Stories Collected While Living in France

French la Vie

Reading His Future

Spirit moves

Photography and text by Corey Amaro:

If you have grown up in a large family then you understand the depth of the word, "Cousins".

I have at least a thousand actually, I have near 50 first cousins.

Add second cousins to the list goes into the thousands. I grew up thinking friends and cousins were one in the same.

My nieces and nephews are happy to have Sacha live in their backyard verses clear over in France. Sacha is a good cousin/friend to his five younger girl cousins.

 

 

 

Mind reading

 

Energy force

 

 

I remember being in love, and I mean in love with my guy cousins they were so cool, hip and good looking!

When you grow up in a big family having a crush on your cousins is a given, especially when you are a kid.

 

In the field

Marie (my 11 year old niece) convinced Sacha to let her read his future.

She took his hand to "feel" his vibes. Sacha played along by raising his hand to the sky.

It looks as if he is going to be baptised doesn't it?

 

Palm reading

 

As Marie read his love life, Sacha covered his eyes.  

Marie said, "You are going to MARRY Kate (his five year old cousin) when she gets big."

 

In a daze
 
Sacha pretended to be in a daze as he walked around like a zombie. The five little girl cousins giggled, the more they giggled the more he played the part.

It reminded me of happy days of playing with my cousins outside, acting goofy, making up stories and pretending.

I am thankful that Sacha is able to have this time with his cousins, and to play their games and be part of their lives.

While Marie pretended to read Sacha's future I thought about how this time in Willows will give him many good moments to lean and grow from. His future is being seeded with family fun and love.

 

Walkabout

 

 

How many cousins do you have?

Did you have a favorite cousin growing up?

Comments

40 responses to “Reading His Future”

  1. Bridget

    I have thirteen on my Mother’s side alone. These 13 cousins and I all lived relatively close to my home town in Sonoma County while growing up. I cannot remember a weekend we were at one my Aunts or Uncles homes. My favorite cousins were Becky & Perry. They lived on the west side of Petaluma, had a huge barn out back that had a large willow tree next to it so that you could climb on the barn, a small creek next door and beyond the barn was a field of ponies. At the end of their street was the some kind of storage area that had small piles of gravel with train tracks next to it. Oh boy the adventures! I don’t think we went home clean once after visiting them. Thanks for letting me share. Cousins are truly the best!

    Reply
  2. Elaine L.

    Oh my gosh! I really relate to this post. My mother came from a family of 12 children. My grandmother was an only child. The first thing she told people when she met them was that she had 50 grandchildren and 51 great grandchildren and that was 36 years, ago. She was very proud.
    I had crushes on several of my boy cousins. Now, with facebook we are having fun posting and talking about old pictures and fun times at my grandmother’s. She was the center of our Universe.
    Sasha will treasure these moments with his cousins.

    Reply
  3. Kit

    It sounds wonderful to come from such a big, close family. I always yearned for that as a child. I have only two cousins, a little older, who we looked up to and a few second cousins who we hardly ever saw.
    My kids have several grown-up cousins who are now producing a generation of littler cousins for them!

    Reply
  4. Laura @ 52 FLEA

    I loved this post! Sacha is such a sweet guy. Since my Mom was an only child…I have only 5 first cousins and none of them lived close by. A very different experience but still a wonderful childhood! My sisters are my best friends now…Your big family is a blessing…and it is clear that you know that!
    🙂

    Reply
  5. Holly

    it is wonderful that Sacha is able to be here spending time with family…
    a great big beautiful bond with memories that will last forever!

    Reply
  6. Suzanne, the Farmer’s Wife

    I have 12 cousins, but saw them only rarely because they lived a thousands miles away. We would travel to stay with them in the summertime. My older boy cousins were wonderful because they allowed their little nerdy cousin (me) to tag along with them when the went to the malt shop. I felt SO grown up and cool.

