It sounds sort of a like a horror film: The Aunts! The problem? There’s an extra “u” in there. These aunts aren’t scary at all. They are, however, plentiful. Our son is surrounded by aunts from all sides. He’s even got great-aunts making the rounds. These aunts aren’t the cheek-pinching type, they’re a vibrant bunch of fun loving women who love to play with their nephew as much as possible. Would you believe we see a lot of them? I’m lucky because I like all of my sisters (including my sister-in-laws) and having them over is a real treat. One of the terrible truths about us being away from family for half of a decade was that we weren’t around family. For part of that time away we had a child. Now that he’s back I’m sure he’ll never want to live far away from family again.
Just about every day our son has some big event or another planned: swimming at an aunt’s community pool, visiting an aunt at the coffee shop, dragging a visiting aunt up to his room to play with his new wooden puzzle. Having a full day is a very good thing considering how much lost time he’s making up for. It also helps when dad needs time to type away in the basement while working on his dissertation. The aunts not only provide a joyous time for him, but also a needed break for mom and dad (not that we don’t love him a lot, because we do). Soon we’ll be celebrating his birthday. All the aunts will be there to cheer him on as he moves into another year. They’ll feed him cake and eventually help him clean up. They’ll sing and play and maybe even rock him to sleep. What a lucky boy.