My brother

(this post was started in July and worked on Friday evening....no I wasn't up at 1am on Sunday night!)
I started this post back in July and never finished it! It is 1am and the house is quiet...so I am taking advantage of the stillness! I know I have written a post about Trudy and don't want Frankie to feel left out(not sure if he reads our blog or not....) so this one's for you!


This is my older brother Frank Bentley Layton the 4th....or "Frankie" as we called him growing up. He was born on my birthday....wait....that couldn't happen since he is the oldest... so I guess it is true that he had the birthday first! He will be 39 in March which sounds REALLY old. Thank goodness I will only be 34! hardy har har!


We look extremely alike and all through school I was only known as "Little Frank" until he graduated. Then i got my name back. He was always the goofball and I loved to laugh at him. He would often make faces in the rear-view mirror(not while he was driving) and when he got a good one he would show it to me to make me laugh:) And most of our pictures were of us making funny faces. It seems we could never keep a straight face for the camera!

I use to sit on his stomach and pretend he was a spaceship. I would push buttons on his chest and he would make the beeping noises. We were always playing games like that. One night he made me stay up until midnight....something I never did and thought it was SO late! I guess I thought it was such a big accomplishment for someone to stay up that late.

We all had our bedrooms in the basement where the ceiling was never finished so there were cracks where the wall met the floor beams. One way he would taunt me was by throwing my stuffed animals up there trying to get them to fall behind the walls....it would be fun to see how many are there!

Another funny memory was when he had me hold a kitchen towel in front of my face while he had target practice with the lotion bottle. He would smash on the pump to see if he could hit the towel. I wanted to stop after about 5 shots but as I was pulling the towel down he fired again hitting me right in the eyes....luckily i had them closed so it didn't burn.

We became really close during my first year at Calhoun Community College where we both played in the Jazz Band. We drove everyday to school together. It was so fun to be with him my first year. He showed me the ropes and knew EVERYONE there so I just had to say who my brother was and the red carpet was rolled out! He has a lot of charm! I loved going to Calhoun and loved, loved, loved playing in the Jazz band and loved even more having Frankie there with me.

There were many different ways we could get to Calhoun-lots of backroads. A lot of times we would pass by Tanner High School where there was this 3 way stop. We would just slowly stop and then keep going(you know...like we all do sometimes!)....well one morning there was a cop sitting across from us. I remember seeing it and thinking, "I need to mention it to Frankie"...but didn't get it out of my mouth fast enough! That ticket was expensive since it was a school zone!


On our daily drives we would pass by mansion-houses and then trailor parks. Just like Alabama where there were few zoning laws and land was cheap. There was a new subdivision going on one stretch of hwy 31(i think that was the HWY) that was going to have some expensive houses. We would joke that someone was going to put up a trailor in there and how funny that would look.

There are lots more memories I have of my big brother I just can't think of anymore right now. He is a wonderful man and I am so lucky to have him as my brother! I was blessed with a great family! I love it when we get together and talk about funny stories. I look forward to seeing him and his family this month!