over again

 These are from my week away, crossing into washington. My sister Bella holds her breath accross the bridge while I snap some keepsakes. I feel like i fall in love every time.

yes, i'd marry that view. 

21. the happiest birthday

(this image reminded me of you. ha. anyways, if you are reading this, you probably just found clue #10. yeah, i'm making you climb sur le toit. advice: don't fall, it's a long ways down.)

dear bella,
i love you dearly.

i don't consider myself qualified to give you any birthday advice, but people say that pretending to know what you're doing is almost the same as knowing what you're doing. so here we are, and that's what we'll do.

advice enters:
you’ve only got one life to live, so live it dancing. live it laughing. live it with grace.
don’t live it taking yourself too seriously. please wear mismatched socks. walk on your tiptoes like we did when we were little. laugh louder than everyone else in the movie theater. ask lots of questions. stand up for yourself. put glitter on everything tangible. be nice to others. drink copious amounts of tea/coffee. believe in miracles.
also, try to see as much of the world as you can in your short amount of time.
and please—love your flawed, beautiful self wholly.

but you dear, are living a wonderful life already. and for you, i'm not worried at all. your combined wit, wisdom, and wondrousness has baffled me. i am happy, so very happy you are my sister.
you have made me proud, and am sure to only become more so.

i am excited for all the adventures we will have together and alone.
hand in hand or ten million miles apart i know you will be living your heart out. you taught me, so i will too.

i love you.

with love,
mandy

F

that 'f' in my post title doesn't stand for anything bad if that's what you were thinking. it stands for 'francesca'.

she turns fifteen today. my petite sœur, fifteen years old. (she'll totally kick butt this year.)


joyeux anniversaire to her.


i love.
i love.
i love.
you.

i miss her everyday. but today, i miss her most.

when i was little, i never thought all three of my sisters would be my best friends like they are today. we had our tiffs, and by golly, still do. we made one another mad more times than i can count. but in all fairness, my sisters are my best friends, ever.
that's a picture of my great-grandma and my two older sisters with me. it's my oldest sister's birthday today. the little girl with the floral skirt and a crown on. she turned twenty-two.

la.
she takes better care of me than i take care of her. she calls me from faraway and leaves messages on my phone when i'm in ceramics class. i've smiled and laughed with her. la has this love for life and blessing other people that i don't have. she loves jesus. and this quote, sums her up in a nutshell.

"I don't want to drive up to the pearly gates in a shiny sports car, wearing beautifully, tailored clothes, my hair expertly coiffed, and with long, perfectly manicured fingernails. I want to drive up in a station wagon that has mud on the wheels from taking kids to scout camp. I want to be there with a smudge of peanut butter on my shirt from making sandwiches for a sick neighbors children. I want to be there with a little dirt under my fingernails from helping to weed someone's garden. I want to be there with children's sticky kisses on my cheeks and the tears of a friend on my shoulder.

I want the Lord to know I was really here and that I really lived."

- Marjorie Pay Hinckley 

that's her. she's doing it.

Joyeux Anniversaire dear.

bottom line, i feel bad for everyone who doesn't get to have her for a sister.