Kids in a House with a Grandparent

We moved back to Arizona from Texas because I wanted my children to know their family. That's still the truest sentence I have for this house.

My mom was taking care of my grandmother, Donna Hancock, when my mom was diagnosed with cancer for the third time. We came home. Our two kids live under the same roof as their grandparents, my dad Mick and my mom Terrilyn, and, for a while, under the same roof as Donna too. Donna lived with us until she passed a little over a year ago. While she was here, it was four generations. It is three now.

I wrote the household itself in One Roof, Three Generations. This piece is about the part of that life that includes children and grandparents in the same ordinary day.

I didn't want my kids' knowledge of their family to depend on visits we might or might not make. I wanted it to be the house they live in: the same kitchen, the same table, the same people in the morning and at night. Living close was the point of coming home, and living under one roof is how close it became.

If a story is theirs to tell, it stays off the page. What I can say is the arrangement itself. They are growing up in a house with their grandparents in it. They knew their great-grandmother as someone who lived with them, not as a name in a story about a place we used to visit.

More of our family lives down the road as well: my brother Tyler, his wife Sanni, and their six kids, and my brother Jared and his wife Allie, who is expecting. That matters to the same wish. The kids have family in the house and family nearby. The fact of it is enough.

What takes patience is not a mystery, and it's not a crisis. It's the ordinary friction of people at different ages sharing a kitchen and a calendar. A door that is allowed to close. A meal that can land without becoming two dinners. A little room for a slower body and a little room for a child's day. I wrote about those practical pieces in Cooking for Every Generation, When Schedules Don't Line Up, and Privacy in a Full House.

I don't want to sell this as a perfect education in family life. It's a real household. Some days are easy. Some are not. The reason we moved still holds on both kinds of day: the kids know their family because their family is here.

My mom, Terrilyn Miller, lives with us and will write for this site, especially about food. If you are thinking about a move like ours, I hope you'll read What I'd Tell Someone About to Move In With Family. The practical advice is in that piece. This one is simpler. I wanted my children to know their family. We came home, and this is the house that made room for that.