Organizing For A Better Family Reunion

Summertime is a great time for extended family gatherings and most of you have done this over and over again. I, too, have shared time with cousins, aunts and uncles, and even people I am surely related to but don’t know exactly how. My experiences have led me to believe that family reunions can be enhanced with several preparations.
It is important to realize that the coordinator of the reunion will have an easier time if he or she delegates much of activities to others. People love to help. They enjoy knowing what their specific responsibilities are and they usually come through in a wonderful, creative way when asked to do definite projects. Here are several projects to delegate that make for a more successful reunion.

Identity Chief
Have a system to identify everyone that will be attending the reunion. If using name tags, have new ones for each day because they will be lost, crumpled, and eaten by small children and pets. Also, make it easy to discover how all the attendees are related to everyone else. This might be accomplished with large posters showing the different family heads, their children and grandchildren. Such an outline will make it easier for newly discovered cousins to find out how they are related.

In addition, I have always liked a relationship chart that tells me that my daughter-in-law’s two nieces, for example, are my third cousins, twice removed, by marriage. Such a relationship chart is fun to peruse and makes it easy to feel connected. This chart is downloadable from genealogy.about.com/library/nrelationshipchart.htm.

A third fun project is posting large maps of the local state, country, or even world with stickers showing where families currently live. The stickers could be added before the reunion or put on as each family arrives. This pictorial association allows for fun discussions and helps family members that live close together become better acquainted.

Official Photographer
It is useful to have an official family reunion photographer who is responsible for taking photos of family groups. While casual photos are fun, the more formal family group pictures make for enduring memories. It is beneficial to take pictures of individual families, first cousins, brothers and sisters at all levels, and couples. The official family photographer would also be responsible for identifying the people in each photograph and sharing these photos via CD or internet so the family reunion memories are available for review.

Contact Coordinator
Reunions are a wonderful time to update the contact information of all attendees. Proper spelling of full names, home addresses, phone numbers, email addresses, and correct birth dates make keeping accurate family information so much easier. The Contact Coordinator might make up a simple form for each family head to complete and submit. This information could then be printed and mailed to all family members.

In my own family a dedicated aunt has annually prepared contact information of all her parents' descendants. There are eight columns with each family head listed at the top of the column. Family members are listed in turn with their spouses, children, and contact information. This contact information has kept the extended family in contact with each other as it is convenient for us to do so because of her dedicated work. She asks, corrects, clarifies and then prepares the printed information on two sides of a single sheet for sharing after the get-together. It makes for great family reunions because we are more familiar with each others' names, childrens' names, and where we all live.

Program Planner
Family reunions are a great time for attendees to remember their progenitors. A Program Planner coordinates a short, fun program to help everyone understand the background, history, and stories attached to these people. Large photos are helpful as well as costumes and short skits. This can supplement the fun talent segments that are usually included in evening programs so the younger generation can appreciate their ancestors’ lives. At the end of this program, ethnic desserts are an easy way to introduce family foods. My husband’s ancestors are from Sweden, for example, and so desserts native to that country prove to be a popular with our children when the extended family gathers together.

Reunion Secretary
If possible, it is very useful for the family reunion coordinator to have an assistant that takes care of all the paperwork, is in charge to make sure that communications are happening with all attendees, and just works through the menial, but important details. This also gives the coordinator someone to counsel with as decisions are made through the planning process.

Reunion Treasurer
The final, essential element to a successful reunion is a kind and reliable family member who handles the funding of the reunion. This person is solely responsible to make sure that everyone pays up on the camping ground fees, the large group meals, and the costs for taking the families to the local swimming pool. Family reunions cost money and this person’s finesse in keeping good records and collecting monies until all is settled and zeroed out can prove invaluable in keeping family members unified from reunion to reunion. There is nothing quite so galling as to be out a substantial amount of money and not be refunded as promised. The Reunion Treasurer keeps accounts straight and family members competently honest.

Have a great family reunion. If you are in charge, ask for help in all directions. If you are attending, call the coordinator and offer to help with one of the projects we have discussed. It will make all the difference in a successful family reunion!

©2009 Marie Calder Ricks/www.houseoforder.com