Let me back up to our road trip to NYC that I told y'all I'd update you on in my last post (No Pain, No Gain). To say that I was scared to make this long, long road trip with three small children would be an understatement. There was a lot of anxiety going into the trip due mostly to the fact that our one year old is not a great traveler...there was also the fact that I have never driven very far North, and I have never had ANY desire to drive THROUGH midtown Manhattan!!
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| Legoland's version |
Seven years ago, this same group got together for the first time. Three couples were married, one was engaged, and one was about to get engaged. There was one child in the mix, and it was a weekend full of late night antics, days sleeping in, hours on end spent on the beach, dinners out, and a lot of cluelessness by eight of the ten of us about kids!! We finally got back together three years later and had added six kids to the mix. We had one on one coverage for each child, everyone there had at least one child, and one couple had one about to be born so they weren't there. Our experience was just a taaaddd different than our get-together several years earlier. There were early mornings, early bedtimes, limited trips to the beach, lots of hungry mouths to feed, simple dinners, and more fun and laughs than any of us could've imagined. The husbands are all really great daddies, and they were fantastic entertaining the kids...but the wives had the rhythm behind the scenes down pat. I still can't explain it to you...how it happened...how these four women who really had only spent time together in small doses could somehow come together and make this ship run so smoothly. It was awesome...we all pitched in with babies, with diapers, with meals, with sunscreen, with baths, with everything. We took on each others' children as our own and we got what needed to be done done. This is when our bond as sister wives was formed.
Again, fast forward two years, add three more babies to the mix, and you have our trip to The Hamptons that occurred this summer. There were ten adults and ten children staying in one house...granted it was the PERFECT house with the PERFECT yard and the PERFECT pool, but it still could've been a lot of chaos and confusion. Nope, not this time, and you know why? The sister wives were back in action!!
From the moment we arrived, it was apparent that this was going to be a great week. We drove up to dinner al fresco and children playing in the yard. The tiniest babies were all snug in their beds, and the rest of the kids were reintroducing themselves to each other and making new friends. I walked in the door and was met with a delicious, hot meal and a very large glass of wine. My childrens' plates had been made, and they were immediately swept out of my arms and into the fun. My husband was whisked away to the corner with the guys to laugh and laugh and laugh (aka giggle and giggle and giggle...a sound that only comes out of his mouth when he is reunited with this group of guys). It was a better greeting than I ever could have dreamed up but also no less than what I expected from the sister wives.
Our week was filled with days in the pool, baseball in the backyard, fireworks, a very rainy Fourth of July with a trip to the children's museum thrown in, great food, long chats, and lots of time to hear what was going on in everyone's "every days." The couples are all on the same page having small children and small peoples' schedules to adhere to...this makes it easy to help each other out and fall back into a sister wives rhythm. Again, we all chipped in with nap times, with pool time, with drink refills (for the small and big people), with feeding children, with preparing meals, with clean up, with coffee making, with making sure that everyone was taken care of. It was an awesome week, and I would drive 13.5 hours again tomorrow to do it all again...every single minute of it...these sister wives of mine and their precious husbands are some of the most important people in my life, and I would literally move mountains for each of them.
The coffee cup pictured above was a gift from one of the sister wives to the rest of us. I drink out of it almost every morning (well, except for yesterday, when someone decided to drive to work with it), and I am reminded of these amazing friends who are kindred spirits separated by many many miles (NYC, Raleigh, Boston, Chicago, and me in Winston). I love starting my day with gentle reminders of what matters most in life. I usually read whatever devotion happens to be on my nightstand while drinking my coffee from my "sister wives" cup. What could possibly be better than starting my day with faith and friendship?
I know that I have said it before, and I will say it again. Finding good friends in life is so so important. It's crucial to find those friends that you love and who are always looking out for your best interest, who will keep you in check, and who will support you through your victories and through your mistakes...and vice versa. My sister wives have each others' backs. They are an open book. They say what's on their minds. They support each other through thick and thin. They love each others' husbands and each others' children. They can read each others' minds. They know exactly what the others need even if the others don't have the words to express what they need themselves. I know how rare it is to find a group of sister wives such as these, and I also know how important it is to have people in your life to be your rock(s).
There is so much joy to share as well as a lot of heartache to bear in this life. This week has been filled with reminders of just how fragile life can be...of how fragile people can be. It is always my hope that I can understand the "why" behind people's behavior rather than the "what" of the behavior itself. There's the hope that I will look at others with more discerning eyes, that I will look past the facade that others may put up and see through to their core. So many times we get caught up in what we have going on that we forget to share our lives with others...whether being a friend or finding a friend that we need. So, friends, it is my hope that you find someone to share your joys and your sorrows with each and every day. Friends, that you will find the time to spend with each other. Friends, that you will take the time to find out what's really going on in each others' lives. Friends, that you will go deep and not be scared of what others may think when you open up and tell your truth. Find a sister wife to confide in...whether that looks like a best friend, a sister, a husband, a brother, a mom, a dad, a pastor, a counselor...find someone who you can share your whole self with...someone who is safe and who will listen and get you through. Be someone's sister wife that they can reveal themselves to, that they can trust, that they don't have to pretend around. It's a two way street, and all that we have is each other. "Love one another."
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| The sign that hangs in our kitchen |
...so how did that road trip go, you ask? It was hard, it was fun, it was longer than expected, it was easier than anticipated, it was a good thing I didn't do it alone ;), and it was WORTH IT! Everything that's hard usually is.
Happy Cooking!
