God Made Us Sisters

2009-05-09T09:19:00.002-04:00

I recently heard that brides say from the second bridal shower until the wedding flies by. I would beg to argue that from the day he popped the question it has flown by.

Last weekend, my wonderful sisters threw me a bridal shower and bachelorette party. It was so wonderfully fun. The bridal shower was great. The women that were there played differrent roles helping me become the woman that I am. There were people from high school, people from college, people from hard times, and people from great times. It was so fun to be able to be there, with all these people from all different walks of life.

Sure, I'm not a huge fan of being the center of attention, but I really enjoyed spending time with them.

Then came the bachelorette party. Oh heavens. It was so funny. We started at Buck Mulligans (an Irish Pub my dad helps run). We had dinner and drinks, and the girls got me a button that guys had to spin. They also got me a viel and garter I had the pleasure of wearing all night. I usually don't have fun in bar-type situations...but being with (most) of my bridesmaids and good friends was so awesome. Some of my favorite parts of the night include Paige getting two lap dances, Katie McNaughten's dad buying buttery nipples, that sweet old man that danced with me (and his beautiful wife who gave me a flower and wished me luck), yuckas and peeing behind a truck. Oh what a night. :)

yeaaah boyyyy

2008-08-03T14:14:00.004-04:00

I finally gave in- I'm updating this sister's blog thing.

I would like to start off by saying I am not stupid. Most of these post represent me as being blonde. I'm not. I have brown hair.

I started to notice this past week how quickly everyone is growing up. Its exciting but also really scary.

I keep thinking about how in a month Ill be moving out, leaving behind Ashley and it actually makes me really upset to think about. My new roommate won't be anywhere in comparison to Ashley. I am going to miss our movie nights, Ashley's terrible shower singing... well her singing in general, having someone to talk to while Im in the shower, turning our back on Grannie when she is lecturing us and telling her no one cares and to shut up because we can hear each other but she cant hear us. I think I might just make Ashley come back to school with me so she can just live with me.

It is also scary that in 9 months Heather will be married and her life will be over. No more going to visit her in Indiana, no more getting chased around the house and getting my toe broken.. hahahaha I'm just kidding Heather.

I wouldnt trade my sisters for the world. I think I am so blessed to have them in my life, and I am also so glad that they are not just my sisters but my best friends. I love you two. you are AM-SOME.

Reasons why I need a therapist

2008-05-08T14:59:00.002-04:00

For the most part, my childhood was normal. Except of course, boxed wine.

Through exchanging text messages with my sister, Ashley, I learned of all the reasons why I should be seeing a therapist:

-When Ashley had a bad day, she took it out on me by saying, "I wish I could just take a gun to your head."

-Mom completely ignored my request that Ashley should visit a specialist to treat her for Middle Child Syndrome.

-Even though I had my own room, I always had some little girl sleeping next to me playing tricks on my brain through my sleeping patterns.

-Ashley brainwashed me into telling her what her birthday and Christmas presents were.

-I lived with a hobo for several years. When Paige would come spend the night, she'd bring every article of clothing with her and stack them against the wall.

my update

2008-05-04T02:13:00.002-04:00

I have been accepted to the program I wanted to go through for grad school, so eventually I will have my master's degree in library science, which I hope will get me where I think I want to be. I am excited to be on the same campus as Kim, and I'm not exactly sure if she is as excited as I am about it. And I am proud of Ashley for graduating and the prospective jobs ahead of her! But I definitely will miss seeing her when I am on campus in the fall (sometimes I think she is more excited about seeing me than my sister is).

I think Kim and I have gotten closer than we used to be. I think I used to be total BFFs with Emily, but since she got married we have grown apart. And in that time, I feel like I have bonded a lot more with Kim. I don't know if she feels the same way, especially when I go through her closet to find clothes to wear.

So, that being said, I'm kind of bummed that it is the end of the school year because she is about to move and be busy for the summer, so I won't get to see her hardly as much at all.

