As a military family, we have never lived close to my parents and the relationship is strained. My husband’s parents passed the first year we married. My kids don’t have grandparents! It’s hard to have a village when the village doesn’t exist or shuns you.

Thank you, Maree. We didn’t expect to get grandchild #2 this quickly, so we’re very excited about it!

Congratulations on another grandbaby coming! But I feel your pain with the distance on that side. 🙁 My youngest daughter Jenna lives near me, so when she has grandchildren, I’ll be very close by. I guess if I had to choose, maybe it’s best to have the furthest ones first, since I’m more free to travel back and forth to Morgan’s house now, AND I still have some energy to do it. 🙂

I hope this book will give you some useful tips. I found it very helpful, maybe not so much for the baby stage, but definitely as time goes by!

Oh, I feel what you’re saying, Kela. My daughter’s in-laws live 2 miles away, and I’m 3 hours away. So the other grandmother gets to see our grandbaby tons more than me. Thankfully she’s a wonderful woman! 🙂 I really admire her very much, so it makes it easier.

However, that doesn’t remove my own desire to see my granddaughter more myself. Sigh. My season of life is a little different than yours, though, since I no longer have any kids in the house. I’m more free to take off and go for a visit when I feel the need.

I so appreciate you sharing your situation here. I’m sure many can relate to exactly what you’re saying! I want to follow your example and check my heart often. God can work all things out for our good—and for our grandbabies’ good, too, with or without our weekly presence. 🙂 Blessings to you!

My biggest issue is dealing with jealousy. We’re in a season of life where we still have children at home; with all of their activities and jobs to work, so picking up and seeing the grands and doting on them (monetarily or with gifts) isn’t the way I pictured it would be.
They have the other set of grandparents that can pick up and go visit for days on end AND buy, treat, and extravagantly spoil them…and I have to admit, that it (wrongly) has me feeling “some kind of way”.

I have to often check my heart and remember the season that we’re in and its not about out-doing one another, but loving the babies in the way that we can.

Yes, the idea doesn’t have to apply only to grandparents but to any of us! I’m sure you are shining a light in your relatives’ lives, Carlie. It just takes a little more intention on our parts to be “present” when we have that distance to bridge. But God always keeps us close regardless of where we are.

Thanks, Joanne! We’re very excited! I love your advice to pray, pray, pray. I’m already praying for the newest one. Seeing her on the ultrasound (and finding out she’s a “she”) makes it all so real!