January 1, 2010 - Happy New Year....bring on the reunions! First stop - The Stook Family

Happy New Year from Holland!

After getting up, eating, and getting ready, we headed to Zoetermeer where we were meeting up with the Stook Family for New Years.  This is Ed’s Mom’s side of the family and there are people that they haven’t seen in many years, if at all.  So, this was an exciting day for both us and the rest of the family.  I like to say that Ed has a glimpse into how I felt when I met his family for the first time.  You don’t know which cousins go with which aunts/uncles and which kids go with which cousins.  It’s fun to memorize all of this.  Bill and I always say we need to have name tags with pictures on them!

Here are some pictures of the kids:

Random pictures of the family visiting:

Of course, my day would not be complete unless I had a picture of the ridiculous amounts of food that we consumed.  The special thing about today is that we got to have Indo food similar to what Ed’s parents used to make.  It was yummy but I think we were sad for a minute too because it’s never going to be the same as Mom G. used to make. 

These are a few of Ed’s aunts.  It was amazing how much they looked like his mom.  On one hand, it was so nice to meet family that I had never met but I know that seeing these aunts that looked so much like Mom G. was hard for Ed and his siblings. 

Of course, a day would not be complete if more food wasn’t brought out of nowhere.  More food…dessert like items:

We visited more and then it was time to leave.  We made our attempt at a group picture.  Let me remind you that this is not everyone.  There are Stook family members in Australia as well as people who weren’t able to attend and who were taking the picture.  We are contemplating a trip to Australia……right after I obtain Valium or some sort of tranquilizer for that flight.

After the normal half hour long goodbyes, we headed home.  What a great day to catch up with family as well as meet people we had not met before!  We caught up with family where we were staying and then headed to bed.  It had been a long day and we were wiped!  We needed our rest for the next reunion we had tomorrow!