While we were all driving in the car a few days ago, Amy pointed out just how long we’d been together as a family. Namely a pretty long time. And more specifically, now that I checked it out, at the moment this post goes live, it will have been exactly seven years since I made a post publicly mentioning that Brandy and I were a couple. Now, we’d been “dating” for probably at least a month before that, maybe more, and we’d known each other for well over a year at that point, and it was still a while little longer until Brandy and Amy actually moved in, but it seems like as good a starting marker as any.

So, seven years. During that time we’ve lived together at five addresses in three states as I worked for three different companies in a variety of different roles. We lost Brandy’s Dad. We also lost a few good pets that we loved dearly. We adopted Roscoe. Amy has grown from elementary school to high school and from a bubbly little kid to a wonderful almost-adult. Brandy has gone from being a Real Estate Agent to a Stay-at-Home-Mom to a College Student. And of course Alex was born and has grown into a sparkly eyed toddler and is doing exciting new things every day.

We bonded into a family almost from the very start. As with any family there have been ups and downs, but overall it has been a very good seven years. Somehow, simultaneously, I can’t believe it has really been that long, and I can’t believe it was ever any other way.

Thank you Brandy and Amy and Alex for these seven years.

I love you all very much.