Blended Families; Who Stepped on Whom? The Trials and Treasures of Step-Parenting

Your new spouse’s children were so cute and sweet while you were dating.  Everything changed after the wedding….what on earth happened? Unfortunately, seventy percent of all second marriages fail and a large percentage of those lay the fault squarely at the bottom of the step – step-children and step-parents.  It does take two parties to have a relationship and the truth is, step-families add up to way more than a simple two-way relationship.

Julie Ziglar Norman learned quickly after her marriage to Jim Norman, which blended his three children, ages nineteen, twelve and twelve, with her six-year-old, that blending a family wasn’t a simple matter of “want to.”  Nor was it a matter of reading the right books.  Blending a family took time, patience, tolerance, love, prayer, laughter, perseverance, letting go, tears, more prayer, anger, forgiveness, groveling, and more and more prayer.

Along the way to a beautiful family there were hurt feelings, hard feelings, happy feelings, confused feelings, understandings and misunderstandings, but all of it was worth the end result.  Invite Julie to share the hardships and the humor that inevitably happen when two worlds collide and the resulting dust is required to settle into something new and workable.  Be inspired by the stories of each of her children and how earned trust and respect matured into true love and a sense of family that transcends inherited rights.