Beyond grandparents...

[ElsaVonM]

We've talked on here about what we hope to bring forward from how our parents, and what we hope to change. My question today is about your slightly extended family:

How often did you see your aunts/uncles/cousins? Were they a major part of your life?

How is it the same or different for your kids? If you live far from your siblings, what do you do to make sure your kids know them and vice versa? If you and your partner don't have siblings or your siblings are out of the picture, are there other people in your kids' lives (family friends, etc.) who fill this role?

[ct]

I wasn't super close to my aunts/uncles/cousins growing up. My parents each have 4 siblings, but the relationships were strained and physical distance divided us. My closest relationship is with one of my dad's sisters. She was actively involved in my life growing up and had her son when I was 14/15. So, I babysat him frequently and though he's my closest cousin, the age difference makes me feel more like I'm his aunt (which is fine). I'm his god mother and its been an honor for me to watch him grow up.

As for my kids, at this point their great aunts and uncles play a larger role in their lives. They are close to the aunt/cousin I mentioned above and are also very close to DW's aunt, uncle and cousin.

Unfortunately my brother is not healthy enough to be in their lives right now (and doesn't plan to marry or have children) so I don't see much happening there. Andrea's brother and our SIL and niece live locally and we see them fairly often - i wish there was more closeness there, though...definitely something lacking. Its mostly a holidays-type relationship though we do babysit each others' kids on occasion.

[2brides]

I didn't. My mother has one brother who was significantly older (13y) and so his kids were much older. We saw them only a handful of times over the course of my childhood as my aunt/uncle/cousins lived NH and we were in GA. I saw one of my cousins and my aunt/uncle about 5y ago at my dad's birthday party. One cousin committed suicide a few years ago and I have no idea about the other. They've all has substance abuse/mental health/domestic violence issues. I have a 2nd cousin who I discovered lives about 45m from me - in the town where L and I moved from. I haven't seen her since I was probably 5y or so.

I am an only child. So no one there. We don't really have anyone filling that role. We have their Godfather, who is a good friend of ours, but he and his wife are Foreign Service officers and are currently in Nigeria on a 2y assignment (before that they were in Paris.) We try to keep up with Skype and his yearly visit home.

L has 3 siblings and they have a total of 13 kids (including newly aquired step kids.) The oldest being 30y and the youngest being 4y (most are in their 20s.) So, the kids do have a lot of cousins, but they all live in TN and we haven't made the trek there in 3y. And none of them have been here (just not in the financial cards for any of them.) I hate that they don't really know their cousins (they do talk to a couple of them - the ones closest to their age - on the phone when they are at L's parents house.

I would have loved for the kids to have a huge extended family and lots of cousins to play with. But with L being the oldest of her siblings and having children later in life, there is a huge age difference between them. Not to mention the proximity.

[seattlekari]

I saw my mom's sister and her two sons (10+ years older than me) and her eventual new husband probably every few months growing up. They lived a 3.5 hour drive away. My parents had a falling out of sorts with my dad's brother and his wife when we were pretty young. Their two kids are staggered in ages between my brother and me and sadly over the years we didn't really get to know them. When my paternal grandmother passed a few years back I did reconnect a bit with that aunt and one cousin, but we don't keep in touch that much.

My brother and E's dad did not get along and it caused a major rift between me and my parents and brother for a few years (that's a long story for another time). Despite being long past that relationship and of course having a gf now, it's taken some time to heal that situation. My brother and SIL and new nephew live about 45 minutes from us. We see each other nearly every time my parents come visit which is about every 2 months. I am hoping we'll be able to start doing more things together even when the folks are not here now that we both have kids.

I am kind of sad that E's kids won't have aunts/uncles to dote on them. I am hoping that E will have a stronger relationship with her cousins that will provide that network. She has a ton of cousins on her dad's side of things.

[bluedaisyus]

My bio-father had brothers and they had kids, but we never saw them. My mom had one sister but she lives in CA and doesn't have any kids, nor was she a kid person, so we very rarely had any contact with her. I haven't seen or heard from her in at least 10 years, I'd say. Probably not since my grandmother's funeral. My dad had a brother and sister, but we didn't see them much (uncle was schizophrenic and would disappear for long periods, and aunt was estranged for a while) and neither of them had kids either. My mom's BFF and her husband were pretty much like an aunt and uncle to us, though.

The boy gets to see my sister and brothers pretty regularly. Both of my brothers have 4 kids and my sister has a SD, and he definitely gets a lot more interaction with them than I had with any of my cousins. My wife's sister is very involved, too, but not their born-again brother or his kids.

