Family reunion

About a year ago I emailed everybody on my dad's side of the family--aunts, uncles, cousins, partners, etc.--and said that we need to get together.  We went through a long phase there where we only saw each other when people died, and while that ritual is of course incredibly important, that's not the only context in which we should meet.  Summer of 2010 we got together at a wedding (great fun!), and then we did Thanksgiving 2011 in Cookeville.  We needed a fun 2012 event, too.

The logistics were actually pretty simple.  Planning a year in advance was necessary for this crowd, which includes web designers, attorneys, neurosurgeons, food chemists, development officers, nonprofit directors, students, etc (and go ahead and include the phrase "high powered" before each of those professions).  But we were all committed to doing this, so we found a weekend that worked.  Aunt Sally and Nick were awesome because they agreed to host the whole thing in Chicago, a convenient location because it's in the middle of the country, and this family stretches from coast to coast.

I'm not sure what to expect.  Oddly, for a family this size and with this many people of reproductive age, we only have two kids--Maybelle and her cousin Benjamin.  Sadly, Benjamin won't be there, so Maybelle will be the only child.  This means, in part, that while a lot of the group will be heading out for big nighttime fun, at least one of us will be headed back to the hotel with Maybelle.  And let me say, without any self-pity, that there's a very good chance that person will be me.  I wake up with Maybelle every morning, which means I get tired a lot earlier than a lot of folks.  9:30 rolls around, and I'm yawning.  A big night out in Chicago sounds very, very sleepy to me.  Snuggling in the king sized bed with Maybelle doesn't sound all that bad.  But it would be cool if there were a cousin or sibling having a similar experience.

I'm eager to find out random things from this extended family.  I warned them that I'm assembling questions--things like, "When did you realize you'd fallen in love?" and "What was your first job?" and even "What's an average day like for you?"

We've prepared Maybelle for this trip by making her a book like her "Uncle Trey Book."  This book is called "Our trip book."

Here's the long video.  It's probably only going to be interesting to immediate family members, those whose names she gets to in her reading (this is Nonni, Poppi, Uncle Trey, Uncle Aaron, and Aunt Mary):


Maybelle reading "Our trip book," July 12, 2012 from Alison, Walter, and Maybelle on Vimeo.

And here's the short one, made for the general public.  It's really, really short!
Very short "Good reading" video, July 12, 2012 from Alison, Walter, and Maybelle on Vimeo.