BFFLs

I'm all about my best friends and especially my best friends for life.  I am close to a bunch of friends from elementary school, a few (including my husband) that I met in high school, a select few from college and a few from my professional work as a teacher, from town, and my neighborhood.  I'm not someone who knows everyone.  My friends and family say I'm an extrovert.  But I'm not.  Only with them.  I'm the one that sits at the end of the soccer field with my family and watches the game.  I don't know everyone in the crowd.  I'm a little socially awkward with people I don't know.  My friends don't believe me.  I am content.  Happy with the friends I have.  I just wish I got to see them more!  I make friends for life.  So careful.  If you want to be in my inner circle you better be prepared to stay awhile!

Getting together for one of our reunions & our 40th birthdays

BFFL is the new term for best friends for life.  Kids sign off on birthday cards and texts with this acronym.  My girls just assume they will be friends for life with their closest friends because I am.    I hope they are.  That would be wonderful!  Many of my friends have known each other since elementary school.  My friends are the ones that got me through the peer pressure years of high school where we all were part of "Club Goody Two Shoes!" Not everyone was happy when we showed up at parties in high school.  We were class officers, in honor society, prom queens, homecoming queens and presidents, vice-presidents, and officers of clubs- thus the nickname.  We were the field hockey team that had fun but weren't that competitive.  If we knocked someone down on the other team we would stop to help them up.  We didn't always have it easy.  There were eating disorders, tragic deaths of peers and parents, and the usual teenage stuff.  But we watched each other's backs and no one felt peer pressured to do anything we didn't want to do because we had each other.

A few of us were together even back in 4th grade!

I love my friends from home and their children.  Our kids are growing up knowing each other as their "Nashoba cousins".  We get together as frequently as possible for ladies nights, beer brewing nights, and pretty consistently for big get togethers at Christmas and in the summer each year for a big BBQ.  There are get togethers in between of some families with dinners, and camping, and playdates.  The kids have known each other since they were babies.  We all attended each others baby showers and many visited new borns in the hospital.  They blend together like cousins.  Old and young, boys and girls, sisters and brothers and friends.  When we get together the parents sit and talk and marvel that we are so happy our kids are friends.  The kids go off in small groups or play one giant game together.  We hope to emulate one of our friend's get togethers with her mom's best friends from college who they grew up knowing as their "Colby cousins".  They grew up getting together like we do and attended each other's weddings and are friends into adulthood.  Now their children are growing up knowing each other too.  We hope that one day (even if they don't marry each other) they will at least attend each other's weddings.  What a great group of friends for life.

We love Summers because we get to catch up with our friends that don't live in town with us.  We see best friends for long fun days at the beach, exploring Rockport or just going mini golfing for the afternoon.   We meet up with others for our annual camping trip or New Years Eve.  Birthday parties, the Bolton Fair, baby showers and back yard get togethers are all excuses to see one another.  Sometimes we all go apple picking together or have a potluck dinner at one of our houses.  We try to do family days and couples nights out mixed in with a few ladies nights here and there.  Wish we could fit it in more often!  Life is busy with all of us and our kids many different schedules.  Our friendships are strong and when our kids are grown up we will still get together because we are best friends for life.  A sneak peak into some of our get togethers...

Love you all.  And I love that our children all love each other too!