🏡 I came home after a long day, arms weighed down with groceries, only to pause at the porch.

✨ Shoes. Every kind imaginable — sneakers, slides, flip-flops — a chaotic, glorious pile spilling across the welcome mat. Not a handful, not a few… dozens. And in that instant, I felt it: the house was alive again. The teenagers, my little humans who had grown up around my kitchen table, were back. Friends since grade school, now high school graduates, almost ready to leave this nest.

☀️ This is our 18th summer together. Eighteen years of laughter echoing through the halls, late-night talks, spilled snacks, and memories stitched into every corner. And maybe… just maybe, this is the last summer like this.

💛 I inhaled deeply, opened the door, and let the chaos embrace me. The noise, the mess, the laughter — it wrapped around me like a warm, wild hug, reminding me that this is love in motion, fleeting and beautiful.

🌿 Because one day, the porch will be still. The shoes will be gone, the laughter replaced by silence. And I’ll ache for the joyous chaos — for tripping over sneakers just to step inside, for hearing voices that once filled the air with life.

✨ For now, I’ll savor every wild, wonderful, messy moment.