Latest Recruit that I've got to move to Colorado is...

I am sooooo excited to announce that we have a new recruit moving from Iowa to Colorado.  Here's your hint to who it is....

Who else raises their fists to their nose when he is just as equally as excited as we are in this picture?




That's right- my baby brother (who is not really a baby any more , nor does he does he still show his excitement this way but I have a hard time forgetting either of those things;)

Jeff has accepted a position at Wilber-Ellis as a feed marketer.  Only in Colorado does this translate to him marketing brewers malt from breweries to farmers.  He will be based in Golden, CO and his main account will be Coors.  He just became one of the coolest guys I know.  Ok, he already was, but this just solidified the fact.

My list of recruits is growing!  I am starting to wonder when Colorado is going to start to give me a kickback for the tax revenue that I am bringing into this state...

Words can not describe how excited I am to have Jeff live so much closer to me.  But I will try.

There may have been a time that Jeff and I didn't get a long.  Yes- there were times where we fought, were purposely annoying, and even tormented each other.  There was the time that about five members of my high school wrestling team came over to my house and gave him flushy after flushy, just because it amused me.  And there was the time that I came downstairs for a date and Jeff had a choice selection of horrible pictures of me that he was displaying, to which he followed with "Do you REALLY want to date her?"  Or the time that I put pictures of him holding kittens in the high school year book.  I think that one was my favorite.

But ever since I was a senior in high school and he was a freshman, we have been pretty close.  We would go out on "dates" to movies every couple months, just him and I, and talk about things.  We kept that going even when I went away from college.  When he joined me at Iowa State, we did the best we could to line up schedules and see each other.  Even if it was only tailgating when neither of us would really remember.  There were times that I did his laundry for him.  There were times where I bought him beer.  I'm sure you can guess which happened more often, although not as much as one would think.

What I appreciate the most about our relationship is that we've always been extremely honest with each other.  With Jeff, it doesn't matter what I have to say because he'll listen and vice versa.  We've helped each other thru some of the more difficult things in our lives - breakups, job changes, moves to different states, etc.  When something big happens in my life, good or bad, my brother is usually one of the first people - if not the first - that I call.  When I need him to be, he is the voice of reason and his opinions help me put things into perspective.  He has an odd gift for knowing when I don't need a voice of reason, that I just need to be heard.  It's then that he provides an ear and will simply say "I don't know the answer but you seem to have a better gage on what's going on then you think." 

He is the one person that I talk to almost every week. 

My brother is one of my best friends.  It's because of this that I have wanted him to move closer for a very long time.  I thought that closer would only be Omaha or Kansas City.  Which both are still a much cheaper flight than Cedar Rapids.

A year ago he came out for our First Annual Sinterklaas Party up in Frisco (there will probably be a post explaining the Sinterklaas tradition later in the year).  He spent Friday on the mountain snowboarding, and had made sure that he had a few too many cocktails while in the hot tub while waiting for the rest of us to arrive after work.  The majority of us were still sober when Jeff drunkenly proclaimed "Give me a year and a half and I'll be out here."

Now, if I was a betting woman - I would have placed my bet that it wasn't going to happen.  Jeff had told me (sober) many times that he would love to be out in Colorado, but there weren't many job prospects for him out in the Western half of the US.  He needed to be either in the Midwest or even on the East coast.  And I would have also said that I knew my brother well enough to think that he would keep himself on the same job path, that out of the two of us- he was the one who didn't take risks, especially with his career.  I think that everyone in the hot tub just thought Jeff was drunk, on vacation, and a little bit jealous of the life that we got to live on a somewhat regular basis. 

If I had taken that bet, I would gladly be paying up right now.  I'm really glad that he's taking this risk.

I don't know if Colorado or my parents are ready to have the two Bell children living in the same state, but I do know that we will have fun together.  Because its my opinion that everything, including a sibling friendship, seems to be better on a mountain.