Who is Family?

First of all I need to finally send out a huge thank you to Jason Breeden for creating my banner. He did a great job and I love it!

So, the day that all us singles dread is approaching. Yep, Valentine’s Day has returned. I have always enjoyed Valentine’s Day, in a relationship or not. I think they both have their perks, and I didn’t realize this until I stopped moping around on Valentine’s Day.

When I did that, I realized that Valentine’s Day is what you make it. There are other people you can celebrate your love for besides your significant other. I usually get little cards and put some fancy chocolate in it and give them out to all my friends and family. Yesterday I received my first Valentine of the year. It was handmade from my niece and it is probably the best Valentine I have ever gotten! I’m not her aunt by blood, my title is honorary.

It got me thinking about those people that are so close to us, they are almost considered family. I heard somewhere that your friends are the family that you pick for yourself. I know that some of us have more of these friends than others, and I wonder how much having a stable family or not effects that. There are very many people who make up my “family’ and very few actually are.

Harry didn’t really have a family when we first meet him. He technically had family in Petunia, Vernon, and Dudley, but I doubt he thought of them that way. When we last see Harry, he has gathered a whole slew of friends that make up his adopted family, and I wonder if he would have sought these people to be close to if he had had his mom and dad around.

First of all is Hagrid, who I see as kind of an uncle to Harry, Arthur and Lupin would be ones as well. Hermione and Ron seem to fit the brother and sister role, with the Weasley twins as his cousins. Dumbledore is a grandfatherly figure, and Professor McGonagall and Molly as his aunts. Surius would be a father or uncle to Harry. I’m sure there are others as well.

I really like this whole idea of family not being only your blood family, but all your loved ones.

So make sure you tell all your loved ones you love them this Valentine’s. Happy Valentine’s Day everyone!

“She’s like my sister’ he went on. “I love her like a sister and I reckon she feels the same way about me. It’s always been like that.”

face=”Tahoma”>Spoken by Harry in chapter 19 of Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows