life in the district. : 99 of my closest cousins ...

Sunday, July 31, 2011

99 of my closest cousins ...

7 of the orginal Rives Children ...

Julia is third from the right.

Every 3 years the Rives Family take over the beach and have a week long reunion filled with lots of family time, beach time and catching up.

We've been doing this since the first Reunion in 1963 and we've got it down to a science. We have meals together (yes, all 99+ of us) on Sunday, Tuesday and Thursday. We always have a "Cousins Night Out" which you wait impatiently for until you can join the older cousins....but of course that means that you ARE one of the old cousins now. There's golfing and deep sea fishing ... and of course beach time.

I mean, its pretty legit ... we have a website and all. I went through it and found photos from previous reunions and thought they would be great to share in today's post.

Anyway, we spent July 17-24 at Emerald Isle and had a GREAT week battling the heat wave and enjoying the family time.

The first of the week inlcuded the whole family gathering in the same area on the beach for some Beach Olympics which is a fancy way to say: hang out and play Corn Hole, Tug of War, Horseshoes, Bocce Ball and Ladder Ball.

The little kids went first!

Rives getting ready for his turn!

Then we somehow had a draft to pick teams -- and the Adults had a round.

The young cousins and one of the sand castles!

(Rives is the first little one on the left side)

On Wednesday Dad and Tucker fried some flounder, grilled some corn, and boiled some shrimp and we had a delightful meal with just the Julia Rives Mann family!

Dad and Tucker cooking at the 1999 Reunion

Dad and Tucker cooking at this year's reunion.

the finished product!

Thursday is picture night ... we eat another big family meal (Fiesta Night!) and all gather in the lawn for family photos ... my my, how things change over the years