my twin

No, we're not really twins. I just like to say that we were twins in the womb, me coming out a few (16) months before her.  We've got a pretty rich history together, Em and I.  From the many games we played while we were supposed to be sleeping to the imaginary world we created in our tree house.  One of my favorite memories is when we went over to our neighbors house and captured somewhere between 20 and 30 butterflies and took them up to our shared room.  We let them fly free during the day and then at night we put them either in our butterfly net or in the window between the screen and glass.  To this day I'm not sure if our parents know about our butterfly garden we kept for a few weeks in our room (us four kids are pretty good at keeping live things from our parents. Like the story of how we got our late cat, Bella.  We found her at the bus stop one day and fell pretty in love with her.  We hid her in our garage for a few weeks, feeding her cheerios and stolen cat food from the neighbors. Knowing our parents' strict "no pets" rule, we decided that if we gave her to our mom for her birthday, then she could not possibly say "no" to our sweet stray cat.  And what do you know? They said "yes"!). 

Growing up, though, Em and I have always been pretty close (you know why I'm throwing you a hard nudge here, Em (; ).  And despite our many, many, many, many differences, it's never slowed or faltered our relationship.  I think I always took advantage of how close we were until my first year here at school and I realized how much I missed her.  AND THEN I thought the world was ending when she almost made the wrong decision to attend Wright University.  So you can imagine my pure excitement when she chose to come here!

And I don't think we've taken advantage of each other both being here as much as we should, but when we do get to sneak in a lunch or dinner, it's always so, so, so good.  Today we grabbed lunch and it was so good to catch up on her life and then do the same for her with mine.  It's so cool to see how God is working in both of us and how much we're both growing as women.  

Emily is really shining here in school and also especially on the rowing team.  I am really enjoying watching her come into her own and learn to live more independently.  She sure is making our family proud with all her accomplishments thus far into her college career.  And even though I've struggled a bit with just HOW well she's doing here (like, she is mastering this whole college thing), I'm at a place now where I can be full of excitement and joy for her as she continues to grow as a child of God.  

My confession: I love you, Em. And I love our spontaneous (and planned) mini-dates.  I'm so incredibly proud to call you my little sister and so, so glad we are both at the same school right now.  I love you forever (can't wait to marry those twin brothers we talked about when we were little and living in neighboring homes!).