Friends Like Gems

"A friend should be one in whose understanding and virtue we can equally confide, and whose opinion we can value at once for its justness and its sincerity. " -Robert Hall

I am lucky, and Maeve is lucky, to have the friends that we do.  We have single friends that are so kind and flexible with us and scheduling, and love to play with Maeve, we have friends with older kids who remember what it was like, and are likewise kind and flexible.  But the most surprising friends, the ones who I feel so lucky and blessed to have, are our friends with kids Maeve's age.

Across the street is a little boy a year and a half older than Maeve, and his six month old brother, and his mommies.  B's mommies are such kind people, as I was reflecting on with my Husband last night. Raising a kid can feel like such a lonely job, when only a few of your friends are in that same stage of life, and I was starting to feel like almost no one "out there" was doing things the same way we were.  And when we moved into this house and started to get to know our neighbors, I was just blown away to meet more parents with more or less the same philosophy as us.  Parents I did not fear offending by the way I raise Maeve, parents I did not feel were a poor influence on her, either.  B's mommies are a rare gem, and they're just across the street!

Our other parent friends who I'm thinking about today are not quite as surprising a find, as I had known K's dad when we were in college.  But to reconnect after eight years and find we had kids nearly the same age, and had a similar parenting philosophy?  Golden.  And it's been so fun watching Maeve and K play and learn together, I can't wait until they're older and really start to interact more.  And I hope they get along, because we plan on spending lots of quality time with K's parents!

The best part of today: Maeve gets to play with B and K, both!  She is going to be so happy! We have so many cool people in our lives, we are so lucky to know all of you.  If you're reading this, chances are, you're one of the people I'm grateful for, too.  So just know that we appreciate you, you are all rare gems that we could ourselves so blessed to have found.

Maeve and K on the 4th.  Cuteness!