Quality vs Quantity

 We've all dealt with the quality vs quantity in a variety of aspects in our lives. The brand new five bedroom home vs the four bedroom 95-year old house that has been taken care of. The sporty two-seater sports car vs the SUV that can seat you and three friends! 

My quality vs quantity today comes in the form of family-mainly birth order, which by the way NO one has control over. Quality family time is more important than quantity. You can spend 24 hours together and make great memories the same as spending four days together and making memories. It is all in what you do with the time. How you spend it. What you do. The fun you have. 

The same goes for birth order. Let me explain, I was no doubt an oops baby. It happens and I always like to think and I know, I was planned, just as all babies, regardless of their birth order, by God.

I constantly take flack, ribbing and hear-every single time I am with them, the term "baby of the family' and spoiled. Yes I am. I have absolutely NO control over this. But here are a few thoughts about this and may be something we all need to think about. 

-the oldest or only-that child that makes you a parent. So exciting and fun to see the firsts and learn as your child learns. You make mistakes and you spoil as well. 

-the middle child-often the missed or forgotten child and the rebel. Don't know if this is true and any good parent would never let this happen, but life gets in the way at times. Why buy new when you've got perfectly good hand me down, and all of a sudden the middle child is the "forgotten" or "neglected". No they are not, they get the same stuff, just slightly used, but still just as good and given with the same amount of LOVE. 

-youngest-"spoiled" and the "baby" of the family. Not by choice. Yes some youngest kids are spoiled rotten, just as some "only" children are. I've got four only children nieces and nephews and they got more and had more than my three kids ever had. Why? I don't know. Does it make them "special" or "spoiled" I don't care. Parents do the best they can. It is what it is. I choose not to label. They have all grown up to be good people. 

But here is my take, because time after time, after time I hear the "youngest" or "baby" or "spoiled" terms used almost every time I have a conversation with my siblings...

I didn't get as much time with my parents as the older siblings did. I lost my dad when I was not quite 36 and my mom when I was still in my 40's. I know of people who bury parents when they are in their 60s and 70s. That's a lot of years they get to spend with their parents, making memories and learning from them. I was a young mom when my dad passed away-my kids don't have years and years of memories that my older nieces do, my oldest son was just 10 years old. My dad and I had a close bond. My spoiled time with my dad was sitting on the back step on beautiful summer evenings as dad would take off his work shoes and socks, empty the cuffs on his overalls and we'd watch the cats and kittens play. We'd talk and laugh and if that is being spoiled, then yes I was spoiled. I have those memories. But I know dad did this ritual of taking off his shoes every evening outside when the weather would permit for many, many years before I was born and long after I left home. 

My mom taught me a ton of life lessons, from how to bake to how to find the fun and laugh. My mom could make doing dishes or testing the moisture content of grain a fun experience....so many memories of life and growing up. 

I always got drug along when my parents would go "visiting" with no one to play with. I didn't have anyone to play with most of my childhood, except for my nieces. I would have to entertain myself....maybe this is why I got a pony that was shared with my brothers. Or why I got things that the older siblings didn't get, also besides the fact that my parents probably had more money than when they were new parents with the first three or four kids. Just a fact. Not my fault. 

The point that I want to make in all of this is my siblings got a lot more time with my parents, they got quantity and quality-or whatever they made of it. I got quality and not much quantity, and I chose to make memories and enjoy the time. 

None of us know how much time we have, be it with someone we love or our own lives but our birth order has nothing to do with anything. Was I spoiled-according to my siblings standards, yes, but I'm pretty sure I had nephews and nieces who had more "stuff" that I ever had or wanted. I didn't need stuff to measure my parents love for me, regardless of my place in our family birth order. I have memories and lots of them and if that makes me spoiled, then yes I'm spoiled. I got to travel to see my sister and other relatives,  just like my older siblings did. I got memories and fun from those experiences.

At my age the baby and spoiled term brought up over and over again is OLD. I treasure the times I have with my siblings who are 16, 14, 10 and 7 years older than me. There is no closeness in age to my brothers and sisters that they share. I'm the tag along. I've been forgotten-people thought I was a grand daughter at my own mom's funeral visitation. Or just plain didn't remember me at my dad's funeral visitation. Oh well, this does not make or break who I am. Yes I typically had the oldest parents in the crowd and I'd hear people say to my parents, 'wow, you've got one that young"! Yep, they did. It's just how things worked out. I remember cleaning like it was the end of the world when my older sisters would come home to visit, it was a big deal and a celebration. Mom would cook and be so happy to have them coming home-fun and exciting times at home. 

But here is one thing I do know, my parents were proud of all of us in our own unique ways. And I have no doubt they still are regardless of our "birth order".  So here is what I have to say, get over it. grown up, move on and treasure what you had with our parents. We all were very blessed with great parents and they loved us all the same, but in different ways, but non the less, all the same. I never felt favored or slighted. 

And remember it is quality vs quantity...and all in how you view it.