4/27/08 The e-Cousin Champagne Tradition

Here's another cool e-Cousin tradition. It was actually born the same year as the e-Cousin Spa Day event. Mary Louise's daughter, Christi (technically, a first cousin once removed from all the e-cousins except ML) married Matt that year and the e-cousins decided to celebrate. What gift could we give. And we came up with the idea that each of us would bring a champagne glass. We would toast Christi and Matt and then give them all the champagne glasses. They would end up with a set of 8 glasses, but no two would be alike. It's actually pretty cool because it's beautiful set of glasses and goes with any china/crystal patterns and every decorating taste (country, modern, etc.), and your guests can always figure out which glass is theirs.

So we did it for Christi and Matt in 2001 and Katy and Bing in 2007. Since Rebecca and Albert got married in October, it was perfect to do their champagne glasses at the next family reunion, which happened to be at their house. :-) Then Katy figured out that we had never done it for Nancy and Dale. Even though they got married after Christi and Matt, we somehow missed them. So we decided to "get caught up" by giving them champagne glasses, too. You can only imagine the nightmare of the emails. There was one set of emails going to ALL e-cousins about the reunion and regular e-cousin chatter. There was one set going to everyone except Rebecca about Rebecca's glasses and another one going to everyone except Nancy about her glasses. Oh my. But somehow, we pulled it off. :-)

Here's Katy filling the glasses with bubbly so we can break them in and toast Rebecca and Albert. All the glasses on the left of the sunflowers were for R&A. Notice that there are more reds on that side since Rebecca seems to have an affinity for things red. (And isn't it appropriate that Katy's face be hidden by sunflowers now that she lives in The Sunflower State?) All the glasses on the right are for Nancy and Dale.

Because ML couldn't be there, Katy brought glasses for her. Apparently there was even side emails going on between the two of them as Katy went glass shopping and then sent photos to ML to see what she wanted to give. And we even thought to bring an extra one for Rebecca to give to Nancy and Dale even though she didn't know about it. That was quite the trick! But we "thunk" right. Rebecca was sooo excited and relieved that we had a glass ready for her because she didn't want to miss out on that. Dang we're good! What an amazing group of women to be a part of!

4/27/08 Sunday Brunch

I love the Sunday Brunch of Family Reunion weekends because it's so relaxed and so fun and such a celebration of family, fun, and life. But I hate that it signals that another reunion is coming to an end. :-( This year's was no exception. But it was nice that everybody stayed for most of the day. There were no early departures (Nikki and Vernon before sunrise or Deborah and Daughter on the 9am flight). So the entire cast spent the entire morning and even part of the afternoon together before the inevitable call of work and obligations on Monday morning called us back to our regular lives.

Albert cooked up some of the fish that "the boys" caught on their escapade while the e-cousins were at their spa day. It was my first time to eat "dolphin" (the fish not the mammal) or barracuda. They were both delicious but is that the fish or is that the magic of Albert's cooking? We also enjoyed Rebecca's yummy quiche, coffee cake, and cheese grits. How can she do all that cooking on top of the amazing spread she put out on Friday night?! I love being related to talented cooks. I'll be picking out all the finest restaurants when reunion is in Maine in 2009. ;-)

4/26/08 What "The Boys" Do For Fun

So what do the spouses of e-cousins do at a family reunion while the girls are at the spa? Typically there either weren't any spouses or was just one so that person would either hang out with the aunts and uncles or just kind of disappear for a while. But lately, we've got more spouses! Last year and the year before, a golf outing was planned. This year there were 3 of them and they went fishing. Here are photos of the three of them and their catch.

4/26/08 dinner and desert

After our exciting and fun Riverfront Cruise, we came back to the neighborhood and had dinner at The Gold Coast Grill. Yummmmmmm!! And we had spectacular service, too! Afterwards we had ice cream at Kilwin's next door. For some folks, this was not their first experience at this great chocolate and ice cream shop. Then some of us walked back to the hotel while others drove/rode. What a great ending to a great day.

4/26/08 more elusive KMO

Here's more photos of KMO taking photos. See Dad and Twyla in the background?

4/26/08 after the cruise

I hung out with Mommy. We found this friendly fellow "hanging around". My what big teeth you have!

Here are the only siblings that made it to this reunion (of the sibling generation that is)--Daddy and Twyla.

Here are the newest members of the family: Flicka and Stinker with their "mom".

4/26/08 The elusive Karen

After the cruise, we hung around the Riverfront area for a while just to take in all the sights. Nancy, Dale, Bing, and Katy took in the local beverages. ;-) Karen loves to evade the camera so I found her here and took as many shots as I could with the assistance of the ever-helpful Dale.

