There’s something strange about sisters.
When you’re younger, it feels impossible to imagine becoming best friends someday. You fight over stupid things. You annoy each other on purpose. You swear you’ll never understand one another. One minute you’re screaming at each other, and the next you’re sitting in the same room acting like nothing happened.
That was us.
And I mean really us.
I bit her.
I hit her.
We fought like normal siblings do.
Honestly, if you would have asked either of us growing up if we thought we would someday become inseparable, we probably both would have laughed in your face.
We were so different.
But even back then, even in all the chaos and fighting and little sister jealousy… I looked up to her more than she probably ever realized.
She was my person before either of us even knew what that meant.
From day one of my life.
I wanted to do everything she did.
When she started playing softball, I wanted to play softball.
When she succeeded at something, I wanted to succeed too.
When she walked into a room with confidence and beauty and strength, I noticed it.
I noticed all of it.
And the truth is… she was better than me at a lot of things growing up. Especially softball. She worked hard and eventually went to college on a full-ride scholarship for softball, which at the time felt larger than life to me.
She was beautiful.
Confident.
Strong.
Independent.
Everything I thought I wasn’t yet.
And as her little sister, all I wanted was for her to love me, include me, notice me.
Because even when we were younger and constantly fighting, I idolized her.
I trusted her with everything.
Some of my earliest memories of us are honestly so simple, but somehow they stayed with me all these years later.
When my parents were building an addition onto the house, we would go outside and pick up nails for nickels. I was obsessed with nickels for some reason. I thought they were the greatest thing in the world. And Tristin, being Tristin, would trade me dollar bills for my nickels because she knew I loved them so much.
And I genuinely thought I was getting the better deal.
Looking back now, it makes me laugh because that was us in so many ways.
Me blindly following her.
Trusting her completely.
Believing anything she told me because she was my big sister and that was enough for me.
Even when we drove each other crazy.
There are certain memories that stay frozen in time forever, and one of mine will always be her picking me up from North Eugene when I was a freshman and she was a senior at South Eugene.
She pulled up absolutely blasting Imogen Heap’s “Hide and Seek.”
At the time, I was mortified.
Like full teenage embarrassment.
I remember thinking, “Oh my god, please turn this down.”
But the second I got into the car and we drove away, we were both screaming the lyrics at the top of our lungs together.
And honestly, that memory feels like us.
Because behind all the fighting and differences, there was always this connection between us that never really disappeared.
When our parents weren’t home, we would blast music through my dad’s CD player while cleaning the house or pretending to do homework. Loud enough to shake the walls. Loud enough to feel free.
She also tried teaching me how to drive.
Keyword: tried.
Until I wrecked her car and ran over the curb in the parking lot at Awbrey Park Elementary School.
Which honestly feels full-circle now considering I work for that same school district today. It’s funny how life works sometimes. Two of my core memories with my sister happened in places connected to the life I live now.
Life has this weird way of tying everything together years later.
And somehow, through every version of our lives, we kept finding our way back to each other.
But if I’m being honest, our relationship truly transformed after I moved home from Texas.
That’s when we stopped being just sisters.
That’s when we became best friends.
At the time, both of us were walking through some of the hardest seasons of our lives.
I was coming home after my divorce trying to figure out who I even was anymore underneath all the heartbreak, disappointment, fear, and uncertainty.
And at the exact same time, Tristin was stepping into her own power while navigating the ending of her marriage with the father of the boys.
Neither of us had life figured out.
We were both hurting in different ways.
Both rebuilding.
Both grieving lives we thought we would have forever.
But somehow… we rebuilt parts of ourselves together.
Back then we lived only about three minutes away from each other, and honestly, I don’t think either of us realized how healing that season would become.
We spent almost every moment we could together.
Dinner nights became routine.
Late-night drives.
Pokemon dates where we would drive around trying to “catch them all” like two emotionally exhausted adults pretending life wasn’t simultaneously falling apart around us.
We took Cohen, Aiden, and Easton to the park constantly. The boys would run wild while we sat there talking about everything, heartbreak, healing, fears, motherhood, relationships, dreams, survival.
Some of my favorite memories are the quiet ones.
The boys asleep in the room directly across from us while we sat on the couch eating ice cream and watching movies late into the night because neither of us wanted to be alone with our thoughts yet. There are more times than I can remember sleeping on that King sized bed just the 5 of us!
Sometimes she needed me.
Sometimes I needed her.
And there was never really a question about showing up.
If one of us called, the other came.
That season was messy and painful and beautiful all at once.
Sometimes strength looked like crying on the couch.
Sometimes it looked like forcing ourselves to laugh anyway.
Sometimes it looked like surviving another day when everything inside you hurt.
And through all of it, she became my safe place.
My person.
The one who somehow always knew when I wasn’t okay, even before I said anything out loud.
That’s who Tristin is.
She is fire.
An Aries through and through. Fierce. Protective. Passionate. Strong-willed. Stubborn. Deeply loving.
My mom always jokes that if you put both of us in a crowded room, Tristin would know half the people there within an hour. She would be talking, laughing, connecting with everyone around her while I’d probably still be standing quietly in the corner observing the room trying to decide whether I felt safe enough to fully open up.
We are complete opposites in so many ways.
But maybe that’s why I’ve always admired her so deeply.
Because she carries a confidence and strength I spent years trying to grow into myself.
And watching her become the woman she is today has honestly been one of the greatest gifts of my life.
