Fun with Cousins

I feel so blessed to be able to share with my children cousins of their age. When I was growing up, I had a younger girl cousin who I was very close with and I am so grateful that she lived close by and that we were able to see each other often and have fun together. I truly believe there is no greater gift than family. Of course, good neighbors come close. ;) Which is why I'm also grateful for the 2- weeks-younger-than-me girl who lived right next door to me for my entire life (well, minus my first 2 years) and became my best friend and is still my best friend to this day, 23 years later. And guess what? Now she's family. Because I married her brother. See why I think so fondly of good neighbors?
Anyway, I'm talking about Doph. (I still need to write the post about her name!) For some reason we always had the idea that your firstborn would be a boy. I don't know where this idea came from but we definitely, without a doubt, figured we would always have boys first. So, when her first baby was born we were SO excited when we found out that the baby was a girl. A few months later I became pregnant with my first and we still assumed that it would be a boy (Because it must have been some starnge fluke that Doph's first was a girl). But then I had a sonogram (I don't wait until the birth to find out the sex like Doph does) and found out that I too was having a girl. Hooray! Only 11 months apart, and they are two peas in a pod just like me and Doph. It's so funny to see the night and day pair. Mini Me and Mini Doph. It's wonderful. Then Doph had a boy and exactly a year and 8 days later I had a boy. And 6 months later Doph had another boy. Those three are so cute together! The three muskateers with their blond hair blowing in the wind and the sun reflecting off their beautiful blue eyes. My boy looks like he could be their brother. They all get along so great together. Then I got pregnant with #3 and soon after, found out that Doph was pregnant too!


We hoped for girls again, (especially Doph since she had 1 girl & 2 boys and this was most likely her last pregnancy because of her high risk and the dangers involved) but alas, we both had boys. Two beautiful, wonderful baby boys, exactly two weeks apart- just like me and Doph. These 7 kids are just as close as they can be and it's such a joy to watch them together. God is good.