter what, all through your life. I’ve been spending this week with my family, and it’s reminded me just how wonderful life is with them.

I must clarify, I am with my biological family right now, but for me family has never been defined by blood. My mother was adopted, and so I’m not biologically related to any of my Grandparents, Aunts and Uncles, or cousins, on that side of my family. That has never made them any less important. No, we don’t look alike, or act alike. We could be perfect strangers. But thanks to my Grandparents willingness to take in four children, we aren’t. We share stories of growing up, holiday memories, birthday surprises, family reunions, pajama parties and pizza nights… just like anyone else. My cousins and I have all grown up to be wildly different people, but we would all come together in heartbeat if we needed each other. My Aunts and Uncles are all supportive and amazing people, which is no surprise considering they were raised by my Grandparents. I could write a novel about how fantastic they are.

Right now I am lucky enough to be with my Dad’s side of the family, who I rarely get to see. I am surrounded by children constantly. Great Aunts and Uncles, second cousins and the whole lot. We will be making a few stops in order to see everyone on the list and I couldn’t be happier about it. I spent all day alternating between which child I was holding and playing games with. For six years I was the only kid on this side of the family, now the second oldest is thirteen and the youngest is one month. I love them all with all my heart. My older cousins are married, with kids obviously, and everything’s different except for the fact that we all come together for a good meal and a competitive round of beanbag toss no matter what. Good food, good games, and just being together. Catching up on what we’ve missed, trying to keep the kids out of too much trouble, sharing experiences and stories, eating copious amounts of food. Enjoying time with a loving and supportive family is one of the best things you can do.

Sometimes people have family in friendships. As I said earlier, your family isn’t always your blood. Your family is whoever loves and accepts you in life. Sometimes close friendships do that more than a biological family that doesn’t fully support and accept you. Families come in all shapes and sizes. Biological or not, big or small, near or far, the defining factor is love. No family is perfect, every family has its issues. When you can come together and be there for each other despite difficulties, disagreements, or issues between one another, that’s how you know you have a family. My favorite way family is described, is at the end of “Lilo and Stitch”. To end this article, I would like to quote Stitch as he is describing Lilo and Nani.