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There’s no denying it now. I am officially and completely a people person.

This past weekend we kept our friends’ three girls while they made a super-packed-full trip to their new home in the Washington, DC area. They dropped them off Thursday morning, and we had them until Sunday night. At first glance that seemed like a pretty long time, but I knew it would go really fast. And it did.

The best part was not the four days of two adults and eight kids though. The best part came on Sunday afternoon.

My sister and her husband and their four kids were on their way to their new home in the Buffalo, NY area, and were planning to stop by and visit. So, now we had twelve kids (ages 9 down to 1 month) and only four adults. But we didn’t stop there! Later in the afternoon, our friend Laura and her son came to visit bringing the total up to 5 adults and 13 kids! All in our little yellow house!!!

And I could not have been happier. 🙂

I looked around at one point at the four families represented in my living room and just smiled. I couldn’t help it. That is what I want my house to be. The place where people hang out. Come, visit, hang, for no reason … just to be together. It was wunderbar.

Later that night, our friends came back to retrieve their kids and ended up sticking around to sample the good food from the day (cinnamon rolls and chicken wings and skyline chili, etc) and taking in an episode of the Knight Rider. It was a great ending to a fun day and a great weekend.

But then…

On Monday, Jen’s parents came over with our nephew to spend a couple fun days with our kids and Jen (while I was here working). They were gone most of yesterday, and are gone again today now doing some fun things around our area. I’m glad for the kids. They are having a blast. But it’s really quiet here.

I have officially discovered that I am a “people person”. Fellow people people seem to need “down times”, but I can’t get enough. I miss those little girls we had here for the long weekend. A lot. I certainly miss my family right now. And last night, the two boys spent the night with Grandma, Grandpa & their cousin… and it just wasn’t right. The house felt empty, though we still had the three girls here with us.

I am definitely a people person.

[Tangent… Last night when we just had the three girls, I thought to myself, “This seems way too easy!” I felt like it was “parenting-lite”. I guess the hardest part of parenting these days is not the feeding and cleaning that we mostly do for the three girls (ages four and down) but the relational and life-training that we are doing with the boys (and probably Kirstie, too). So without that “challenge”… I felt like we had the night off! 🙂 Tangent over…]

So, I am incredibly grateful to God for the big family he has placed me in, and look forward to it growing if that’s what He’s got in mind. I’m super blessed to be part of a great extended family, too (my mom & dad, sister & fam, my aunts, uncles, cousins, grandparents, and even all my in-laws).

Guess that’s probably why I’m a people person. 🙂