You know, they've really done a good job with the family relationships in the show. There's such a varied mix of lifestyles: Pinkie living with the Cakes; Applejack living with her brother and grandmother; Rarity off on her own and running a business; Twilight away from her parents to study. The result is much more real, I think, than a lot of shows marketed to the same demographic, where all the characters are female and each lives alone in a separate house. (I'm thinking specifically of Strawberry Shortcake in this case, but the same basic gimmick applied to Rainbow Bright in the '80s.)