Fun Family Reunion Facts

Wild Man and I just back from a trip down South for a combined birthday party (for my aunt) and family reunion.  I am using initials to protect the identity of the innocent and to protect myself since the guilty know where I live!

• My mom is the youngest of 12 siblings, 11 of whom lived to adulthood, 10 of whom had children, and four of whom are still living.  The oldest, second-oldest, and youngest were present (personally or electronically – more on that later) were present at the reunion.  The occasion the precipitated my mom organizing the reunion was that her sister (the oldest of the 12) turned 90 a few days ago!  Talk about a reason to party!
• Uncle C (the oldest boy and third-oldest sibling) is 86 years old and couldn’t come to the reunion because he is in a rehab center.  We were, though, able to set up a Skype connection and let Aunt C and Uncle C “visit” for a while.  A very cool use of technology!!
• One of my cousins, T, lives about a four hour drive from me, but the last time I saw her was a year and a half ago in Dallas.  Yes, that’s shameful. I will make every effort to see her in a more reasonable time frame!
• I have more cousins than I can keep up with!!  I’m sure there are some I’ve never met – and others I  haven’t seen since I was a young child.  I have cousins older than my parents, so I have second cousins who are my age.  Is it any wonder that I can’t sort out who’s who?!
• I may claim Southern heritage, but I’ve become a Northerner in many ways.  It was HOT in Mississippi last week – and I didn’t like it one bit!  I was very glad to leave the 90+ degrees (with a zillion percent humidity) and return to temps of 60s and 70s.  Yes, it can get hot up here, but it doesn’t stay hot for nearly as long.  I’m definitely acclimated to this Upper Midwestern weather!
• But I will not give up my love of Southern food!  I had me some Popeye’s fried chicken, some homemade Chicken and Dumplings, and some iced tea while I was down South!  Unfortunately, I did get around to fried catfish or any crawfish (although, I think the crawfish may be out of season).  When I got back home, I made some venison steaks with rice and gravy because I was still on my southern food high.
• Wild Man rediscovered the joy of fire ants.  yippee.  We have ants up here that bite, but they don’t sting like red fire ants do.  Wild Man and his cousins know to stay away from the ant hills when outside, but they still managed to get some bites.  Wild Man had one on the very bottom of his foot.  Thank the good Lord for hydrocortisone cream.

I think that’s enough “fun facts” for now.  Hopefully, we’ll do this reunion again in a couple of years – but without the red ants!