'We've made the best of it': Blended family photos
Being part of a blended family isn't always easy, but when you do it right the payoff is so worth it.
When 14-year-old Tayden Hanks was redecorating her room, she asked for updated family photos, her stepmother Kelsey Hanks told "Good Morning America."
"We've had some candid photos from other times we've been together, but we never had a real photo shoot," she said.
But when Hanks approached the other adults in Tayden's life with the idea -- her mother, Thalia Campanella and stepdad Brandon Campanella as well as her husband and Tayden's dad Tim Hanks -- everyone was game.
The family, which aside from the adults and Tayden also includes a total of four other children, see each other frequently, very often at Tayden's many sporting events.
"Our biggest thing is that we're all able to be in the same room at the same time," Kelsey Hanks. from Los Lunas, New Mexico, said. "We sit together at games, have birthday parties together. She never has to choose and we are all always there for her, always."
Hanks posted the photos by Shae's Photography to her Facebook page and in the caption, admitted having a blended family isn't always easy.
"Blended families are not always ideal, but sometimes life. just. happens," she wrote. "This is our life. This is our situation...and we have made the best out of it. Are we perfect? Far from it. Has it always been easy? Nope. But we try our best to make our daughters life the best that we can make it. After all, we all have one thing in common. We all share one thing. A daughter."
Hanks told GMA the secret to making the family work is open communication.
"We have split custody but we talk and make it work. If they need more time or we do, we can usually work it out," she said.
