I am so lucky b/c my family is the most welcoming people in the world.  My older sister also married a caucasian man so that I believe helped my parents realize that color is just that.  Sean's family is so interesting to me b/c they are the American white family but his sisters just love black men, lol.  All of Sean's nieces and nephews are half black.  So naturally they have been nothing but welcoming to me, also helps that I am completely awesome, lol.  Sean once told me that he never would have thought he would marry a black woman and I never thought I would marry a white man but when you love someone, it doesn't matter.

How does your family feel about your FI/DH and vice versa?

My FI also comes from an interracial relationship so it's pretty interesting. My family always knew I wasn't going to marry a Chinese guy b/c I'm definitely not traditional and never really dated Chinese guys - so my family is good w/FI. hehe My FI's family on the other hand - well..it's mixed. His dad is fine w/me but his mom is a different story. She's racist altogether and although she's gotten better over the years she still makes racist remarks about Chinese people (she's Japanese). When we first started dating she told my FI to "go find yourself a nice Japanese girl"..........that was the beginning of our "wonderful" relationship.

oh no Kaytanna!  that is terrible.  i hope she continues to get better!  i don't know how people do not realize that saying things like that is so hurtful!

My family LOVES Rafy. I get more joking comments about him being a yankees fan than him being hispanic.

His family, well some like me some don't. His grandma is super old fashioned and I know she has a hard time accepting the fact that Rafy didn't marry someone hispanic. which I don't really understand because Rafy's uncle married a white lady and his grandma likes her just fine. Maybe it'll take a couple years for her to come around?

His Mom brought it up one time when she was mad at me for a totally different reason all together. Her husband stirred up some drama and MIL got mad at me-this is a month before the wedding and she gives me this lecture about how we really aren't right together, I'm white/he's hispanic and we're too different blah, blah, blah. She had always liked me before I had a disagreement from him so I knew she was just finding any excuse to say we shouldn't be together. It wasn't a newsflash that I'm white!

His aunt though totally adores me and loves to joke around with me. When she introduces me to her friends she'll be like "this is my niece-yeah I know she's a little white skinned but she's cool" and gives me this huge goofy grin. we both crack up.

midnyte - Things have sort of gotten better..I guess. We had a HUGE blow up this past summer when his mom criticized my last name and how Chinese people don't know how to name their children. I still haven't spoken to his parents since May...but his mom is supposed to apologize to me....I'm still waiting...*taps foot*....

Awww Kaytana...I'm sorry!  I know how it goes though!  My parents and his parents are both so supportive of us and each of us feels like the other's parents are almost like our own.  And they treat each of us like their own, so that has been wonderful.  The extended family however....that is a completely different story. 

The eldest on his dad's side, the one who is the head of the family, was completely against us from the start, and even tried all kinds of things to hook him up with someone else while we were dating.  Now they're all pretty resigned to the fact that we will be family and are coming around. 

Part of me understands, because we aren't just interracial, we are from two completely different parts of the planet, and neither of us is perfectly fluent in the other's language and culture.  Plus, over there....foreigners are rare, really.  So they are not used to seeing people from all kinds of different backgrounds like we are here. 

But the other part of me just wishes that they would realize that people are people, no matter where they are from, and that because of our differences we may have greater obstacles, but we will also have greater rewards.  And that opening yourself up to someone so different from yourself causes you to grow, and expand your thinking, and check your own pride and selfishness; to understand things from someone else's point of view, and really communicate.  It is BECAUSE of our differences that we will grow in our marriage and union together, and not in SPITE of them. 

Even some of my friends here don't completely understand.  But we know we will be happy, and the ones closest to us fully support us, and that is good enough for us. :)

@ChildofHope: WOW, i couldn't have said it any better! :)

@ Kaytana, I really hope things get better for you and your FMIL.  That must be hard for you and your FI.

I consider myself lucky.  My parents never brought up race when it came to my dating life.  I think when they moved here from Uganda, they knew that I would most likely end up marrying an American!  They love  Matt.  It's like he's the son they never had.  My dad recently gave his testimony in our church and at the end he said a little blurb about my mom and my sister and I.  Then he said that he was looking forward to his future son-in-law who "shows much promise" in his eyes.  (Yeah, I balled)

His family is also super supportive.  When we had first started dating, his oldest brother was actually in a long term realtionship with a black girl, so I think she paved the way for me!  They ended up breaking things off, but the family is still crazy loving to me.  The only person who didn't approve was his uncle.  (keep in mind his family lives in this small deep country town)  It kind of scared me at first because Matt wouldn't let me come near him for the longest time.  Well, after two years of dating, his uncle called Matt up and told him how wrong he was to hate us together, and how seeing how great I was for Matt, he felt so ashamed.  The next time I was in town he came up to me and started talking and wanted to know if we could all go out to eat together.  I was blown away... it was a complete 180.  Just goes to show that fighting fire with fire doesn't help in all cases.  :)

Both of our families are extremely welcoming and everyone really gets along.

We are blessed!  Both of our families are open-minded and quite honestly, the interracial aspect or our relationship probably doesn't occur to them :)

*Edit:  After thinking about it, I think my interest and open mind to my DH's Persian culture was a HUGE plus with my MIL.  I know she would have loved and accepted me if I hadn't been so interested in learning about their Persian traditions and language, but I do know it definitely helped ;)

I've had some really old-school friends of my Grandparents make funny comments.  I just don't take them personally.