It Takes a Village to Raise A Child

This popular quote would refer to me and my upbringing.. and since seeing Dad-E's previous post about thanking his parents, I thought I should thank all of those that helped raise me as well! Being an only child and an only grandchild, it's easy to say I was pretty spoiled and got a lot of attention growing up. Not the bad kind of spoiled brat-ness, we didn't have the "best" or the "newest" of everything all the time, but I think I turned out all right regardless! I still do have trouble though with the whole "fair" and "sharing" concepts, me being an only child and all (well, my step & half-brother's are pretty great, not trying to count them out, it's just that I grew up living by myself as an only child, and saw them occassionally as well). Anyway, growing up with divorced, young parents, and very involved grandparents, as well as loving uncles, and my mom's countless number of friends, I'd have to say I was so lucky to have so many people care about and love me. I learned to grow up pretty fast, as most of my "playmates" were my mom's friends, and to this day, I still would consider many of those close friends of hers my family... and know that they would do just about anything for me as well. Even at my wedding, I think I had more of my mom's friends there than my own friends, it's just the way I was raised.

It's hard to know that Alli Ru won't have all that family and my close friends down here to grow up with and to be raised by, but I hope the values, lessons and love I learned and value from the way I was raised are instilled upon her. It took a village to raise me, and I know that same village & more love Alli Ru too, even if it's from over 600 miles away...