The last weekend of February, we headed up to Northern Michigan for our annual winter family reunion! We have been doing this for many years, and it’s hard to know how many years we will have left of this tradition.
We left on Thursday after school and began the 5.5 hour drive up to Michigan. This was actually one of the best drives we have had- the weather was clear, no one was crying most of the time, we only stopped once for gas, food and bathroom and our van didn’t break down (you laugh, but just you wait…)
We arrived to our Airbnb around 10pm and got all of our stuff inside and the kids to bed. We stayed up a bit talking with the rest of the family that was staying at the Airbnb and then went to bed around midnight. It’s always hard to try to recover from the school week while wanting to spend time with family we don’t get to see all that often!
Friday morning we woke up and got all our stuff gathered to take over to the main house, my in-laws cabin. We piled into the van and….it wouldn’t start. Theo started working under the hood while the kids and I opted to start walking to the cabin (about a mile down the road). Well, it was very cold and we made it about a quarter mile before my father-in-law came along and picked us up! He ended up taking us back to the Airbnb to help Theo try to get the van started, so we waited in his nice, warm truck while everyone tried to figure out what was wrong with our van.
We eventually made it to the cabin and greeted everyone, got some breakfast, and settled in to hang out with the family for the morning. My father-in-law brought out his beloved treasure box and the kids all gathered around! My mother-in-law handed out various items that she is ready to pass along from her house and some memorabilia from when the boys were all young.
Side note: Grandpa has done the treasure box for over ten years now. He finds all kinds of trinkets and treasures to put inside it and then each kid gets to pick one treasure a day from it. They graduate from the treasure box when they turn 12 years old- it’s hard to believe that Tera is just about to hit that milestone!
Around 11, we took the entire group to the Airbnb for some family pictures. The Airbnb had this big room that was great for taking pictures. Of course, we didn’t have a vehicle so we were just trying to get our family of 6 into different cars and everyone was departing at different times and Theo and I found ourselves without anywhere to sit/ride, so we decided to really ride in style and ride ON the snowmobile IN the trailer. Haha.
We took some lovely family photos- it’s always nice to have these pictures to look back on- although we were missing quite a few people this reunion! One family of 9 was not present and the two oldest boys also stayed behind- so we were missing 9 grandkids and two additional adults.
After pictures, all the men spent some time trying to figure out what was wrong with our van. They all determined it was the starter, so Theo called a tow while everyone else headed off to the Chinese restaurant for lunch. Please note one of my children’s plates- this was what he picked after going through the whole buffet hahaha.
After Chinese, I headed back to the Airbnb to lay Ori down for a nap and read my book in complete silence. The kids and some uncles/Dads spent some time out on the frozen lake shooting rockets and driving the snowmobiles. When Ori woke up, I had to call for a ride and wait for Theo to come pick me up (it was really hard to not have a vehicle while staying at a separate house). Theo got there to pick me up and just then his brother called him that Tera was stuck in the ice. We booked it back to the cabin/lake but by the time we got there someone else had already rescued her and she was fine. I still don’t really understand what happened to her foot, but all is well in the end…
Of course, after the ice escapades, everyone needed a change of clothes, so I had to borrow a vehicle to drive back to the Airbnb and get clothes for the kids, then back to the cabin again. It was incredibly stressful having our van broken down ($$$$$) and then not having transportation when I had to keep going back and forth from the two houses. Thankfully, the mechanic fixed the van by that afternoon and Theo was able to go and pick it up! It was indeed expensive, but at least we had a van now!
The rest of the afternoon involved games and lounging about. We scrounged up some sandwiches for dinner and then played more games after dinner, before heading back to the Airbnb for bed.
Saturday morning was a repeat of the day before- except this time our van started right up and we were able to have a vehicle all day! We headed over to the cabin for breakfast and shortly after the ladies headed out for our thrifting/lunch trip. All of the aunties, our mother-in-law, and any girls over the age of 12 get to attend this outing. We hit up the thrift store, sometimes a boutique shop and then out to lunch. The Dads manage all the kids at home. We don’t ask too many questions 😉
The afternoon continued pretty much the same as the one before- games, playing, lounging about. Dinner was pizza and then we had an evening of singing with Grandma. It was the last day of the reunion, so we all started to pack up and gather our stuff before heading off to the Airbnb for bed.
We woke up on Sunday morning and after having a bit of a frustration with packing up, we finally went over to the cabin for breakfast and then hit the road back to Ohio. We had an uneventful and fairly quick trip back home, and as soon as we got back we had to dive into homework and getting prepped for school/work the next day.
I’m thankful that we had a safe trip up there, and that our van didn’t die until we had arrived! I’m thankful that we all stayed free of illness and that everyone had a good time together. It was really stressful to have our van break down while we were there, but I’m thankful that it was a fairly quick fix and we weren’t stuck in Michigan for an extended amount of time!
As time passes, the family reunion is shifting slightly. The grandkids are starting to get older and have jobs that prevent them from attending. Each year we add more family members and it can get fairly crowded and hard to fit- we are busting out of the cabin! Finding an Airbnb that sleeps ~20 and isn’t robbery is not an easy feat- I’m so thankful that my FIL books the Airbnb and pays for the stay, but it’s such a challenge to find the right one that meets our needs! For me, personally, it’s hard to do a big weekend like this in the middle of the hardest months for my mental health. While it is so fun being with family and honoring traditions and relationships, it can also be incredibly overstimulating and exhausting and I struggle to recover when I get back to “real life” the next week! It is for sure a delicate balance of finding that middle ground of “worth it”- is it worth it to sacrifice sleep and rest to spend time with family? Yes. But is it worth it to add all the factors of stress to an already overwhelmed plate? That’s the type of thing that I think I need to decide on a yearly basis.
So- what about you? What do family reunions look like for you? How often do you get together? Do you find it restful/relaxing or stressful but worth it? What are some of your tips and tricks for re-entry after a family reunion weekend?
Is there a reasoning to the timing they pick for the winter one? Could it be adjusted to help with some of what makes the timing hard? Our families haven’t done multiple day gatherings in a while so reading about yours made me miss those years but I know with our teen’s schedules it would be hard to make it work.