LeAnn Rimes: `There`s no `step` in our family`

The 29-year-old country singer said that although husband Eddie Cibrian's children from his previous marriage to Brandi Glanville aren't hers, she loves them just as much.

Talking about her relationship with Mason, seven, and Jake, four, on her blog, she said, 'Step. Stepmother, Stepfather, Stepchildren - the word 'step' can take on such a connotation to so many in our society. A family is a family. In my eyes. There's no 'step' about it.

'It's not easy being a stepparent, taking on a mother or father role in your new blended family and household. It can be incredibly intimidating.

'Eddie's sons, I treat as if they are my own. Eddie has always encouraged me to look at us as a family, and a part of our family are the two beautiful boys that we share with their mother and hopefully one day another wonderful man.

'One thing that I know is, I will never replace their mother,' she adds. 'I would never try. I will however love them with all I have and do everything in my power to help raise them in a loving, safe and proper environment.'