4/26/08 Family fun

The prior posting was about the sights on the Riverfront Cruise, this one's about the best part . . . the fun family folks on the cruise. Check out Albert in most of the photos . . . he's checking on everyone making sure they're having a good time, asking if they need anything. The tray in his hand is from the refreshments he brought up from the concession stand below deck. He's ready to make another trip if anyone needs him to. What a host!

4/26/08 sights on the riverfront

We took a 90 minute cruise down The New River which is the longest deep river or the shortest long river . . . something like that. It reaches depths of 45-100 feet but is only 2.9 miles long. We had a guide who pointed out sights along the way. I took a lot of photos but I'm not sure I'll remember what is what. Just know that this is a teeny tiny portion of what we saw.

This little yellow house with a yellow boat out in front is the house of the mayor. It's an older home from "a different era" and was modest and cute, I thought. There were many mega-mansions along the way that had no lawns because the house took up the whole lot. I preferred these cute, older, "original" homes.

This yacht was built in Italy and cost over 29 million dollars.

Cool! We got to see the draw bridge draw. There were 3 sailboats, 2 coming at us and 1 behind us, that had masts so tall they had to raise the draw bridge.

This one's for Steve. This is the 28 million dollar home and the 11 million dollar yacht of the commissioner of the NBA.

This was the very first house in Fort Lauderdale. It's now a museum.

4/26/08 Riverfront Cruise

I didn't know this until after the cruise, but apparently Mother read about this in AAA and suggested it to Rebecca who got the whole rest of the family interested. So we all went. It was really fun. It was a gorgeous day and the area down by the riverfront is very nice. More fun!

Hurry! You don't want to miss the boat! (Valet parking was full and we were cutting it pretty close to our 4:30 departure time. We had 3 cars full of people. Fortunately, the 3 drivers made it in time to catch the boat.)

4/26/08 Spa Day

Aaaah, Spa Day!! This e-Cousin tradition is how old now? hmmmm. I need to track down this history. We first became the "e-cousins" before the reunion that Rebecca hosted in 2000. She had been emailing all the family members about details for the reunion but eventually just emailed the girl cousins "because you're the only ones replying". That group helped design the reunion shirts via email and after lots of plotting, planning, and virtual laughing, we started emailing about other things besides shirts. We've been emailing ever since and it's fabulous. We get quick updates on soccer schedules and vacation plans and what's going on at work. Then when we get to reunions we can talk about the big things 'cuz we're all caught up on the little things. The 2001 reunion at Uncle Vernon's in Los Osos, CA was the first spa day just for the e-cousins. And we've been doing them ever since!

4/25/08 Princess Stinker's Bedroom

Rebecca and Albert just re-did the guest room and turned it into "Stinker's" bedroom. Oh my. Is she really a princess or is she just treated like one? How gorgeous is this room??!!

4/24/08 amazing dinner with extended family

After that we headed back to Rebecca and Albert's where there was serious cooking going on. They were hosting a big barbecue dinner for all the Overalls plus the extended family. Carol was Rebecca's assistant for a long time and they've been good friends ever since. Carol's 2 daughters (who are all grown up now . . . we first met them 10 years ago), her son, her daughter's boyfriend, her son-in-law, her husband, and her 2 grandchildren were all there. It was a long and glorious night of amazingly delicious food and lots of fun. It even included s'mores!! What a great spring break to get to have s'mores twice in 48 hours!

4/25/08 Friday at Rebecca and Albert's

Karen and I both arrived in Fort Lauderdale-Hollywood Airport around midnight Thursday night/Friday morning. Our planes were scheduled to arrive within 20 minutes of each other. When I was sitting in BWI and they announced that mine was going to be late, I text messaged Karen with the news. She texted back immediately: She was in Atlanta and they had just announced that hers was going to be late, too. So we still arrived within 20 minutes of each other. It was after 1 by the time we got luggage, got the rent car, stopped at WalMart, checked into the hotel, and settled into our room. I slept in a little bit on Friday morning but Karen was up by 8 because she was picking up Nancy and Dale at the airport at 10. Eventually, we were at Rebecca and Albert's house and from there, we headed to Big Bear Brewery for lunch. It was Mother and Daddy, Aunt Twyla, Karen, Nancy, Dale, and I for lunch . . . Rebecca, Albert, and "Stinker" (as Albert calls the little one) stayed behind to cook and prep for dinner.

Here are those two engineers, Dale and Daddy, having an interesting conversation on the couch in the family room (well, they were until I said, "SMILE!" but they only stopped for a moment).

...and here they are on the couch in the living room, sound asleep. They really are like two peas in a pod.