Last weekend felt blissfully normal. As a stepfamily – I think we’ve arrived at the jell-o phase, and I am so glad to be there.

On Saturday, my 17-year-old stepdaughter watched two movies about blended families – “Stepmom” and the remake of “Yours, Mine, & Ours” and declared them among her favorites. Then she wanted to know if I would get out the scrapbooking toys so we could work on a project together. I merrily obliged. We made a gigantic mess all over the dining table and no one minded.

Her brothers were over for dinner on Sunday night and we watched “Planet Earth” on the Discovery Channel after eating. The night was punctuated with comments about how I hate to eat mayonnaise, our picky eater still eats his salad with only lettuce, everyone loves warm little chocolate cakes just out of the oven, and the Dad’s jokes are still as lame as ever.

It was a far-cry from the mean-ager years when I would secretly dread the arrival of the kids and ponder privately if our lives would ever get past the boiling moments of their teens. I even wrote a column wondering if we would ever get to feel normal again. We had the slamming doors, the grunting, the eye-rolling, the emotional roller coaster swings, and even an “I hate you” explosion.

On a few occasions, I would concoct a reason to leave the house and drive away (or simply flee the premises with no excuse). I’d go up the road and pull into a church parking lot to cry and gather strength to turn around and drive back. If anyone in that church has ever seen me, they must think I am a deranged person.

Even when things were going well, it always felt like something was simmering just under the surface. And on more than one occasion – I think each of us – me, my husband, and all of his kids - have complained about feeling like we were walking around on pins and needles and afraid of upsetting someone else.

But something in our lives has changed. We’ve solidified as a stepfamily – our hurts aren’t worn on our sleeves, our flare-ups are tempered, and our feelings aren’t raw.
We’ve settled into our stepfamily and somehow gelled together. There was no magic formula – it just took a long time and a lot of patience. Those stepfamily experts were right – it does take about 4 years to hit normal and for a stepfamily to really gel. And I’m so glad we’ve apparently arrived. Here’s three ways a gelled stepfamily is like jell-o.

1. You keep your shape and have cohesion as a stepfamily group. Your stepfamily has norms and habits that its members know and reference – like Dad always tells bad jokes, the older kid always hogs the remote, and the TV is always off when “we” eat dinner.

These habits and little bits of knowledge about each other’s preferences and talents take time to build up. Repetition is key – and its redundancy may be maddening, but it’s so important. Some of these habits and routines are even mildly annoying at times, but it’s often in an endearing way.

2. You don’t slip out of the mold easily and you stick with your stepfamily. I don’t dread the arrival of the kids like I used to. I actually miss them when they are not around and I’m grateful they call us, email us, and drop by the house when they are not staying with us.

Unlike a lot of stepmoms, my husband never pushed me to do or say “I love you” to my stepkids. He simply let us grow our relationships and figured we would all work out our feelings on our own. I told my husband a few weeks ago that I love the kids. It was something that I came to on my own, which means it’s real, not forced.

3. You bounce back from a poke – or two – or three. Life as a stepfamily is never automatically easy. We have special needs as blended families and we live in a culture that isn’t always set up to best support and meet those needs. And life in general can be tough, whether or not you live a stepfamily.

When an ex-spouse goes nuclear, an adult loses a job, or a child suffers a disappointment, a stepfamily pulls together. It doesn’t implode on itself or explode onto everyone else. A gelled stepfamily can bounce back when life gets intrusive or messy. I hope you get there. And I’m so glad we’re feeling like jell-o.

Dawn Miller writes a column on life in blended families at thestepfamilylife.com. 
Visit Dawn's blog for a daily dose of life in the blender.
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