Hellobee

Both my partner and I come from small immediate families, but somewhat large, extended Filipino families. I am an only-child and he is the oldest of three with one younger brother and one younger sister. All of our parents have at least five siblings and we both have five or more cousins on each side, many of whom are now marrying and growing their own families! Growing up I had a couple cousins that I was close with in Illinois prior to moving to California where my extended family increased three-fold. My partner’s family mostly lives in California with some on the East Coast as well. My family on the other hand is more spread out across the US and the Philippines. Having a large extended family has its positives and negatives which I will go into more depth below.

Positive: While my kids may be the youngest on both sides of our family (for now!), they still have a lot of relatives to play with during family gatherings. Also, so.many.baby-sitters! Enough said.

Negative: Birthday parties are no small feat for us. We are often conflicted with who to invite to what events in our children’s lives. Do we invite just our parents’ siblings families? Do we also need to include family friends? What about our college friends who have become family? Oftentimes our party guest list is about 100 -120 people. We are fortunate enough that our house is able to able to hold that many people inside and outside, but I dread the day when our families outgrow our house!

Positive: Being the youngest, means our kids get a lot of hand-me-down clothes and toys – most of which are still in mint condition! They also get lots of presents on their birthdays and during Christmas.

Negative: Gift-giving during Christmas time is quite an intensive shopping experience for us. We actually have a category in our budget titled “Christmas Gifts,” because yes we must budget for the amount that we spend on a yearly basis!

Positive: Our kids are used to being around crowds of people. A family gathering usually has at least 10 people and at most 200; so they are not strangers to meeting new people. With that, the kids are exposed to a variety of personalities. They know how to adapt to different people’s demeanors and can handle social situations well. They are also comfortable being taken care of by other people.

Negative: While StarCakes is comfortable being the center of attention and warms up pretty quickly, GemCakes takes a bit longer to warm up to a new situation and new people. It can get even more overwhelming for her when all the relatives want to hold her, greet her and play with her, making her more scared and hesitant to let go initially.

Positive: We have at least one family gathering per month because of birthdays/baptisms/graduations/anniversaries/etc. It’s great because we get to see our families frequently and our kids get familiar with their relatives.

Negative: The bad part is when events conflict and we have to figure out how to shuffle the kids from one event to the next in the same day. This was especially difficult when they were younger and needed more than one nap. There are also times when we have had to choose one event over the other because of timing and location.

Positive: When we visit family in other states or countries we have locals who we can stay with and who can show us around.

Negative: It is tough to get together with our out-of-state/country relatives on a frequent basis. We see my Illinois relatives once a year, but have yet to visit family in the Philippines. So we often keep in touch through social media. Luckily, social media has improved since our childhood so it is not as difficult to text, Facebook, or Google Chat with relatives a state or country away.

This picture was taken during my daughter’s baptism. It doesn’t even include both sides of our families!

Positive: There are so many people to share in the joyous events of our lives and there are so many people cheering us on in our endeavors. We have a huge support system and community and wouldn’t trade that for anything.

Negative: Everyone knows everyone’s business and rumors spread like wildfire. If I tell one auntie, I basically told the whole family a secret!

Positive: While most of our relatives speak English, many still speak Filipino, Tagalog and Bisaya. The Filipino community is diverse in and of itself, so within our family our kids get to hear two different Filipino dialects. They also get to practice Filipino signs of respect, like calling older cousins Kuya or Ate and practicing mano po with their elders. There’s definitely no negative to that!

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Do your parents come from large families? What do you love or dislike about having a large or small extended family?