I had lunch with Emily last week. It was nice to sit and catch up with her, and we talked a lot about things that had been stressing us with work and money and life in general. It is nice that even though we have grown apart, we can pick up right where we left off. I guess that's the thing about sisters.

PS — Paige is going into engineering? I don't know if I ever would have guessed that. I'm not saying she's not smart because I know she totally is, and I know shares the same ambition and drive her sisters have. I'm just thinking back to all the quotes I have heard from her, her blond moments, her gullibility ...

Family updates!

2008-05-03T22:00:00.004-04:00

We have some big changes coming about with the sisters in this blog.

I (Ashley) am graduating from nursing school on Friday!!!! I have already been offered a position at ohio state medical center and awaiting others...

Paige (the baby) is graduating from high school in less than a month!!! She is moving on to do some engineering at OSU!

We will be living in the same city again... AND I will get to do big sister things for her like take her out to lunch and buy her things. Being a big sister can be such an awesome thing sometimes.

Heather... well I don't think she has a big update at the moment... but we love her anyways.

The three of us will be going to Greece on the 26th of May!!! I am excited to update about that trip. I am sure there will be lots of bonding and lots of laughter and lots of fighting. It is just what we do. If sisters are good for two things its to laugh with and fight with (then laugh about fighting with).

Sister Cheryl got accepted into the masters program that she was hoping to get into which is GREAT news!!!!!! I'll let her update that...

And Kim... she is just like Heather. Nothing big at the moment (that I know of).

Change is such an exciting thing!

Love endures all things...

2008-03-20T19:02:00.002-04:00

Till Death Do Us Part...

2008-03-20T14:55:00.003-04:00

Last weekend when I went home--I found out that Ashley is in the process of planning the Laughlin Family member's funeral.

As we were out to birthday brunch with a bunch of strangers, when Ashley takes out her video camera and asks what kinds of things we love. My responses were typical, "my sisters, reading, hammocks, coffee, buying books..." Paige's responses were also typical, "myself, my IPOD, journaling..." and Ashley's was ALSO typical, "dancing around in my underwear..."

Then when I asked her what it was for--she calmly explained that it is to be played at our funerals.

Hello, Morbid.

more about sisters and the holidays

2007-12-07T02:14:00.001-05:00

Kim always complains that I don't really have as many Christmas gifts to give as it looks because some of them are fake gifts.

This year is looking like I won't be short on the fake gifts, but that doesn't mean the real gifts aren't going to be good ones.

Well, except for Kim's. I haven't started shopping for her yet, so I really don't know how her gifts are going to turn out.

What good are sisters on the holidays if you can't give them a Christmas gift of something they left at your place or something they tried to previously pawn off on you? There is no one else in the world who will accept those gifts and find humor in them.

Holidays and petty fights

2007-12-06T16:48:00.000-05:00

Us sisters have really neglected our 'Sister Blog'...

Hopefully this will spark some motivation.

I was thinking today about how I can't wait to go home for Christmas break and be with my sisters. But I was also thinking about how when we were all home for Thanksgiving... we fought a lot. Haha. It's definately one of the joys of sisterhood.

We fought over little petty things that really didn't matter. Now that I am trying hard to remember what they were... I can't. That is how insignificant they were. Maybe it was about the 100 trips we had to take to different grocery stores and the all for one or none for all mentality.

I don't know how other sisters punish each other for fighting... but in our house it's obstaining from card games, refusing to go on errands with eachother, and the worst of all... the silent treatment.

Despite all the little fights we had in the few days at home... I want to be with them again because the fun that we have always outweighs the little fights.

I also love that all we did was played triple solitare and watched trashy t.v. shows.

I adore my sisters.

The end.

Ashley

Kim's clothes

2007-05-15T11:11:00.000-04:00

I was attempting to leave the house wearing a sweatshirt of hers. She caught me as I was walking down the hall before walking out the door.

