charlotte : 3 months + 24 years.

on this weekend (which actually happened two weekends ago), luca turned three months old and we celebrated my twenty fourth birthday. so basically we took a lot of pictures and ate a lot of cupcakes. cupcakes with peanut butter frosting and topped with mini reese's peanut butter cups, mind you.

the rest was pretty much the usual. quality family time, church, luca cuddles. this time though, i got to hear luca talk and talk and he's just the best, you guys. that little voice? i die. how is it possible that he keeps getting cuter?

there were only four weeks between this trip and my last one, but those four weeks felt like four months. i am extremely grateful to be able to make the trip so frequently (even if it's not for as long as i would like), but that doesn't mean the time in between isn't hard. because it is. because for the first twenty two years of my life, there was no "in between" time. there was no seven hour drive to separate us. and maybe it's just because of my birthday and realizing how old i am, but i keep thinking about that. remember when T and i shared a room? when she technically had her own but still chose to sleep on the floor in mine? and even when she got married and moved a whole town over, we still had sleepovers?

now she's there and i'm here and our lives are separate, connected by daily texts and phone calls and one weekend a month of actual face time. how did that happen? how did we get from there to here?

on this weekend, i thought a lot about that and tried to be extra appreciative.