Family reunion time!

A few weeks ago we attended a family reunion for my dad's mom's side of the family. It's the only part of my family that has regular, organized family reunions. I didn't know most of the people, while others I know just vaguely. The best part was connecting with family members I don't get to see very often.

Kieran digging into a family delicacy, glishte, which is an acquired taste!
I didn't like it as a child, but I like it now.
Kieran's my daring eater.

He actually liked it!
Glishte is a cabbage roll stuffed with beef and rice and cooked with sauerkraut.
I'm trying to find something about it on the internet, but no luck--I'm probably spelling it wrong.

The large family tree wall, carefully detailed and annotated..
That's Marilyn, my dad's cousin and the chief geneaologist,
explaining how we are all related.

I was interested to learn that one of the names at the top of the tree was Maria!

Each branch of the family came up for a photo in front of the family tree. Our branch was by far the biggest, and we were missing a whole lot of people!! My dad has five living brothers, who have 11 kids (who have 14 kids). Most of them didn't come; if they had, it would have been even harder to fit everyone in for the photo.

Our family branch

These are photos of some of my ancestors:

I'm not closely related to her, but I thought it was a darling photo--
I think her name was Amelia



One of my favorite great-aunts, Evie (my grandma's sister) is the one in the aqua beads.
I loved her!!



This photo was taken at my grandma and grandpa's house in the 50s--
my dad and his brothers are in there somewhere!

The reunion/picnic took place on a pretty farm out in Canby, on one of those excrutiatingly hot days. Fortunately the farm had plenty of shade!

I thought it was a good place to have Kieran pose for some head shots for his audition

With my cousin Tim

With my dad's cousin Lynn, who traveled all the way
from Philadelphia with her husband for the reunion

I remember when I was 16 and my family took a cross-country trip, and we stayed with Lynn and her family for several days. Both Lynn and John are only children, so their two kids have no first cousins...plus most of their family lived far away. I'll never forget how excited they were to meet relatives. It made me realize how lucky I am to live so close to so many of my relatives (and to have so many of them)!

Visiting our new-found cousins in Philadelphia--
Look at all those tube socks (and my argyle kneesocks!)

I recently reconnected with Lynn's daughter, Beth, on Facebook...which has been a great way to keep connected with my cousins (and Mike's cousins) far and wide!