    Reply
  7. Everton Terrace

    I imagine Sacha will remember this time all his life. It’s just such a wonderful gift, warms my heart. I don’t have a large number of cousins, though my husband does. We grew up far away from all our relatives. I have a cousin now who lives across the country but she is near and dear to my heart, more like the sister I never had.

    Reply
  8. Rhonda P.

    Ah, yes, like you I have many cousins. I don’t think I’ve ever counted them, though. I will have to do that today. My parents are both from large midwest families. Family spread all over this country. It’s wonderful!
    You are so right, the memories of playing with them all when we got together is embedded in my mind. The California cousins laughing at how we said Mom. So much fun.
    My favorite cousin was Meredith Kay, she was the coolest cousin to me. She still is.

    Reply
  9. Evelyn

    I have 4 cousins on my mom’s side of the family and 11 cousins on my dad’s side, although only 6 of those 11 are still alive. We were very close to our cousins on my dad’s side while growing up, but sadly have grown apart in our adult lives. I was always in love with my boy cousins! Wish we could have stayed connected somehow.

    Reply
  10. Jenna

    I had a lot of cousins as well. My favorite was also tall, dark and charming.

    Reply
  11. naomi

    I only have 11 first cousins all together. My sister and I are the oldest of all of them by about 7 or 8 years, so we loved to carry them around as babies and love on them. We are friendly with all of them now as adults, closer to some than others, but I love knowing and being friends with them now.
    LOVED this post.

    Reply
  12. Jeanne

    Lots of cousins in my family as well and I love them ALL dearly.
    Love you
    Thanks for all you share
    Love Jeanne♥

    Reply
  13. Cheryl ~ Casual Cottage Chic

    Alas, I come from a small extended family so not many cousins, and they lived states away from us, so we didn’t really get to know one another. I’m sure Sasha is cherishing each and every day with his US family 🙂 He will speak of the year here for years and years.

    Reply
  14. Nancy from Mass

    well, I do come from a large family, but I only have 4 first cousins on my Moms’ side. My Dad was an only child. However, my Paternal grandfather was one of 13 and 11 of them married and had 4+ kids each. I have loads of cousins in Canada (2nd, 3rd cousins) and I mean loads! My favorite cousin is my first cousin Denise. She is 7 years older than me and I still look up to her this day. She taught me how to fold a fitted sheet by myself (and people are amazed at how well I can fold them), she rebuilt her lawn mower engine (but held off while she was mending my wedding gown so her nails would not be dirty looking). She always makes me laugh and I’m glad we speak often.
    I’m sure it was difficult to send Sacha to Willows for a year, but it will be a year he will never forget!

    Reply
  15. Tamara Komuniecki

    Such a lovely family, Corey — and such a lovely son.
    I grew up with a lot of cousins as well, though not as many as you! And I do remember having crushes on a few of the older, handsome ones!
    Now Finn only has a few, but my sister lives close to us and she has a nine-year-old son and six-year-old daughter, and they have already been enjoying getting to know each other.
    We are really trying to decide if we should have another child and I do want to, so that Finn has someone to grow up with…but with my health issues we are not sure if we ought to go through it all over again…tough call.
    Thank you for sharing this wonderful moment with us.
    If you make your way up to Vancouver, we’d love to have you!
    Tamara

    Reply
  16. Carol

    I have one cousin … that’s it. I come from a small family. You are very lucky to have such a large, extended and loving family. I can only imagine how wonderful that must feel.
    Sasha sure is a handsome young man. I am so pleased that his gap year in CA is turning out well for him.

    Reply
  17. Carol

    My sincere apologies for spelling your son’s name incorrectly in my previous post.

    Reply
  18. Valerie, Grants Pass, OR

    You must be so, so very happy watching all of this. What a wonderful family!

    Reply
  19. ThroughtheMilkhouseDoor

    I’m related to the other half of Willows…Taylor, Spooner cousin galore.
    Beautiful post today, Corey. Thank you..