Not just as my sister.
But as a mother. An absolutely incredible one at that.
Watching her raise Cohen, Aiden, and Easton has been incredible. Those boys are strong, loving, wildly different little humans with huge personalities and so much heart, and so much of that comes from her.
She pours everything she has into them.
And somehow, even carrying the weight of her own life, she still always made room for me too.
I spent so much time with her and the boys during those years that they became part of my healing too.
And honestly… if it wasn’t for my sister, I wouldn’t have them.
I wouldn’t have little voices yelling “Auntie.”
I wouldn’t have the park days, movie nights, chaos, laughter, and love that eventually became part of the heart behind CAE’s Crystals.
When people read my blogs about the boys and the meaning behind CAE, they see the love I have for Cohen, Aiden, and Easton.
But what they don’t fully see yet is that all roads lead back to her.
Because she gave me them.
Not intentionally in some grand dramatic way.
But through the life we built together during those years.
Through the nights we survived side by side.
Through the healing we walked through together.
Through allowing me to become part of their everyday lives.
She gave me a family during a time when I felt like I had lost so much of myself.
And I don’t think she fully understands how much that saved me.
Even now, when I think about my “why” behind this business, the healing, the writing, the crystals, the boys… it all traces back to those years.
Those boys.
That house.
(Yes, the blue one… if you know, you know.)
The couch we cried on.
The laughter in the middle of heartbreak.
The late-night talks that somehow stitched parts of us back together.
That chapter changed me forever.
And somewhere in the middle of all that healing, she gave me something that would end up meaning so much more than just a crystal.
My Moldavite necklace.
At the time, I was honestly terrified of it.
If you know anything about Moldavite, you probably understand why.
Moldavite is a rare olive-green tektite formed nearly 15 million years ago after a meteorite impact near the Nördlinger Ries Crater in southern Germany. The molten material launched into the atmosphere and cooled as it fell back to Earth, primarily across what is now the Czech Republic.
But beyond the science, Moldavite is known as a stone of transformation and awakening.
A high-frequency crystal believed to accelerate healing, intuition, spiritual growth, and life changes. People say it removes everything in your life that no longer aligns with your highest self.
And honestly?
That terrified me.
Because deep down, I knew there were still parts of me clinging to pain. Fear. Old versions of myself I hadn’t fully let go of yet.
I had heard people say Moldavite is a stone that’s meant to be gifted. That it finds you when you’re ready to begin your healing journey.
I don’t know if that’s fully true.
But I believed it when she gave it to me in 2020.
Because by then, she had already been transforming my life long before I ever wore that necklace.
She helped me rediscover my strength.
My independence.
My voice.
My worth.
She stood beside me during some of the darkest moments of my life and somehow still reminded me there was light ahead when I couldn’t see it myself.
And there were moments where she did far more than just stand beside me.
There were moments where she pulled me out of places I truly did not know how to escape on my own.
The kind of situations that slowly break you down without you even realizing how much of yourself you’re losing. The kind where you stop recognizing your own voice. Your own spark. Your own peace.
And somehow… she always knew.
Before I fully admitted it to myself.
Before I was ready to say it out loud.
Before I even understood how bad things had become.
She knew.
There were times my location would go offline and she would immediately notice. Times where she could hear something in my voice that nobody else picked up on. Times where I would try to pretend I was okay, and she would see right through me anyway.
She knew when I was in relationships that were hurting me.
She knew when I was struggling.
She knew when I needed help even when I wasn’t strong enough to ask for it myself.
And the truth is… she became the backbone I needed when I didn’t have one of my own.
Even living an hour away now, she was there.
Always there.
There was never judgment.
Never shame.
Just love.
Protection.
Patience.
And this unwavering refusal to let me completely disappear inside my pain.
Her and Geoff both opened their arms to me during one of the lowest points of my life. A time where I felt completely stuck. Completely broken. A version of myself I barely recognized anymore.
I was exhausted emotionally, mentally, spiritually.
And if I’m being honest… I’m still healing from parts of that chapter.
There were moments where I genuinely thought I was going to lose everything I had worked so hard to build.... My crystal business, my sense of self-worth, my energy, my passion, and honestly, parts of myself too. I felt so emotionally drained.
I remember not even wanting to step foot into my crystal room anymore.
The passion was gone.
The drive was gone.
I felt disconnected from everything that once made me feel alive.
The business I had poured my heart into suddenly felt heavy because I was carrying so much pain everywhere I went.
And somehow, every single time I started sinking too far into it, Tristin would pull me back up.
Not by forcing me to heal faster.
Not by pretending everything was okay.
But by sitting with me in the middle of the brokenness until I could slowly find my footing again.
She let me cry.
She felt my pain with me.
She carried strength for me during moments where I had none left to give myself.
People always say your sister is your built-in best friend.
When I was younger, I never understood that.
But at 35 years old, I finally do.
And I think one of the greatest blessings of my life has been realizing that the girl I once fought with, hit, yelled at, and probably annoyed to death became the woman I trust with the most fragile pieces of my heart.
Life gave us both storms at the same time.
But somehow, walking through them together made both of us stronger.
And I truly do not think I would have survived the last twelve years the same way without her beside me.
Not just because she’s my sister.
But because unbeknownst to both of us… she had been my person since the very beginning.
And I don’t think she fully understands this, but there are parts of my life I genuinely do not know if I would have survived the same way without her.
Not because she solved everything.
But because she refused to let me face it alone.