Family Reunion Extravaganza (and T-Shirts)

My husband's family had a reunion over the Fourth of July weekend and we hosted it this year.  It is appropriately named the "Great Witte Gathering" and meets every other year in different locales across the Midwest.

Nathan and I hosted it this year and had a whopping 45 people hanging out and relaxing for the 3-day weekend.  For the past few reunions I have been lucky enough to design the shirts for this event.

I always have a lot of fun coming up with a theme.  This year was pretty easy as the colors were patriotic and I drew popcorn using AutoCAD and Photoshop to convey the "Pop into Valpo" theme.  As you may not know, we live in Valparaiso, Indiana which was home to Orville Redenbacher and still hosts the annual Popcornfest and Parade.  It wasn't a big leap to utilize that idea for the reunion!


A few things that are a must for our reunion is a group photo in which we were our reunion t-shirt. We take many photos of this group shot as the little ones tend to fidget.

GWG 2011

We, also, have a a skit night at every reunion.  Every family puts together a little performance that may involve a song, poem, play, or whatever.  They usually involve a bit of humor, too, and every gets a kick out of it.  Our skit was a reading and performance rendition of "An Ordinary Day" by Ken Nesbitt.  We had masks and props to act out what was happening in the poem.  Quick, easy, and a bit silly, so it fit us perfectly.

Another addition to this reunion was a home made Family Feud game.  (Seen below).  Each  family had, previously, filled out answers to our survey questions that were general, Bible, or family related and we compiled them into the top answers for our game.  Each team/family participated  in different rounds until the top teams faced off.  The winning team won a giant bag of gummi bears from a local candy company.

We had a great turn out this year with only 3 people not being able to attend.  It's great to reconnect with family that lives far away and see how we've grown over the years.