Family Week has been full of fun, informative, and family-oriented activities for all of us and it has been the source of wonderful family memories we will cherish for years. Our two sons have loved the playtime in the park in the morning from the bouncy house, to the magician, to yoga, and a shaving cream slide, they’ve loved it! And they can see so many beautiful families that are a lot like ours. We are already looking forward to the other programming available as our boys get older!
Perhaps as vitally, Family Week creates a community of other lgbtq parents and their families. It is affirming and inspiring to be around other families like ours and a reminder too of the amazing array of ways to make a family and that each, including ours, is special and significant. We also feel an inherent understanding from others and though we certainly have differences, we don’t feel we have to explain, educate others about, or even defend our family; rather, as we share, we celebrate and find empathy, respect, and a reflection of ourselves in others during Family Week more than any other part of our year.
We have also been moved and impressed by the staff who actively engage and celebrate our children and our families. Just to have the genuine smiles without the unspoken (or spoken) figuring out of ‘what kind of family’ you are is such a relief from the, sometimes, very personal challenges we face meeting a world that can be less than understanding day after day. We think husbands and fathers are wonderful, and you will meet so many during Family Week, but it is a relief to have no one asking after a husband or a father for our two-mom family or our kids this week.