[ElsaVonM]

I have 5 cousins - 1 on my dad's side and 4 on my mom's side. 3 of them are close to my age and we spent a lot of time together when we were younger, but not much as teenagers. I have 2 aunts and 2 uncles and saw 2 of them regularly but didn't really get to know my other aunt and uncle until I went to college where they lived (Boston) and was able to spend a few years getting to know them before they moved. I love all of them but I don't feel like I have much in common with any of them and our adult relationships aren't close.

Jen's sisters live 3,000 miles away so right now we only see them (and our niece and nephew) when we visit there 1-2x a year or when they come here. They have been good about visiting and we plan/hope to go 2x a year when our kids are old enough to be better fliers. My brother also lives on the other side of the country but he is planning to move here in the next couple of years, and I want that so much - I want our kids to be close to him and know him as well as they know my parents. My sister lives only about 90 minutes away but she's really busy with school so we don't see her as much as I'd like. I'm worried that she is going to move far away when she graduates and gets a job, but she is young (21) and I totally understand the need to roam.

[2moms2b]

I grew up with my cousins as my best friends (especially on my dads side). My dad is one of 11 and each of my aunts and uncles have at least 4 kids if not many more (I have 63 cousins and we combined have 23 kids just on my dads side) . Growing up we did live about 2 hours from the rest of my entire family but we went often especially in the summer. I just remember running around with my cousins (about 20 of us) that were within a few years of each other. To this day I still see most of them quite a bit and we laugh that our family holidays would scare most people as it can be over 150 people all closely related. Several of my cousins have kids the boys age (within a year) or will be giving birth here soon so they should grow up with a lot of friends. I am one of 4 and much older than my siblings so they are not married nor have children. We are all very close though and it's not unusual for them to be over at our house on any given day. They all love their nephews and are always calling to come see them.

M's family is much smaller but she grew up close to her cousins, aunts, uncles etc. She has two brothers (they are each 13 months apart) very close in age. Her middle brother has two kids and they live about 10 minutes from us. Just like my siblings we are always hanging out together. We don't see as many of her cousins anymore as most have moved for careers or school out of the area but just last night one of her cousins came over with his wife and their 4 month old. We chatted while the kids played on the play mat.

We would both go completely crazy or be way to home sick if we weren't close to our families. If M was down I would totally have a house full of kids but time and finances will prevent that.

[kershnic]

My mom has 3 brothers, but one of them is pretty estranged from the family. I've met him once. He has two kids, but they're both at least 10 years older than me and I've never met one. Obviously not close. Her other 2 brothers I saw a few times a year as a kid. No cousins from them. One of those uncles I never see now as an adult, and the other I see a few times a year but he doesn't believe in my marriage so I'm kind of done with that relationship. My dad has 1 sister, who has 1 son. He's 7 years younger than me, lived in a foreign country for many years, and is a spoiled brat.

My sister and I are close. We see each other every 4-6 weeks or so... a little less since all this ttc shit got heavy. I am really sad that infertility has made such an age gap between my nephews and my future children. B has two younger ssisters. They're not all that close, but I think they may get closer as they mature out of college/grad school. Middle sister is getting married in June, but we think they'll wait a few years for kids. Little sister is young and hhasn't seriously dated anyone that we know of, so we suspect kids are still years away but who knows.

[ballandchain]

My parents each had one sister, and we have 3 cousins from one of them and 5 from the other. We knew them a bit growing up, but saw them rarely (the 5 lived about 7-8 hours by car, so we saw them once a year; the others lived on the other side of the country and no one had a lot of money for air travel so we saw them infrequently at best). Right now I am FB friends with most of them, with varying degrees of closeness. I am pretty close to one cousin on my dad's side and his wife, and have a decent relationship with 5 of the other 7. My aunt on my dad's side is kind of like my surrogate mom now that my mom isn't alive. We email all the time and she visits fairly often. I will consider her sort of an honorary grandmother to my kids, even though she will technically be their great-aunt.

I am fairly close to my sisters and both actually live within walking distance. Neither is married or has kids, so our kids will be the first and possibly only grandchildren on my side of the family and I have a feeling my family is going to spoil the pants off of them. I am glad they will grow up seeing their aunties all the time.

My wife has a big family, some bio and some step, and they all have kids ranging in age from 20s to age 2. I think everyone else is done so our kids won't be super close in age to anyone. And they all live out of state, so we only see some of them once a year. Family is important to them and everyone pretty much gets along so they will definitely be a part of our kids' lives, but not a regular part.