No family at all within even long-drive distance. We have a fantastic nanny and good friends. I’d love for my mom to live closer but we have our village.

Lots of family in the area. I wish we lived on opposite coasts from most of them.

My mom and dad live 1.5 miles away. We see them daily. My kid doesn't do overnights with them regularly but I've never had to hire a babysitter. It's pretty cool.

My mom lives with us but works FT so I'm sure she needs a break from the kids too at times (they often try to hang out in her room). Before my in-laws moved out of state and we had only had 1 kid, they would always be willing to babysit on the weekends.

Unfortunately my mom is retiring and moving to a different state next year. We have never not had help and we now have three kids. Because she is able to telework, she has come through many times for sick days when we couldn't get off, she will pick the kids up if I ask and my husband and I are always able to do late night errands just to get out the house. She also will try to have dinner ready when we get home and does a lot of the cleaning.

However, having another adult in the house has caused a strain on our marriage on top of the kids so this transition will be quite interesting. My husand will definitely have to step it up with household tasks. It will be nice to have our own space and I wish she would just move nearby. We do have extended family nearby who we get together with occasionally but they have never watched my kids.

We have no family in the area. Parents are each a 2-3 hour drive in other parts of the country. Nearest sib is about a 4-hr drive away; we see them once a year. It was similar for me growing up--grandparents were living in different countries, and I'd see them about once a year.

We make do, but it's more expensive. For example, I have to travel for a conference, and my spouse can't take care of our kid given odd work hours--so I'm bringing the kid with me and using the conference-provided childcare. Then, spouse will meet us the next day and take over childcare.

The alternative was seeing if our good friends would be able to take care of our child (and they have several kids, so we don't like to ask them unless dire circumstances). So again, we make do. It's part of the reason we stopped at one kid.

Our closest family is a two hour flight away.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Lots of drama. Absolutely no help, even in an emergency.

Same here, sadly.

Us, too. Please, tell me, what's it like to have functional, financially and emotionally stable family?

We have functional, financially and emotionally stable family who lives across the country but we visit with every 2-3 months. Sometimes DH's parents come for 3-4 days and the FIL flies home to go back to work and MIL stays for a total of two weeks. They're super helpful (a smidge into gender stereotypes).

- FIL will fix, hang, etc., anything. He's down for any household project.
- MIL will take the kids to the farmer's market
- One time they came a week before Halloween and when I came home from work MIL was sitting on a drop cloth spread out in the living room with both DD's stripped to their diapers, scooping out pumpkins and making a huge mess. I would never have done that with them.
- FIL will do tons of yard work
- They will read the same stories four times in a row
- MIL will bake breakfast muffins with the kids
- They clean up after themselves and encourage the kids to follow our rules
- They try to pay for groceries (we don't let them) and will pay for a couple of meals out

How beautiful - we have my mom 20 minutes away and she helps us a ton but not like that! She's 70 years old still drives and lives independently so we don't want to overburden her with the kids, so we ask for help strategically, like when I'm traveling for work, she'll come to the house before they get home, take them to sports and generally serve as the adult in the house while they have a snack and do homework until DH comes home. If and when I become a grandparent, I hope to be as helpful as possible to my kids, and would definitely be a little more proactive assuming I'm in good health. Amen

Anonymous wrote:We do and it's great. I used to take it for granted until I started reading on here about people struggling with raising their kids because they don't have any local family.

Both sets of parents are in town and they help us quite a bit. I'm close with my parents and I feel able to go to them for help whenever I need a babysitter in a pinch (sick day, snow day, appointment, etc.). They often take my kids to their activities.

My in laws pick up my kids and feed them dinner once a week. They also fill in for my husband whenever he is out of town (H and I split drop off and pick up - when he's OOT, my in laws do the pick ups).

It would be really hard not to have this level of support and a safety net to land.

Yeah, you’re very fortunate.

Nope, and it sucks. It sucked more when they were young. Now that they are older, is still sucks but in a different way. Its hard for the kids to form a close bond with someone 5 hours away. We aren't travel people and neither are either set of grandparents. I see my parents twice a year and DH's parents once or twice a year depending on if we go on a vacation.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Lots of drama. Absolutely no help, even in an emergency.

Same here, sadly.

Us, too. Please, tell me, what's it like to have functional, financially and emotionally stable family?

We have functional, financially and emotionally stable family who lives across the country but we visit with every 2-3 months. Sometimes DH's parents come for 3-4 days and the FIL flies home to go back to work and MIL stays for a total of two weeks. They're super helpful (a smidge into gender stereotypes).

- FIL will fix, hang, etc., anything. He's down for any household project.
- MIL will take the kids to the farmer's market
- One time they came a week before Halloween and when I came home from work MIL was sitting on a drop cloth spread out in the living room with both DD's stripped to their diapers, scooping out pumpkins and making a huge mess. I would never have done that with them.
- FIL will do tons of yard work
- They will read the same stories four times in a row
- MIL will bake breakfast muffins with the kids
- They clean up after themselves and encourage the kids to follow our rules
- They try to pay for groceries (we don't let them) and will pay for a couple of meals out

That sounds amazing. You're incredibly lucky.

Anonymous wrote:What is it like to have your family living nearby as part of your "village"?

You create your own village.
My folks moved here after retirement. We see them once every week or two. They are wonderful grandparents with independent lives. I do not ask for free anything from them. That's not a village, that's taking advantage.

Our family isn't from DC, but both my sister and I live in the area, while our parents are in Charleston, SC. She lives 5 mins away from me and was single up until a few years ago. They don't want kids, so no cousins, but she's helped me out in a pinch many a time. She's taken off work once or twice when my kids were much younger and sick and my husband and I simply couldn't take the time off ourselves. She often offers to watch the kids, even though they're old enough to be alone for awhile, because she loves them and wants to spend time. She also watches our dog when we go on vacation and has made me promise her to give her the right of first refusal and that I would never send him to be boarded.

Oh this again. Op, give it a rest

We live here because we family is close. My sister and her family and my parents are all very close. We see my parents weekly for dinner and they do last minute child care when they are in town and if we can’t take the day off. We dont rely on them for day to day care but can leave town and they will watch the kids. They also do occasionally baby sitting.

We see in-laws 1-3 times a year.

I really count my blessings because I have my mother-in-law father-in-law and sister-in-law and cousin living nearby so that has been a huge help. I basically never had to pay for babysitting. Our cousin is a nanny and nannyed for our daughter (we paid her) for a while and that was fantastic.