Family is: ancestry, parentage, pedigree, genealogy, background, family tree, descent, lineage, bloodline, blood, extraction, stock;

Family is Aunts, Uncles, Cousins, Moms, Dads, Daughters, Sons, Grandparents etc. Family is the familiarity in the physical: a recognizable trait: nose, eyes, ears, height, hair color

etc. It’s also the similarity of characteristic traits: kindness, loving ,anger, loyalty, forgiving etc..

Family gives love and acceptance because you were born into it: Because I’m the daughter of a brother, I have uncles. Their wife’s are my aunts. Their children are my cousins and so it goes. The definition of family led me to believe that I would be accepted because I was born. Welcomed as an addition to our heritage. Loved, just because I was born a part of family history.

My blood family has not been successful in the cultivating of our heritage or maintaining a connection to it or each other.

The sins and ways of the ancestors is definitely prevalent in the family. We’ve lost touch, stopped speaking, done hurtful things all in the name to be right.

Have you ever been to a family reunion and really looked around… you can see your own eyes in others, your hair texture or color, your behaviors, your smile, even hear your laugh. Family’s are the best and worst of history.

There is blond hair and blue eyes and black hair and brown eyes. There are wide noses and narrow noses. There is skin the color of cream and skin of the shades of the deepest of browns. There is the tallest of tall and the shortest of short… there are lips full and lips narrow. There are smiles that turn up and smiles that turn down in the corners, but smiles all the same. There are beards and mustaches and heavy eyebrows and light eyebrows. There is cancer and diabetes and hypertension. There is diagnosed anxiety and depression. There are marriages and cheating and divorce and separation. There are children born into the family and those that are adopted.

A family has all the great components of both of a great celebration and a great tragedy. There are births, weddings, graduations and family reunions and there are deaths, property, money and disagreements and fights.

A family is a collection of the good, the bad and the ugly of life… but it’s a connection to the past and the future. It’s a name, it’s a place you come from… it’s heritage.

My family? We are a work in progress… I wish I had had more opportunities to see my heritage in the faces of others and to enjoy the warmth and closeness of being accepted into the folds of the family experience. My path has been different …

What I have been blessed to have is family that God created for me… people who don’t look like me .. we share no blood line, but there is mutual acceptance and love, as if we were “family”. I have a mom, a big brother, a host of sisters. I’ve had a grandma and grandpa and a few aunts and uncles: People who loved me as if I was born into their family. They welcomed me, just as I am, and have loved me for just being born. I have been blessed. Through this blessing my children now have family. This supports the fact that we are all Gods children, so we are all family.

Family is a right each of us have.. if yours didn’t pan out the way you hoped.. you can make your own… we are all Gods children so that makes us family anyhow.. we just have to be open to possibilities.

I’m grateful for having blood family and it’s ok that it’s broken… It actually pushed me closer to God over the years and pushed me to see others through the eyes of love. What a wonderful experience I’ve been granted. To experience unexpected love and acceptance by people who didn’t have to love or accept me.

I have family, we don’t look alike and don’t share the same blood line… but we have one major thing in common.. we all love God and He obviously loves us.

My family, is the family God granted me … and I am grateful.