Formal 2009!

Well this weekend was a blast.  I had to work on Saturday morning, but as soon as I finished we drove up there.  Eric invited Ali to go as his date, so they rode with us up there.  It rained pretty much the whole way and it was so foggy we couldn't see more than a half a mile ahead.  As we got up there it cleared up.  We saw quite a few bighorn sheep on the side of the road!  I was really excited about that, but nobody else was.  They thought I overreacted a little, but Eric and Daniel enjoyed commenting on their "giant balls."  They never grow up, do they?  The whole drive up there was so beautiful.  I fall in love with Colorado every time we drive up to the mountains.  We got there around 4pm and checked into our room.  The room was so beautiful.  We had a king bed and a fireplace and every room had a balcony.  We were all right next to each other so we could go out on our balcony and shout to each other.  Eric and Daniel were anxious to get down to the hot tub.  Ali and I decided not to get in, but we sat with them and had some wine and cheese to start off the evening.  We went exploring a little bit and discovered the locker rooms.  They were incredible.  They had individual showers with shampoo, conditioner, and body wash.  There was a sauna and a steam room.  There were individual little vanities with chairs, hair dryer, and a mirror.  At each one was a collection of free stuff including baskets of disposable razors, Q-tips, cotton balls, lotion, hair spray, and tampons.  There was even a machine that presses all the water out of your swimsuit!  The guys were sooo excited, they had to use the sauna.  Ali and I headed back upstairs to get ready.  Eric and Daniel just ended up using the showers down there so they were pretty much ready when they got back.  I ironed Daniel's shirt and then did my makeup and hair.  Ali and Eric came to our room and we walked together over to Seth's room (which was a suite with a loft) where everyone was meeting before dinner.  Seth took a picture of each couple as we entered, and James handed us each a glass of champagne for the opening toast.  We all met each other and took pictures.  I think Seth was already drunk when he gave the toast because he kept saying the same thing over and over again.  "We want to welcome all the dates; by the way have you seen the loft?"  We all laughed the third (and fourth and fifth) time he said it.  Daniel tried to wrap it up by shouting "To Theta Chi!" and we all clanked glasses, but Seth insisted he wasn't done.  It was really funny.  

The restaurant where we had dinner was a short walk down this hill.  It was pretty wet and cold, so most of us drove.  Luckily some of the guys hadn't started drinking yet and they drove us down there.  Each date (I have to say date, not girl, because one of the brothers is gay and his date was obviously a guy) got a red carnation which is Theta Chi's official flower.  We took pictures out on the deck of the restaurant.  The hotel was right in the side of a cliff so the view was incredible.  Dinner was mediocre, but the dessert was delicious!  They had all these little tiny cakes in all different flavors.  After dinner, we went back up to the hotel for about an hour to "hang out."  At around 9:30 we all went back to the restaurant to dance.  I may have had a little too much to drink, because my stomach was a little queasy when we were dancing.  But I danced anyways.  Eric was totally hammered.  All night long he kept telling me "I'm sooooo glad you and Daniel are getting married.  You're going to be so happy together."  Over and over again.  It was quite amusing.  After a few hours we left to go soak in the hot tub.  Daniel and me, Jeff and his date Michaela, and Evan and his date Ricky walked there together.  Slowly, most of the brothers came to join us.  Molly and Amanda jumped in the pool in their dresses.  I found out later that Eric made out with Molly on the dance floor.  Last year Molly had a thing for Daniel and flirted with him incessantly.  It made me kind of mad, but I'm not the type to hold a grudge.  I'm the one with the ring, after all. :-)  So anyways, she has sort of a reputation for being loose.  I can't believe anyone kissed Eric after the way he was acting.  He was really sloppy obnoxious drunk.  But that's Molly I guess.  I guess Daniel had a little too much to drink too, because he threw up in the bushes.  But he felt much better after that lol.  I think I may be making this sound worse than it was.  Really, it was only a few people who were really really drunk.  Most of us just drank a little.  Everyone had a great time regardless.  The next morning a few people went in the hot tub again.  Daniel and I hung out with Jeff and few other guys by the fire pit near the pool.  It was surprisingly cold up there for May.  It was really nice though because we had pretty much the whole hotel to ourselves.  It's in between ski season and summer vacation season for them, so they don't get a lot of business.  We checked out around noon and then drove together about 30 minutes down the mountain to Vail.  Vail is a huge ski town, so it was also pretty deserted.  Jeff worked there this winter so he knew a great restaurant to go to.  About half of us ended up having lunch there and we looked at each other's pictures and compared stories.  We all gave Eric a hard time.  I think he was still drunk from the night before; he didn't eat much.

Overall, it was so much fun!  Daniel and I got to sort of relive our proposal.  We finished off the bottle of wine that we had that weekend, and the hotel was similar.  Only this time we got to hang out with a lot of really good friends and make some new ones too.