Eighteen Years Later, Family Looks Back on Rare Births
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"Right from the get-go, right from the birth date, they were different," said Jack Breitung.
It's been said that sisters are different flowers from the same garden.
“I would say we're more different than similar,” said Katie. "She does cheerleading; I do musicals."
“I'm involved in soccer and cheerleading. I like sports, stuff like that,” said Kelly.
"I'd say my passion is art. I like to do crazy things, like a portrait made out of M&Ms, something like that,” said Katie.
For all their individuality, the sisters have one very big thing in common.
It usually starts with, 'oh I thought you guys were just sisters,' and we're like 'no, we're twins,' and they're like, 'oh, that's cool,'” said Katie.
Twins coming up on their 18th birthdays, but even that has a story that's, well... different.
"It's just a cool story that we have,” said Kelly.
The story started on February 28th, 1994, with Katie's birth, and continued four days later, when Kelly finally arrived.
“Then we say, 'oh, by the way, we're born four days apart.' They usually don’t believe us, then when we convince them they're like, 'oh that's really cool,' then we say we were born in different months and it gets even cooler,” said Katie.
Jack Breitung says when his twins were born, such a thing was pretty rare.
"Back then, it was quite something. They were in magazines and on all the news stations and in all the newspapers,” said Jack.
At the time of their birth, doctors said there had been just 20 such cases of twin births so far apart in the previous 40 years.
"I haven't heard another story like it,” Katie said.
Though born on different days, in different months, the twins have plenty in common.
"I mean we do sometimes finish each other's sentence, sometimes we're humming the same song. We think it's freaky. We have a little handshake," said Katie.
The Breitungs attend Odyssey Academy in Greece, where Katie's in an upcoming school production of "The Wedding Singer." Kelly's an all-sectional cheerleader. Senior year for both is winding down.
“We don't want to be the twins that go to the same college, do everything together. We like to be that separate person, but we can still come together. We want to be close to each other,” said Katie.
In the fall for the first time, the twins won't be together. Katie's looking at Alfred. Kelly wants to go to Cazenovia.
“Two hours and 40 minutes away. We even looked it up,” said Kelly.
In the meantime, the family will celebrate separate birthdays of sisters with a rare bond, different even this year. Thanks to leap year, the twins turn 18 five days apart instead of four.
"For each individual birthday they get cake, they get their presents, they get sung their happy birthday. Just like anyone in the house, it's recognized that's their special day,” Jack said.