Perfect moment: roots and branches

In the Fall of 1932, Fay married "Cap" in western Nebraska. They began together a simple but rough life as farm people. They had three children, who had children, who had children.

And 303 seasons later, their 27 surviving descendants are gathered in a reunion cabin in the mountains of Colorado. We come from Arizona, California, Colorado, Ohio and Oregon.

Cappie died right before Tessa was born, in 2001. Grandma died in 2005.

Their children include my mom and her two brothers. There are two spouses, one being my dad.

My generation includes my two sisters and me, plus three surviving cousins and one who is with us in spirit. Among us, we have five spouses.

The newest generation consists of Tessa and Reed, Dominic, three of their cousins, and five of my cousins' children.

As I exclude myself from the activities to document the morning, I see a group working on a 2000 piece puzzle of the Vegas Strip. I did the hard part (of course) earlier and now they are merely filling in. Slackers.

My cousins are preparing apple-sausage crisp. Smelling good. My cousin Debora has just chimed the 5 minute alert. Salivary glands are activated.

I am delighted that our children are playing so well together, in spite of a very late night of sing-alongs and a very early morning of mountain sunlight. There is quite a buzz among the kids about the bear that got into our garbage last night (despite the tite-lock bin) and left paw prints on each of our cars (luckily no damage).

I am supremely happy.

(See this post from last year's mini-reunion of my immediate family, if your are the odd interested sort who loves other peoples' pictures.)