Seventeen

Today is my sister's 17th birthday- how is this possible?!

 [There's a huge age gap between us. My parents had thier boy and girl so my dad got fixed. Years later, my mom wanted another one so he got it reversed and they had my sister. My mom always wishes she would've had another one because my sister's basically an only child. My brother and I were both out of the house and living across the country by the time she was 8.]

Last night I was telling Aiden it was going to be Rae's birthday and then Steven and I started talking about how we couldn't believe she was 17. He asked where I was when I turned 17 [its so hard to keep up since we moved so much during high school.] I thought about it and realized I was here! The month I came to visit Rebecca I was here on my birthday. Now that I have kids, I can't believe my parents let me leave for a whole month and then fly alllll the way back to Japan all by myelf. I don't think I could let Rian do that. And I'm pretty sure my Mom would NEVER let Rachel do it, that's her baby.

On my 17th birthday my bff Rebecca's mom took us to dinner at Carrow's [now my sister and mother-in-law.] Kathy got a strawberry daiquiri and got us virgins. We wore matching outfits haha! We were such dorks, but it makes me smile. When we got home, Rebecca was on the computer and I put my head on the kitchen table and fell asleep for a little bit. [I don't know why I remember that.] That night I'm sure we hung out with Jason, Andres and Jesse like we did almost every night that month. So much fun. Steven called me that day, he's called me on every one of my birthdays- except when he was in Mississippi.

Here's a picture of us when I was 17.