Planning A Family Reunion

Last June, I was planning a family reunion for the first time. You see, my family used to all live in the same area. Because we were all located around Mississippi, we never had to plan family reunions. We would all see each other frequently enough that reunions were unnecessary. We would get together for Christmas, New Year's, and all the other major holidays. Nowadays, however, things are different. We are scattered across the country, and we don't get to see each other except during very special events. We decided to plan a family reunion in hopes of uniting the tribe again.

I didn't realize how much work it was to plan a family reunion. It is not just like planning a normal get-together, you have to make sure you keep track of everything. First of all, we cannot have a family reunion down in Mississippi. People had moved around too much, and we needed to take a more central location. We decided on a conference center in Montana, and rented it out for the weekend.

It took me months to finish planning the family reunion. I had to figure out food, lodging, activities, the works. When I was finally done, I was absolutely exhausted. It took everything out of me, and I didn't even particularly want to go at that point. I was just too worn out.

Fortunately, once I got there I perked up. Planning a family reunion had really exhausted my desire to see people, but once I was actually there with all my old family members, I started to really enjoy myself. I had thought of everything, and I was pleased with all the preparations I had made. We had family T-shirts, souvenirs of various kinds, and of course plenty even drink. It was a little bit different than the down-home family reunions we used to have when I was a kid, and I do sort of miss those. Nonetheless, it was a way to get everyone together which was the important thing.

There is one thing that I forgot when planning a family reunion. I never thought about putting together a photo book. It was difficult, because there were so many people taking pictures. It ended up taking months to compile all the pictures from all the different family members and send them out to everyone. Once I did, however, it really drummed up interest for the next family reunion. I'm just glad I won't be planning that one!