Cousins

40 hours from now I will be boarding a plane to Denver, CO for a family reunion. We are spending a week in Dillon which is at the base of Breckenridge, Copper Mountain, etc. This will be the first time that my father's side of my family has ALL been together since I was in high school. We are a small unit, although we've grown since my cousins started growing up and getting married. It will be my dad and stepmom, Aunt Karen (party people!) and her Doug, Uncle Joe and Aunt Betty, Cousin Tracy and Devin and their daughter Hailey, cousin Andrea and her Seth and then there is me and Andy.
It's always been me and Andy. As you can see from the posted photo, we are as close as cousins can be. His birthday is just 3 months before mine and people used to mistake us for twins when we were little thanks to our matching bowl cuts. Our eldest cousins used to make us walk ten feet behind them down the boardwalk at the beach. I remember watching in amazement as Andy stuffed as many dollar sized pancakes in his mouth at Uncle Bob's Pancake House. How I wish I could remember the final count but I want to say something insane like 30. One word, so many possibilities: Wawa. Camp Cannedian (I'm sure I butchered the spelling on that one) with Horseback Riding Camp and Adventures in the Dark, a camp that was so twisted now that I think back on it. We would stay up late, get up late and eat breakfast when the other kids were eating lunch, eat lunch at dinner and have our dinner at like 10 p.m. and then stay up telling scary stories in the woods. I got pink eye that year, along with the rest of the camp. But I digress, teenage summers spent back east with my dad were mostly spent at Aunt Karen's house with Andy and his friends that adopted me into their little group. And as we've grown older, we've stayed just as tight. He is the closest thing I have to a brother.
I was on the phone with him last night, talking about the crazy storm Colorado is having right now, in preparation of our arrival, of course. Well Andy lives there but anyway, again...off track. He was telling me he did all sorts of research for the place we are staying. He said he google mapped "bars" around the area. Nothing. Restaurants? Nothing. So he decided to bring the bar to us. "Oh yeah, I've got three cases of beer. One bottle of Gin. A few bottles of wine..." Yeah, cousin, I think we're going to be just fine.
I'm really looking forward to spending this week with my family. Not only is it THE FIRST TIME I'VE EVER TAKEN A WHOLE WEEK OFF WORK IN MY LIFE and not only do I not have any responsibilities for the whole week (sorry Gordo, you know I will miss you soooo much!) but this is really the first time we've all been together as adults. And as an ADDED BONUS, my little Giz Wiz and her hubbie Joshua are coming up to snowboard and crash with us for a few nights the latter part of the trip.
The only issue I DO have is the fact that the forecast is basically 28 and snowing upon my arrival. Wiz called me today because they had a SNOW DAY. It was 75 here yesterday and I am horrible at layering.