I am the oldest!  When I was about 2, I am told that I began to ask for a "STISTER"!  I was thrilled when she was born just month before my third birthday!  Her name is Julie Beth.  She is named for my maternal grandmother, Jewel Elizabeth! 

I look more like my dad, very Italian in my features!  Julie favors my mom and her side of hte family with her more Scandinavian look! 

Julie and I were VERY close as children and while we don't see each other much now, we are still very dear to one another!  I am blessed to have such a talented, intelligent and thoughtful sister! 

The above collage was a gift Julie gave me for Christmas one year.  It was the best gift.  It made me cry! 

It is a little too large to properly scan on my scanner, so some of the pictures are cut off, but it gives the basic idea! 

About the collage photos:

Top Left: That's me on the left with my bushy permed hair wearing a sweater that my friend's mom crocheted!  She and I were singing some kind of song we had made up!  I can't remember what it was.  I think I was about 15 or 16 in this photo (weird, that is how old Kaitlyn is now!) and Julie was 12 or 13!

The next one over (Top Middle) was when I was 12 and Julie was 9.  I remember we had our photos taken at KMart in one of those temp. portrait studios set up in the middle of the store and I was embarrassed b/c I had a cold sore on my lip.  The photographer had me turn my head so it didn't show!  I was so relieved!

In the top right photo I am cut off...  oh well, you miss out on my "Jesus is #1" T-shirt!  You can't really tell, but Julie had a huge purple "goose egg" in the middle of her head in this picture.  She had fallen off of a "chin up" bar and pulled it down on herself the day before.  She had cut the back of her head.  I remember her light blonde hair full of blood and the panic in my heart that she was seriously hurt.  Thankfully, it wasn't too bad!  Just looked bad!  We got a new bunny that day and that helped her forget the pain.  (She LOVES animals!) And in this photo we were dying Easter eggs.  I remember my mom said Julie had a lovely Easter egg on her head!

The next row...  the picture on the left we are posing at some tourist attraction in Northern Idaho in front of a really realistic carved wooden Indian! 

In the middle of that row: We are on the beach of Lake Michigan.  I must have been under 12 because we moved from that area at that time.  I think I was about 10 and she was 7.

The next photo is cut off.  I don't remember when it was taken anyway!  LOL!

The next "row" is kind of un-rowlike!  The picture inset under the carved Indian picture was taken when I was 7 (the age Hannie is now and boy do we look alike!) and Julie was 4.  I was sunburned and I remember how hot and tight my face was.  I wonder what the photographer said to get big smiles out of both of us!  The dresses we were wearing were matching... we loved to match when we were little.  I had my children dress alike until they were too old to enjoy it anymore. 

The one diagonally to the right of that one is my sis and I in front of our home when we were in high school.  I can tell that by my yellow high school sweatshirt!  I think I was tickling her! I don't actually remember, but I know we were having fun!  We usually did!

Directly to the right of that is a more recent photo.  It's not all that recent, but I think it was the last "professional" picture we had together.  In that photo we were both adults.  It was about 10 years ago.  It was my dad's 50th birthday and we had attempted to get a picture with my children.  I had three at the time and Jordan was very high energy (Asperger's Syndrome) and I remember it took over an hour to get one shot with the children and in it, the only way we could get Jordan to not be a blur was to let him spin the tires on a toy fire truck.  So in the picture he is turning he head (and IS slightly blurry) and is spinning those wheels.  I should find a copy and scan it in sometime!  Julie did a great job not letting her frustration show.  It was so stressful and she could have made me feel awful, but she didn't!

To the right of that is a picture of us with our pony, Sparky.  I was about 11 in this one and Julie was about 8.  Maybe a bit older.  I remember that was my favorite dress and I wore it until it was too short!  LOL!  I am surprised my mom let me wear it!  I do remember that this picture was a favorite of hers at the time and she had copies made to give to our relatives!  We had purchased the pony (mostly for Julie...  remember she is the animal lover!) for only $100.  (Which at the time was a fortune for our family!) 

The bottom left photo: Here we are posing with our cat, Toby!  Funny, we had read The Chronicles of Narnia and wanted a yellow cat named Aslan.  We got one.  It died.  We got another one.  It also died.  So, this one was to be Aslan the Third.  When we got him as a kitten, the people who had him called him "Orange Person"!  Isn't that funny?  We just didn't think he was an Aslan once we got to know him and we called him "Toby" instead.  He was the funniest cat and was such a "person".  My good friend, also named Julie, fell in love with him.  When we moved away (from Michigan to Idaho) we gave him to Julie!  But that is another story altogether!  (Maybe for another day!)

The middle one on the bottom is my sis back to back with me.  My mom took this while we were camping.  Like my big bush 'FRO?  YIKES! 

The last photo on the bottom right was taken as some kind of tourist place.  I think it was the same vacation as the wooden Indian statue picture.  I think it was a mill or something.  I AM in the picture, but again the scanner cut me off!  Oh well, you just miss out on my "classy" 70's style outfit!  :)

Julie is now working in a vet clinic in Idaho!  She still loves animals and has many...  I lost count... I think 11 or 12 or 13 cats and dogs and also she has turtles, birds and fish!  She is so amazing with them! She is also very into writing and writes great fantasy novels and poetry!  She had a blog on blogspot for awhile.  But now she doesn't currently have internet. Her blog is still there though and a lot of her poetry is on it...  check it out: HERE!

I don't know how to add that cool LINKY thing, but if you decide to participate in Friendship Friday please leave a comment with a link so I can come read it! 

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