Inside the Red Head's Head<p><strong>Kids Weekend</strong></p><p>Jen and the kids are texting back and forth about this weekend. They are coming home for a quick visit! I love it. I don’t have any details yet so I don’t know when or where or how or what, I just know it’s in the works. </p><p>It’s like flashing back to 2007 when we were splitting custody with the kids’ father and we had them half of the time and he had them half of the time. Literally. We alternated days. I think… and I am straining my tiny little brain to bring up these memories… we had the kids on Sundays and half of the day on Saturday… or did we have them on Fridays and then the first half of Saturday… I’m pretty sure we had them for half of every Saturday. The other six days of the week alternated between houses. </p><p>That was the schedule when I first came into the picture. The kids were age six and four at that time. I was still in my 30’s (which seems laughable for some reason… youngin’). Eventually we changed the schedule to one where they were at one house for two days, then the other for two days, and then the remaining three days would alternate. That way on any given week they would have five straight days in the same house, and each week those five days would be in a different house. It worked. </p><p>Sometimes when I think back over the years I feel sad about the time I missed. Six whole years… why couldn’t I have met Jen earlier and been around to know the kids when they were babies? Then I stop feeling like that and just feel overwhelmingly thankful for the time I have had. What a gift that time has been. What a perfect, magical, brilliant gift that Jen and Bellana and Harry have given me. They’ve let me be a small piece of their lives. I am eternally grateful for that gift. I will never be able to express how thankful I am, how honored I am, how touched I am. Really… being in their lives has been better than anything I could have ever hoped that anything could ever be. Put simply, I am just a dumb ass red head. What did I do to deserve a blessing like this? What did I do to deserve the love of three such exceptional people? I don’t know. If I did I would bottle it and sell it and be a gazillionaire. Seriously.</p><p>I guess what I am trying to say here is that I am going to see the kids this weekend and I am <em>really </em>happy about it.</p><p><a rel="nofollow noopener noreferrer" class="hashtag u-tag u-category" href="https://robertjames1971.blog/tag/college-kids/" target="_blank">#collegeKids</a> <a rel="nofollow noopener noreferrer" class="hashtag u-tag u-category" href="https://robertjames1971.blog/tag/empty-nest/" target="_blank">#emptyNest</a> <a rel="nofollow noopener noreferrer" class="hashtag u-tag u-category" href="https://robertjames1971.blog/tag/family/" target="_blank">#Family</a> <a rel="nofollow noopener noreferrer" class="hashtag u-tag u-category" href="https://robertjames1971.blog/tag/grown-up-kids/" target="_blank">#grownUpKids</a> <a rel="nofollow noopener noreferrer" class="hashtag u-tag u-category" href="https://robertjames1971.blog/tag/homecoming/" target="_blank">#homecoming</a> <a rel="nofollow noopener noreferrer" class="hashtag u-tag u-category" href="https://robertjames1971.blog/tag/kids/" target="_blank">#Kids</a> <a rel="nofollow noopener noreferrer" class="hashtag u-tag u-category" href="https://robertjames1971.blog/tag/step-kids/" target="_blank">#StepKids</a></p>