Family Reunions by Kathy Strukel

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Kathy Strukel brings 20+ years of party and event planning to her business, The Perfect Solutions, a private and corporate event-planning company located in Elkhart. When she is not planning parties for her clients, she loves to entertain family & friends. Kathy & her husband live in Elkhart and enjoy spoiling their 4 grandchildren. For more holiday entertaining ideas, visit www.theperfectsolutions.com

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Planning a PERFECT Family Reunion

A family reunion can be a wonderful time to bring multiple generations together in one place, reconnect with far-flung relatives and catch up on the latest family news.

Here are a few tips that will help assure your family's reunion is a rousing success:

Form a reunion committee

Unless this is a get-together of two or three families at Mom's house, a reunion committee is almost essential to planning a smooth, successful family reunion. Put someone in charge of each major aspect of the reunion; location, social events, record-keeping, etc.

Create a guest list

Start by assembling a list of family members, including spouses, partners and children. Get in touch with at least one person from each branch of the family to help you track down contact information for each person on your list. Make sure to collect email addresses for those that have them; it really helps with updates and last-minute correspondence and cuts down on postage & long distance costs.

Select the date

Whether you plan your reunion to coincide with a family milestone or special day, summer vacation, or a holiday, it helps to poll family members to avoid time and date conflicts. A quick email poll will help determine if the day you have selected works for most of your family members. Keep in mind that NO date will be perfect for everyone, so go with the majority.

Develop a budget

This will determine the scale of the food, decorations, accommodations and activities for your family reunion. You can choose to have families pay for their own overnight accommodations, bring a covered dish, etc. But unless you have another source of income, you'll also need to set a per-family registration fee to help with decoration, activity and location costs.

Consider using a theme

Creating a theme for a family reunion can make planning easier when in comes to deciding on food, games, activities, invitations and just about every other aspect of the reunion. Family history themes are especially popular, as are reunions which celebrate a very special family member's birthday or anniversary, or the family's cultural heritage (a Fiesta or Oktoberfest theme).

Decide on a location

Aim for a family reunion location that is most accessible and affordable to the majority of people attending. "Going home" is a big draw for family reunions, so you may want to consider the old family homestead or other historic site connected to your family's past. Depending on the size of the reunion, you may be able to find a family member who will volunteer to have it at their home. For larger reunions, parks, hotels, restaurants and community halls are a good place to start. If you're planning a multi-day reunion, then consider a resort location where people can combine reunion activities with a family vacation.

Plan some icebreakers

Even though reunions are all about family, getting your relatives to interact can sometimes be a challenge, especially if you've gathered together many branches of the family tree.

"Who am I" is a great icebreaker to get people talking. Write the names of famous people on pieces of paper and tape one on each person's back (don't let the person know who's name is on their back). Everyone now has to guess the person on their back by asking other people around the room yes or no questions about the person like "Am I alive?" "Am I an athlete?", etc.

Another idea is to distribute a list of questions as members arrive. To get answers, they must circulate and talk to people. Questions should cover current information like, "Who just got engaged?" or "Who is retiring and moving to Arizona?" … and family history questions like "Who has been married for over 50 years" or "Who once worked for the Nixon administration?"

Consider hiring a planner

Family reunions can be huge undertakings. There are hundreds of details, small and large that need to be attended to and sometimes it just isn't feasible for a family member to take on the task of organizing a reunion. An event planner can help research locations, create to-do lists and timelines and help with themes, gifts, entertainment and record keeping. Hiring an event planner to coordinate the activities at your reunion can help assure that everyone in the family can enjoy each other's company. How PERFECT is that?

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