I just walked in my front door, home safe from a mad weekend dash to Kentucky and the first thought that ran through my head was "Thank goodness no one had to come in here!" It seriously appeared as if we were taken from our house and put up quite a fight on the way out. We made the 8, er 11 hour trek to Tennessee to see Dave's parents just four weeks ago (a whole other blog that hopefully I'll get to some day) so I wasn't sure how the kids were going to do. When it was just Ben we could go anywhere, do anything because he was such an agreeable guy. When Kiera had her say, we just didn't travel as much. I think the trip where I looked at Dave with tears running down my cheeks and told him that I wanted to throw myself from the car to get away from the constant screaming, closed that door. But we are all older and better at expressing ourselves and we are taking some bold steps toward family travel. Hence the trip to Tennessee followed closely by the trip to Kentucky. The trip (and the drive for that matter), fantastic. This is our 4th annual trip to Lexington to visit with seldom seen and much missed cousins. There is so much background here that I could write for days but the short version goes; I remember seeing all of my cousins (there are only four) when I was 2ish but the memory is of playing in a suit case. I saw bits and pieces of two of my cousins through out the years and then when my little spitfire Muner (my dads mom) died. My dad died just a few months later and we packed it up and headed to Kentucky. For the first time in over 20 years all six (four cousins, my sister and myself) of us were together. It was new and wonderful getting to know the grown ups that my cousins turned into. Our time was short, we said good by and again time passed quickly. Then their mom died and again were came together to talk and laugh and fill in where we left off. That began a yearly trek to Kentucky. The gathering is amazing. We have missed so much of each others lives that you would think that we would need time to reestablish any sort of bond. We don't. It's an easy sort of happiness that allows us to just pick up as if we had dinner just last week. We talk quickly and overlap our stories trying to get and give all that we can in such a short time. We hug and laugh and drink wine until it runs out. We step away at the end of the night carrying sleeping kids and looking forward to the morning when we can start all over again. Then, it is Sunday and we take too long to say good bye. Reluctantly giving hugs and more hugs and begin to think of how quickly our lives will take center stage and how long it will be before we get to sit and talk of the little things with each other. We say good bye at the hotel door and my wonderful sister turns around and makes our reservation for next year. Time will pass but come next April it will feel as if we saw each other just yesterday. I can't wait. I love you guys.