Diversity in Families

When you hear the word family, what do you think of? Do you think of your parents, siblings, or maybe memories you've had with your family? What comes first to my mind is good times and memories, lots of laughter, but also of my family unit and how close we are.

Each person thinks of family differently because we all grew up in different family units. So then what is family?
~An online dictionary states that family is "a basic social unit consisting of parents and their children, considered as a group, whether dwelling together or not."
~Our Marriage and Family book says that family is "a group united by marriage or cohabitation, blood, and/or adoption in order to satisfy intimacy needs and/or bear and socialize children."
~The church put out a statement in 1995 entitled "The Family: A Proclamation to the World." In there it states "WE, THE FIRST PRESIDENCY and the Council of the Twelve Apostles of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, solemnly proclaim that marriage between a man and a woman is ordained of God and that the family is central to the Creator’s plan for the eternal destiny of His children."

All these definitions tell us the different aspects of family and what it could be, but as Lauer tells us "families vary across time, among societies, and within societies. The family unit is continually changing and each family is different due to their society, culture, and even location. Although people are a like in several aspects, each person brings in something different and new into a family which helps create that diversity in a family.