This is a photo of my great-grandparents with all of their children. My grandfather is the tall boy in the front on the far left. The reunion was held in the backyard of the house pictured above. Reunion Preparations

I created a 4′ x 8′ family tree using small foam picture frames that I covered with designer paper. I placed angel stickers on the names of the deceased family members.

The valet parking attendants:
The food!!

Eating raw clams…yum!

Cousin Patty arranged for a visit from the ice cream man!

There were lots of fun activities for the kids:

Uncle Johnny surprised cousin Mary Ann with a 5oth birthday cake (even though she is older than 50!)

Cousins Sheree and Danielle organized the awards ceremony:

Aunt Rosie won the “Most Energetic,” my mom won the “Loudest Family Member,” and since “Scarpa” means “shoe” in Italian, there was a prize for the best shoes. Guess who won?!

Even though it was extremely hot outside, we still had a great time dancing:

Some candid shots:

And now for the most important part of the day…

Remember the picture at the beginning of this post? Here is the third generation of my great-grandparents (so the people in the picture below are the grandchildren of my great-grandparents) on the same front porch as that very first picture:

(my mom is in the red and white striped shirt)

Here is the fourth generation on the same front porch (the great-grandchildren) I am in the white shirt second from the left next to the girl in the dark brown shirt. (Can anyone say “baby boom generation?!)

Here is the fifth generation (the great-great grandchildren):
And here is the sixth generation (the great-great-great grandchildren)
And this is how I felt at the end of a very successful and happy day:

Cousin Andrea and the girls rode Uncle John and Aunt Rosie’s original Schwinn tandem bike. They quickly learned that it is not as easy as it looks!

Grandpop helped:

A bird even got in on the action:

The girls and the neighborhood kids have been spending hours together outside PLAYING EVERY DAY! This has definitely been a summer for the memory book!

They spent lots of time in our pool. Here are Mark, Shannon, Adrienne, Tyler and Erica:

When they became bored with swimming every day, they created their own version of a slip and slide with a tarp, some dish soap, and water from the hose. Here are Emma, Erica, Adrienne, Amy, Mark, Austin, and Jack. Blake is the hose man:
The slip and slide destroyed a spot of grass on the neighbor’s front lawn, so the next day another neighbor let them borrow this wonderful inflatable slide. Mark is in the very back with Freddy, Hailey, Andrew, Jack, Shannon, Adrienne, Erica, Amy, Emma and Kate:

They spent a tiny bit of time in front of our television watching “Wipe Out” and laughing hysterically:

Then it was on to disco night in the garage: