Growing up with Cat was the single greatest gift of my life.. She's carefree, fun loving, fierce, flirty and simply freakin fun. She is hilarious and adorable and an unstoppable force of energy. People adore her bc of her authenticity. She is so true to herself. She is unapologetically Cat.

Cat and I weren’t always as close as we are today. In fact, our time in parallel twin beds consisted of being hyper aware of our differences versus our many similarities. She loved horses, while I dressed Barbies. She was light and carefree, and I was.. not. Her drawers overflowed onto the floor, while my side of the closet was color coded. At one point we found lighter fluid under her dresser with a million other things. We fought like animals… we still do…. But what I hadn’t realized was she completed me. I wouldn’t be me without cat. She is my best friend, and the defining moment in our relationship was our move to Colorado.

I was going into my junior year of high school and she her freshmen year. We didn’t know a soul, and before we knew it our vicious sibling rivalry quickly turned into a best friendship. It didn’t matter we had no one bc we had each other.

From 5am wake up calls for morning cheer practices, hours spent whipping through mountain roads down the hill to Mullen, up the hill for some afternoon SVU marathons and then back down  for another cheer practice in highlands ranch… those hours spent with you in the car will be the ones I never forget. Sometimes punching and screaming at each other the entire way up 285. One time making you chase the car down the dirt road to the point of chucking your lunch at the back window. But mostly it was belting songs at the top of our lungs. We had so many adventures from almost hitting a mountain lion / deer wrestling match one night after cheer practice, that one time the brakes went out on the way to the ski hill or our 180 degree whiplash slip on the way to school one day, flipping the car into the line of cars of oncoming traffic. We slid miraculously between the cars, nearly missing the rock wall on the other side… and without hesitation drove straight home. We had classes together, we were on two separate cheer teams and at one point we even dated brothers. We were inseparable, and it was some of the best years of my life.

One very special afternoon during office hours my senior year, in walks a very handsome boy with shaggy hair and earrings. He’d gotten kicked out of Spanish class… looking the part. I remember sitting around telling stupid stories, probably rambling bc he was a cute boy I’d never seen before.

So at the end of the hour the office lady asks for this boys name to excuse him from class, and he tells her 'Jackson Saeman'. I’m immediately perked up, because my sister made out with a Jackson SAEMAN that weekend at the Sadies Hawkins dance, and let me add he was NOT her date!

I obviously followed him right out of the office, introducing myself as Lauren Wood…. Cat Wood's older sister, pushing her number on him and insisting he reach out, and here we are almost 11 years later, and you still are just as polite as the day I met you. Probably had no idea you were meeting your forever third wheel that day…. The true ball and chain!

Jackson, our family wasn’t complete without you, you make each of us a better person because you’re our brother. You’re our role model, my most trusted adviser, most certainly Tim’s best friend and our brother. The past 11 years have been such a gift and I want you to know officially welcoming you to the family is one of the greatest blessings of our lives. We don’t deserve you Jackson, and I can’t tell you how thrilled I am to celebrate this beautiful union and the start of something so special. There’s no other crew I'd rather grill on top of blue ski basin with, or grow old drinking wine and paradise monster vodkas next to. Because of you, it really is a wonderful life xx