"No! Not that one! You can't wear that one!"

I was so close.

But, she didn't object to my wearing another one of her sweatshirts that was lying on my bedroom floor because I had been wearing around the house the previous day. Too bad it didn't match my outfit as well as the one she made me take off.

I would have washed it this morning! And it's just a sweatshirt!

And she said something about it being more hers because it's from a school in Dublin where her roommate is from. Maybe I should have pointed out that I was going to hang out with my friend who lives in Dublin AND I would have been able to wash it this morning with my last load of laundry because it's the same color.

Dedicated to Peach

2007-05-06T19:09:00.000-04:00

Paige is probably the most genuine, kind hearted people in the world. She's so real. She's also so incredibly smart. You'd have to be graduating high school as a junior.

Now, here's the dilemma: She's also such a ditz. Sometimes when she gets confused, she just gets this look on her face like, "shoot, where am I?"

The only time Paige really gets mad is when we use her stuff without asking. It could be a QTIP and she would get mad. I think it's the whole concept of taking things without asking, which I understand... sometimes.

What made me think of it was the quote on the side of the page about wearing your sister's sweater. When I was home around Christmas time, Ashley and I were at Walmart looking for presents and Paige wanted to meet up with us. She called when she was walking into the store and we told her where we were. As soon as we hung up, Ashley looks at me and says, "shoot, I'm wearing her shirt." I looked down at what I was wearing and said, "shoot, I'm wearing her shoes." Paige started walking down the aisle toward us and Ash and I try to hide behind each other. Paige looks at us, gets "the look" and says to Ashley, "nice shirt." I thought I got away with it, but sure enough, Ashley shouts, "uh! Heather is wearing your shoes!!!!" She's a true sister.

Paige is, on occasion, known for saying stupid things. Here are my top two favorites:

Me: Wow, that car is driving fast.
Paige: Yeah, slow down speedy gonzaga!
(that awkward "where am I look")
Paige: Wait, is it Speedy Gonzaga?
Me:

Paige: Where do you live again? indian-nap-nolis?
Me: Something like that...
Paige: Wait, how do you say that?

Ashley is right: the beauty of having sisters is that they can't and will not ever stop loving you...no matter what. Even when you say stupid things.

We are family... I got all my sisters and me.

2007-05-05T17:10:00.000-04:00

What's funny about Heather's last post is that its 100% true.
I really did believe that Santa would come in and hurt me. Every other child loved him... and I was terrified of him.

Nobody would let me sleep with them... Heather needed her "privacy", mom and dad said NO, so I had one option left...

PAIGE.

Whats funny about Heather is that she sleeps like a log. Nothing and no one wakes her up. I took full advantage of it. I used to wait till she was asleep and I would sneak in her room and crawl over to the bed and get in it. I would wake up in the morning when her alarm went off... becuase I am a light sleeper and it took her 23 minutes to realize it was going off and sneak out. She never knew. Just like that I paraded in on her privacy. She also slept with every belonging that she had in her bed. Phones, jewerly, books, toys, boxes, you name it, it was in her bed. Being so, she kept herself in one corner of the bed which worked to my advantage. I just replaced the items in her bed.

Now, Paige literally just switched from her crib to a big girl bed and that was my last resort. She was a baby... literally... and I thought that she would protect me. Ha. I do still love to sleep with them. Just not in the same bed anymore.

What is great about my sisters, and most sisters in this world is that they can't and won't stop loving you. No matter what you tell them, how you act, how weird you are... they are your sisters and they will love you no matter what. There is not even a choice in the matter. That is my favorite thing about my sisters... I can tell them anything, and act any way... and the love never stops.

Ashley.

2007-05-05T09:24:00.000-04:00

Of all the quotes on the side of the page, I like the top quote the best, "Having a sister always meant having a friend." Oh, there were some days when I hated them tagging along. Actually, most of the time, I hated letting them come. My mom always said, "Heather, let your sisters come. One day when I'm dead, all you will have is each other."