    Reply
  20. Paula S In New Mexico

    Tons of cousins. I can sure identify with this post.

    Reply
  21. Victoria Ramos

    In my mom’s family – she had 7 brothers and sisters – that age difference between siblings were huge, so I had adult cousins that were married by the time I came around. Plus my sisters and I were the youngest of the cousins. There are a ton of them I don’t even know, however we were very close to my mom’s sisters children (4) that lived in our town and not too far away. With 5 of us, there were always plenty of kids.
    I loved my cousin Kevin. He was alittle over 4 years older than I — enough for him to tease and drive us all crazy. I though he was the greatest looking guy — but lucky for him I never went to high school with him (or lucky me I think).
    The same of my father’s side – he was the baby of the family by many, many years and there were only 4 cousins there, all of which are way older than us. All my sisters are great friends with their kids. They lived close enough so we could see them often too.
    I have very great family memories with my cousins —- and being Portuguese I have an VERY extended list of ‘cousins by marriage’ and any other crazy configuration you can think of!

    Reply
  22. Jenny N

    Cousins are wonderful. I grew up in a mostly girl family and my mom’s sister has four boys around my sister’s and my ages. Growing up I always wanted to play/hang out with them…they were the older brothers we didn’t have and they still dote on us to this day. Sacha’s time in Willows appears to be a gift all around.

    Reply
  23. Melanie

    I was the youngest cousin in my family and I always looked up to my cousins. I’m sure they probably found me annoying tagging along with them. 😉

    Reply
  24. Kathie B.

    Have just one first cousin, much much older than I am, though a nice guy (age difference doesn’t matter now the way it did when I was still a moppet but he was already an adult). We grew up only a couple blocks apart in the same neighborhood, so my neighbors all knew him and my uncle, too.
    Back when I was really little, girls would say that when they grew up they wanted to marry their daddy. Absolutely nothing wrong with my father, but just to be contrarian I’d say I wanted to marry my cousin. Never realized it till about a decade ago, but Farmboy Husband’s disposition is eerily similar to my cousin’s, plus the two guys get along famously! So figuratively speaking, I guess I did marry my cousin after all :-)))

    Reply
  25. Karen

    He’s a handsome boy, no doubt, but what is really touching is his sweetness in playing along with his little girl cousins’ games – it looks like they adore him, and no wonder! You’ve raised two wonderful young people, for sure. How lovely for you to have this time to be in the midst of your lovely big family!

    Reply
  26. Patti

    Though meant to be all in fun, we should be aware of what our children are exposed to and grow up to consider harmless. Leviticus 19:31; Leviticus 20:6. Check it out on bibleateway.com – an on-line Bible.
    Did love your post on cousins. What a wonderful opportunity for Sacha and his counsins! I am still very close to mine even though we lived 6 hours from them all.

    Reply
  27. Christine

    I have less than 10 cousins, I think. My favorite cousin has always been Diane.

    Reply
  28. Helene

    You are so right. Cousins are special. I have two cousins I keep in touch with for all these 60 years. We still laugh and talk as if we were kids. My children have 11 cousins who all spent their childhoods sharing holidays, summer vacations and life. They are all still best of friends and know they can rely on these people to be there for them in happy and sad times.

    Reply
  29. pauline

    Your family posts always make me wish to be a child again with my family all around me. There were 13 cousins all together when we were kids – enough for us each to have at least one as a special friend. We still all love to get together and celebrate each other. Sacha is building the same happy memories you celebrate here.

    Reply
  30. Di

    I have 9 cousins on my mum’s side – well actually now I have 8 because sadly one died aged 37, just 3 weeks ago and it brought back so many memories of my cousins when I was young and the joy of family. In our family, there are almost 2 generations of cousins. My mum was 12 and 14 when her brothers were born, and they were 17 and 19 when I was born….they were the ones that were like your older cousins for me – the cool ones – oh and I have 3 that live in the USA (my mum’s sister married an American) and believe me they were cool too! And as my uncles didn’t marry till they were both 30 my younger cousins are 18, 15, 14, and 13 years younger than me so I was the one that played with them when they were small. So I have first cousins on my mum’s side aged from 45 to 22…..

