it’s summertime and the living is easy
August 22, 2011 Leave a comment
A few weeks ago, we traveled up to Missouri for a family reunion of giant proportions. The family just keeps getting bigger and bigger. This family reunion, which happens every three years, is Drew’s grandma’s side of the family – so it’s her’s, her brothers’ and her sister’s families (kids, grandkids, great-grandkids). So that means lots of people.
We started the weekend out at Drew’s uncle’s house with most of the family gathering for a cookout. This year there just seems to be more young kids. And they’re all running around all over the place. It must be tiring to run after them! I wouldn’t know…I just sat back and snapped a few photos.
Before it got too dark, we attempted to assemble the whole gang together for a picture.
The next day was a full day of family fun at the local park. The guys played some wiffle ball like they’ve done every reunion since they were all kids.
They take it quite seriously.
The younger generation looked on, picking up pointers.
The girls opted not to sweat it out. We’d rather pose for pictures.
And play with the kiddos.
Later in the evening, we ate (again) and had a local guy come sing us some tunes.
The little kids danced. (Or twirled.)
And the big kids danced too.
Drew hung out with his bro-in-law.
Some little kids played duck-duck-goose.
Others dragged chairs around the floor. You know, just for fun.
And a few kids even sang for the crowd.
The evening wrapped up and we all said our goodbyes.
Drew and I stayed for another day and spent time at his grandparents house, where we looked forward to Grandma’s fried chicken and watched a nice thunderstorm blow in.
It was actually bad enough that we hid out in the basement for a while. A lot of trees in the neighborhood blew down, shingles flew off roofs, and the power went out for six hours. After the storm blew over, we sat outside until dark, and then went inside and lit some candles while we waited for the power to come back on.
So plans for fried chicken were scrapped. Instead, dinner was Pizza Hut and a nice bottle of wine by candlelight. And that made for a memorable end to our family reunion trip! (Thankfully, Grandma made her fried chicken for lunch the next day, so we didn’t miss out before our flight home!)
See the rest of my pictures from the family reunion on Flickr.
*Blog post title is a lyric from the song “Summertime” by Sam Cooke