Planning a Family Reunion -- A Checklist

A family reunion is a fantastic way to reconnect with loved ones you may not have seen in awhile. Celebrate your family pride and have fun with your relatives at one of these gatherings. If you're planning a reunion, here's a helpful checklist to assist you.

1. Find a location. Locations that you could choose include your home or the home of another relative, your local park, hotel, or recreation center, to name a few. If the weather's nice, outdoors is always a popular choice. Many people choose an outdoor location because not only can you utilize a grill to cook with, there's plenty of room for children to run and play.

2. Write a guest list and gather all contact information. This may be a time consuming task, or not, depending on the size of your family.

3. Send out the invitations! You don't have to go overboard with these...a simple, cost-efficient invitation like a plain white card will do. You can even utilize the power of the Internet and invite some of your clan via email. On your invitations, just announce the reunion along with location, date, and time. Request RSVP's so you will know how much food to get.

4. While you're waiting for the RSVP's to come, you can start planning the other aspects of the reunion like the menu, activities, and decorations. It's a good idea to have fun activities for children to do, because most kids just aren't going to sit quietly while the adults talk. Some ideas are balls, games, coloring books and crayons, hula hoops, badminton or volleyball, blowing bubbles, or even a little wading pool for them to splash around in. Happy kids mean happy parents!

5. Decide if you're cooking or having your food catered. Many people choose to hold an outdoor barbecue, with foods like burgers, hot dogs, steak, chicken and grilled veggies like corn on the cob. Fill coolers with bottled water and soda, and have a few desserts like a cake and perhaps a cool gelatin treat.

6. Plan fun activities and the decorations. A festive tablecloth, as well as some balloons or streamers, will suffice. Activities can include games like volleyball, softball, or even touch football.

7. Don't forget the photographs! It's not every day that your entire family gets together to enjoy a day of carefree fun -- you'll want to preserve these memories! One good idea is to give each attendant a disposable camera so they can take their own pictures. Be sure to take at least one picture of everyone together. You can hire a pro to do this or do it yourself. When you get it developed, mail a copy via email or snail mail to each person that attended.

With some planning and creativity, you can host a family reunion that will be remembered for years to come!