Monday, January 4, 2010

Come Meet the Family

Allow me to present the many, many group pictures of the smaller families that make up our large extended family. Pay attention, because there will be a quiz at the end. (Just kidding!)
Our family patriarch is my dad, Myron, shown here with his wife Kathy. They've been married for 6 years now. Dad is 75 and Kathy is 65. Our mom, Jane, would be 72 now, if she were still with us.
My parents had 4 sons and only 2 daughters: Mary (that's me!) and Karla. Here we are together, the lone sisters.
The 4 siblings at the party: Karla, LeRoy, Jeff, and Mary. In birth order that would be Mary (age 55), Gerald (died at birth but would be 51 now), LeRoy (age 50), Karla (age 49), Jeff (age 48), and Darryl (age 46). Sadly, Darryl was unable to travel from his home in Missouri this year.
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This picture was taken after the guys had played basketball for a long time; hence the sweat stains.
As the oldest, I guess I get to go first. Here we have me with my children: Jacob (age 18), Dylan (age 12), and Sarah (age 20).
Next, LeRoy's family: Nate (age 13), LeRoy, Katie (age 11), and LeRoy's wife Lori.
Some of Karla's children are grown and on their own, so they get their own photos. Here we have Karla with the youngest 6 of her 10 children, who still live at home. Left to right: Brianna (age 18), Gabrielle (age 9), Addison (age 5), Karla, Mariah (age 15), Julien (age 12), and Celesta (age 21).
Karla's oldest is Jeremy, shown here with his family: Analyce (age 3), Makayla (3 months), Jeremy (age 27), Jaren (17 months), and Jeremy's wife Cami.
Next comes Karla's daughter Genevieve and her family: husband Scott, Brooke (age 4), Jaycee (age 2), and Genevieve (age 25). Baby #3 is due the end of February.
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After Genevieve comes Josh (age 23), but he was in California and unable to attend.
Then we have Karla's daughter Elyssa (age 22) and her husband Ross.
Brianna was included in the picture above with Karla, but we wanted to show off her boyfriend Bryce!
After Karla comes Jeff and his biggy-sized family. The youngest 10 of their 13 children are in this shot. Left to right: Hayden (age 7), Jeff, Callie (age 2), Dana, Burke (age 14), Emma (age 11), Elsie (age 15), Brinley (age 5), Micah (age 21), Marcus (age 17), Amber (age 19) with her new son Ian, and Haley (age 9). Micah and Amber have been living on their own for awhile, but the 8 children younger than them still live at home.
Jeff's oldest is Justin (age 25), shown here with his son Aiden (17 months) and wife Alisha. Their sweet daughter Rhionna would have been 2-and-a-half, but she passed away after a tragic accident a little over 2 years ago.
Jeff's second child is Ashley, seen here with her family: Gage (age 3), Ashley (age 24), Garrett (18 months), and husband Matt.
Next comes Jamison (he turned 23 the day after our party), his son Trenton (20 months old), and wife Monica. Monica and Ashley's husband Matt are sister and brother.
Another shot of Amber and her beautiful 10-day-old son, Ian.
This is a rare shot of Jeff and Dana's entire family, with the exception of their grandson Trenton, who was napping.
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My brother Darryl's family would be next, but unfortunately they weren't with us (except in our hearts). Darryl has 3 children: Brittany (age 20), Savannah (age 17), and Rhett (age 13). He also has 4 step-children with his wife Tamera, all of whom are married with families of their own: Chris, Glenn, Tanya, and D.J. We miss them all!
My step-mom Kathy has 6 grown children, as well. Most of them live in other states, but her youngest child, Rebecca, lives in the Valley so we get to see them at family events. Here we have Becky with her husband Dylan and their son Dale (19 months old).
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Are you ready for the quiz? No? That's okay, sometimes I have to stop and think for a minute before I call someone's name, too. We have a very big family, but it's only more for us to love!

3 comments:

Grandma Honey said...

What a great post! I took my time going through each face and name. I knew most of them already so this was sort of a refresher course for me. It was great seeing everyone. I didn't realize til now that Ashley's husband is the brother of Jamison's wife! (hope I got that right) And I'm very struck by how much Ashley looks like her Mom.

Unknown said...

Great pictures!!!! I think ours turned out the worst but i guess thats what we get when we wait until the very end to get our snap shot.

Scott and Genevieve said...

It was a good time. You got lots of good pictures!