The Wonders Of Family

Now those that know me know that my contact with my family is pretty non-existent. They are all quite dysfunctional and seeing as I consider MYSELF to be pretty dysfunctional on most of my good days anyway you can be rest assured that I really really REALLY mean these people are just plain crazy. (With the exception of Nana Pat and those that I haven't seen since I was like 10 - who knows you may be sane by now)

Well just when I thought I was destined to just me and mine up pops Marianne and Emilie.

Marianne is my sister who was adopted out before I was born and you guessed it Emilie is my niece.

I met Marianne about 12 years ago when I super sleuth (aka pushy bugger annoying everyone and anyone with the same surname as her adoptive family) tracked her down.

We met up and she even came to my wedding - my undercover wedding guest - that's right no one in my family knew she was there. Hehehehe I thought it was pretty funny actually, was probably bloody hard for poor Marianne but hey this was a quite a few years ago and we where much younger and sillier back then. (Ok we where younger)

To cut a long story short we did loose touch for a number of years and a couple of months ago I got a simple message on facebook.

'Was your maiden name Alps'

And there started our email relationship.

I was, and am still amazed at the incredible similarities we have despite our long separations through life.

Even better was to come however as last week Marianne and Emilie moved to Tasmania to be closer to her parents who retired to a nearby town a few years ago.

I spent yesterday afternoon with my sister and my niece and it was just amazing.

For me there has been no strange getting to know you guys phase, she is my sister and always will be, she is so strangely normal compared to the rest of our blood only relations that I feel like I have found a little piece of me that was missing.

Emilie is just the cutest little moppet you could ever hope to have for a niece, and even though it was the first time I had ever met her she stole a little piece of my heart yesterday and I am afraid it is lost to her forever.

They will be living in the same town as me and I am so excited that I find myself catching my breath and not being able to quite believe how amazing it will be to have a sister and a niece!