Our nephew is 13 today and truly, how did that happen? Who is this adult in this picture, piloting a literal airplane?!!

He’s been involved in Civil Air Patrol for a little under a year and has already flown Cessnas and gliders and drones, gone on encampment, and done leadership training. He hasn’t stopped ranking up, either.

CAP is a really great example of this kid knowing what he wants–he wanted to fly planes, so here he is thriving in a cool organization. He’s always been like that, even when he was little and trying to figure out how to keep the iPad all to himself.

He’s alarmingly smart and got his parents’ curiosity: In the course of a Sunday afternoon, he asked Grandpa to explain the difference between analog and digital radio scanners and had Matt tell him how DNS works. He’ll explain things to me that I’ve never even thought about and I always learn something new when we hang out.

He may be flying planes, but I still remember these days:

Happy birthday, Bubbs! You are so loved.