    Reply
  31. Delphine Payne

    My family was never close and there are many cousins I haven’t even met! But there were 4 who were in my childhood. One in particular I thought was wonderful and had a crush on, to the point I asked my father was it alright to marry your cousin (don’t know why I thought of that at age 10). Dad just raised his eyebrows and said ‘which one?’ I blushed and replied ‘just asking’.

    Reply
  32. Franca Bollo

    Over 30 Amaro first cousins? Who are these 7+ cousins? Maybe you’re counting those with schizophrenia twice? Mental illness aside, we are only 23.
    __________________________________
    Dear First Cousin Francabollo,
    I was wrong… I thought you or Sheba might correct me, actually there are 24.
    Ginny
    Craig
    Chris
    Joan
    Maryanne
    Diane
    Baby Mary
    Robin
    Judy
    David
    Jeanne
    Frank
    Linda
    Sandra
    John
    Curtis
    Lynn
    Julie
    Christine
    Me
    Marty
    Mathew
    Mark
    Zane
    Actually 24 first cousins.
    xx C

    Reply
  33. Faith Lyon

    I have 10 cousins and all but one are girls, add my sisters and I along with our brother and we have 14 total on my mom’s side. It was fun when all the girls started getting married, at the rehearsal dinner we started a tradition of the new boy hat. Now we are all having kids and competition for names has been a little fierce : ) All still close even though I live in CA and everyone else is back in TX. And yes we each had a girl cousin that we were paired up with mine is Becki and we still exchange presents with that cousin. LOVE big extended families, so fun.

    Reply
  34. Denise Solsrud

    i have dozens of cousins. my mother is the youngest of 12 children. i adore my cousins. we are so family. i always had so much fun with the boy cousins that were close to me in age. when we all get together, the time ends so quickly and always makes me a little sad as the time is up. but, the memories are worth it. cousins,i even like the word. Bestest,Denise

    Reply
  35. Marie

    I am such a good fortune teller!:) The pictures are way funnier and I can see myself! Sacha is so funny!!

    Reply
  36. pattyg

    Wonderful gestures, Sacha could be a Modern Dancer with the Paul Taylor Company!

    Reply
  37. penny willoughby

    Dear Corey, I have many cousins, but my favorite was and is my cousin Mark. When we were 5, he was the ringbearer and I was the flower girl at our oldest cousin’s wedding. The reception was at a fancy hotel in downtown Chicago. We were the only children invited, so we had fun together. We danced like crazy and he bought me cough drops from the gift shop, sigh. That was 50 years ago, and I haven’t thought of it in years. Thanks Corey, enjoy your lovely family, and a safe trip home.

    Reply
  38. Linda

    Can you believe I only had four cousins? I was especially taken with the three who were brothers as boys were so foreign to me. They would jump off of high steps and then go rolling on the ground like soldiers something I would do out of fear of hurting myself or getting my clothes dirty. Their way of thinking was just so different. Today one is a successful business man, one is in prison and one dissapeared many years ago. Hard to believe they were once fun little boys.

    Reply
  39. Becca

    I have at least 35 first cousins and hundreds of second cousins….on my mom’s mom’s side alone there are many hundreds as she had 10 siblings, who had 53 children amongst them and many of those families had many children as well. My husband has double first cousins as his mom’s brother married his dad’s sister….people have such a hard time getting their head around that one….as tho they’re blood relations or something. Aren’t large families fun?

    Reply
  40. Gracie

    I have 10, I’m the oldest so I have fond memories of all of them….. one is my favourite (I know that I shouldn’t say this, but it’s the truth….) and I will always like to spend time with them all….

    Reply

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