Blessings With a Little Curse Thrown In

I cannot believe that for the first time since my mother's death, I had a nice Thanksgiving. We went to my brother's, and it was small and intimate. No one was upset, no one was fighting. There was no fighting back tears during grace, and for once, the feeling of someone missing was not there. Not to say that I didn't think of my mom at all, because of course I did. It was just this Thanksgiving there was a happy feel, instead of the usual sad 'I can't wait until this is over' feel. My dad's new wife's son joined us, and I must say that I really like him. He fits in very well. He's also a dog lover, which is a plus to me! Actually, he rescued a Katrina dog, which I think was a great thing to do. Add all of that to my brother's improved health, and we were overflowing with blessings this year.

Afeter dinner, my nieces. stepmother and I worked on some crafts and generally had a good time talking. It was so nice. No drama, just relaxing and calm fun. Poor hubby had to meet with his sister the next day for coffee and to 'talk' about their relationship. I don't know how many times you can talk about the same thing and get anywhere new as this was the fourth such discussion, but he went. Turns out my husband's family has set up accounts for the boys to use for college, weddings, a house whatever, which by itself would seem like a nice thing. The not so nice part of it is they have hubby's sister as the one in control of it. She decides when, or for what, and how it will be distributed to them. Hubby is in finance; that's his job. I understand not wanting me to be on the account because they blame me for everything, but their own son who they know would make sure the boys were taken care of and the money used properly, now that I don't get. Besides the fact that hubby's sister is terrible with money. She didn't even have a savings account until she was married, and credit card debt...yikes! So it's not about what's best for the boys. It never has been. They have held their money over our heads since we announced our engagement. They try use their money to control us, not to help. Anyway, my ILs basically used my SIL as a gopher. She kept bringing up things about their parents. Like, that my ILs are now willing to see a psychologist/mediator with us. That was on the table a year ago, and was not accepted by them because they aren't the ones with the problem. Then my SIL says that the ILs don't understand why they can't have a relationship with the boys. Hubby was firm in saying if they don't have a relationship with us, they can't have one with the boys. That would only confuse them. As it is, they haven't seen hubby's sister since last February because each time she has come into town, she didn't want to deal with what her parents would say when she comes back from seeing us. It's so sad. So basically she sends the boys gifts, but never calls to talk to them or comes to visit even when she's only 20 minutes away. And her husband hasn't seen them since Tot's christening because he is not happy with us. Whatever. They had only been married a year, and lived in another state, when this all went down so he has no idea what hubby's family is really like. Besides I could go into details about his first marriage that made me downright leery of him, but I decided to get to know him first before I made up my mind. He chose not to do the same. I guess they are now trying to have a baby which would take some of the pressure off of our kids as well as us. Anyway, hubby told his sister that things will not change in regards to his parents, so for them to try to have a friendship-type relationship. No talk of the family problems. She feels she's in the middle, and hubby feels that no matter what she says nothing is changing, so it's best for them both to let it go. We'll see how that goes. When will this ever end???

At any rate, I did have my mom's family over last night, and everything went SO well. This has been the best Thanksgiving weekend in many, many years, and for that I'm thankful.