Aaron and I are always trying to keep our extended Family close to us as much as possible. It is very difficult because of course everyone has their own lives, live in different states and some how these days people find it hard to on top of their ‘very busy’ lives pick up a phone, send an ‘actual’ email or mail a card….
We are not those people we try to always recognize Birthdays, Holidays, Births etc……We always try to make phone calls once a month or to stay in touch to see how people are doing and update people on our status of things as well.
Unfortunately, no one else in our huge extended Family really does this. We normally find things out when we make our phone call to a family member who is in the know or from reading other family members blogs.
Anyway, a week or so ago we found out from Aaron’s Grandmother that his cousin & wife are expecting their first child in March 2009. We were so excited for them that Aaron immediately picked up the phone and called them with congratulations. Since we are the type of people who like to validate peoples life events we also decided to send them an early Baby Gift.
We sent them a package courtesy of RalphLauren.com , we recieved notification that the package was delivered on 9/13 via Fedex but left at the front door. On Tuesday we were talking and found it odd that we hadnt received a call of thanks and I said to Aaron maybe we had better call since it was left at the front door and they live in an apartment complex, let’s make sure they actually got the package.
Aaron calls his cousin to find out that they indeed did not receive a package. Aaron kept explaining to his cousin that it was confirmed for delivery on Saturday that it was left at the front door of the apartment. With that his cousin tells him they don’t live in the apartment anymore that they moved awhile ago…..
UGH!!! If only some one had updated us this nice gesture would not have turned into such a nightmare because as of today 9/19 they still have yet to retrieve the gift from their old address. I put a call in to RalphLauren.com last evening (thank god customer service is open until 11pm) and they are putting a FedEx recall on the item but the problem is they will only reconfirm that it was delivered to the address they were provided they cannot reroute the package so the problem remains with Aaron’s Cousin still having to go to their old apartment everyday to try and retrieve the gift from the current tenants.
- Unless of course the current tenants just saw a package from Ralph Lauren and thought hmmmm no body here by that name must be mine now…….
I wouldnt be so upset if it were just a card or something small but for 1st Babies we like to go over the top and we all know RalphLauren.com is a bit over the top….
MORAL of the Story: Check to be sure you have updated Family info!
If you have a major life event like:
- MOVING or CHANGE OF ADDRESS
- CHANGE OF PHONE NUMBER
- Birth of or expecting a child
- Death of a Loved one
(included: such as if something were to happen to my brother in-laws mother, father, siblings etc)
- Graduation
- Life altering medical illness etc……
PLEASE SEND A NOTE TO YOUR EXTENDED FAMILY
-or-
DEVELOP a CALL CHAIN where people call one another throughout the Family to update those who may not live close by or be ‘in the know’
Its soooo sad to me that the FAMILY UNIT no longer exists anymore….
Its a shame the elders of the Families are just left to flounder while the 20’s -50’s are ‘busy’ with their things and the children of the 20’s-50’s dont know who their extended Family members even are, some barely even know who their own grandparents are on one side of the Family or the other and that’s Just WRONG!!
} The Mrs {
This is page one of the interview…..
