Friday Flashback: "Stand Next to Your Sister."

It's been a few months since I've seen my big brother and I've been thinking about him a lot lately, especially when I see the girls playing together, laughing together, watching cartoons together... all the same things I did with my own brother when I was young.

Not to mention, I find myself constantly saying, "Stand next to your sister," something my mother said countless times as she snapped photos of the two of us as kids.
Dan and I are just under two years apart, same as my girls. In school, we were only a grade apart, resulting in us having a lot of the same friends, as well as being in a lot of the same classes together in high school.

Sometimes this was good. For example: I like candy bars and often Dan would hand me a 3 Musketeers as he passed me in the halls, or drop a Butterfinger on my desk while on his way to his own desk (sometimes the desk next to mine, if our teacher was into the whole alphabetized seating arrangement thing) .

Sometimes this was bad. For example: I'd study my butt off with my tutor for a geometry test or a science test and then Dan, who NEVER studied ever, would get a better grade. I found that slightly (read: VERY) annoying.
Dan was a football player in high school, and I was a cheerleader. Whenever he'd make an awesome play during games, all the other cheerleaders on my squad would scream "GO DAN!" extra-loud for him.

Teachers called me "Little Myers." Or just "Dan Myers' sister."

Or, when I was in second grade and had the world's most horrible haircut, I was frequently called, "Dan Myers' brother."

Mostly by Dan's friends, though. I did not enjoy that.
When we were in college, we worked together at a daycare during the school year, and as camp counselors in the summer. He'd always help me plan sport activities with the kids on my sport day and I'd always help him plan art activities on his art day. And every day we worked together with our room full of kindergartners for Kindercare.

He organized an after school street hockey team, called the Thunder Cats, with the elementary schoolers at our daycare. I organized an after school cheerleading team, called the Thunder Kittens, to cheer his hockey players on.

Its funny looking back... I hadn't realized just how close we've been our whole lives.

When I got married, Dan got an online certificate so he could perform our ceremony. When Gracie was a baby, he moved in with us for a few months. My girls adore their Uncle Dan and I can only hope they grow up as friends like Dan and I did.

It's sort of weird not seeing him very often anymore, but tomorrow we are all off to Austin to visit my family and we'll all be seeing Uncle Dan. The girls are very, very excited and I'm looking forward to seeing my big bro, too!

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Have a flashback of your own to share? Join in the fun over at Tia's blog!

Have a great weekend!

xoxo,