I remember when none of us could find our own friends to play with, we settled on playing with each other. Sometimes we would go under the deck and have our "Three Musketeers Meetings" which met bi-weekly to discuss how we could sabotage the three boys who lived next door, before they would sabotage us.

Sometimes we would get brilliant ideas like having a snow cone sale, lemonade stand, or I would suddenly realize that the poor stuffed animals are probably cold and lonely in the basement, so I would make my sisters carry them up two flights of stairs and make a home for them on the floor of my walk-in closet.

Or, if it were rainy, we would have to do something inside the house, so we would play house in the basement or use it as a skating rink because the basement wasn't finished. Eventually, mom divided the basement into three different "houses" so we each had a section of the basement that we had to decorate and keep clean. Then when we played house, we pretended we were all the moms and were all neighbors. It was pretty cool. After we got bored with that, we would go upstairs and watch movies. I remember if there was a funny part in a movie, we would rewind it over and over again, until we laughed so hard that we couldn't breathe. I remember babysitters saying, "ok, lets watch the rest of the movie, you've seen that scene about 140 times." But it never got old, we just laughed harder and harder every time we watched it.

It's funny how when we grow up, we change. What I like more is how we don't change. I remember Ashley would never sleep by herself. She ALWAYS wanted to sleep with me. Her excuses ranged from "Santa might come in and hurt me" to "the Construction guys across the street scare me." Sometimes she would even bribe me by saying, "I'll tell you what you are getting for your birthday..." and then of course I would consider it, only to find out I was getting a mini-skirt. But for the most part, I ALWAYS said no, I liked being alone and after spending a whole day with my sisters, I needed some time away from them. (Probably the introvert in me). That hasn't changed. I still need my alone time. Although, I didn't know how to express that so I said, "I need my privacy." Ashley still likes sleeping in the same room as someone, and I still hate it.

Ashley and I were usually inseparable. We are only two years apart, and I'm six years apart from Paige. So, Ashley and I got along better, we also fought more. Usually our fights would end with Ash screaming, "Sometimes I wish I could take a gun to your head!" One time I went up to my bedroom, wanting her to feel guilty and held my breath for as long as I could in the water in my sink...thinking I might die. I thought, "well if I die, she'll feel bad." Dad walked in and said, "what are you doing?"

Embarrassingly I said, "Ashley wants me dead." Dad looks at me and says, "oh, ok." and walks out of the room.

ahahahahahahahhahahahahahahahhaa Imagine being the dad in that situation.

The oldest sets the precedent

2007-05-01T15:50:00.000-04:00

The rule in our house was that Kim and I were not allowed to do anything at an earlier age than what Emily was allowed to do it because the oldest sets the precedent. I think that's kind of how it is in most families.

Most of the time that rule didn't really matter. The only time it made me really upset was when my friends were having a coed sleepover because a friend who had moved was back in town to visit. I was all ready to participate with Mom's permission and about to go over to the house for a night of movie-watching and Skittle-throwing when Emily found out where I was going. She yelled at Mom because SHE wasn't allowed to go to a coed sleepover until her junior prom so I shouldn't be allowed to go to a coed sleepover before my junior prom. (This sleepover I was planning to go to was only a few months before my junior prom and was at the same house where she had stayed the night for her first coed sleepover.) So instead of putting my older sister in her place, Mom told me I wasn't allowed to stay the night.

I bring this up because the episode of "Full House" where Stephanie wants to get her ears pierced was on. Danny wouldn't let her because she was only in fifth grade, and he said she could get them piereced when she started junior high, just like DJ.

Emily got her ears pierced when she was 10, so I wasn't allowed to get my ears pierced until I was 10. That was okay with me because I was kind of afraid to get it done.

I ended up getting my ears pierced when I was 12 because Mom was taking Kim to get hers done. If you do the math here, you will realize that Kim was only 9 at the time.

I guess that shows us who the favorite is.