Family...Past and Present

This weekend has been one of past and present... Sweetie and I love going to a little rural cemetery where his maternal relatives are buried. It's a great cemetery! (Cemeteries really are great places...it's quiet, it's green, it's peaceful!) It is so "down home"...the cows are ten feet away, the river isn't much farther and the back-door neighbors have peacocks to keep the bugs at bay! We put flowers on Sweetie's grandparents grave every year...and we swear they move the headstones after we leave! It's always a game of "Finding Grandpa"! Luckily, this cemetery is filled with relatives...you can't swing a dead cat without hitting somebody that we're related to. This year we met the daughter of the sister of an uncle's wife!...and she was alive! If you don't know where Uncle Marv is buried...just ask one of the people in the cemetery...they'll not only show you where the grave is, but they probably know a story or two about him! Sweetie and I wouldn't mind being plopped down here when we pass! And speaking of hitting relatives with a dead cat...this week was also our annual Family Reunion. We're usually together for 3 to 4 days, but this year it was just the weekend. We all (there were around 68 of us!) crammed into a lovely ranch house in a gorgeous mountain valley and proceeded to do what we do best...eat and play games! Our favorite game being Bunko...played by our own set of rules! I do believe we could play that all night! And the eating? Well, good food and plenty of it. I even made Patitsa...a special Easter bread that Sweetie's Mom used to make. Love the connections between all of us...a great weekend of family...living and dead!