Today Ruth had a picnic for all her friends and family so we could meet everyone in one spot. It was very thoughtful and caused her a considerable amount of work. I know that’s true because I watched her the whole time (almost) and she didn’t stop often or for very long. When I got up at 0700 this morning I found her hard at work over a very large bowl of potato salad that was almost finished. Turns out she’d been up since 0530 and needed something to do.

I helped where I could, and as needed, spending the un-needed moments sitting at my computer putting the finishing touches on yesterday’s post. That’s the one I made the final changes to about an hour ago because I forgot to add one photo.

Now I’ll try to name everyone who was there. The purpose of this post is to document relatives for our family members so the names will have no significance to most of you.

Chris, Sydney, Becky. Chris is Todd’s son. Todd is Ruth’s son.

Valerie, Carol, Larry, and Cheryl. Carol, Larry, and Cheryl are siblings and belong to Ruth, their mother. Valerie is Larry’s wife.

Barbara and Ruth. Barb is Ruth’s very good friend. Allen, Cheryl, Ruth, Diane, and Marge. Allen and Cheryl are madly in love and have been married for a long time. Ruth is Cheryl’s Mom. Diane is Ruth’s sister-in-law and my wife. Marge is a good friend of the family.

Jay and Ovide are very good friends with Ruth. Jay is a female impersonator and Ovide is a caterer on the side. Ruth is Ovide’s sous-chef for catered events. They have a ton of fun together.

Jay, Ovide, Fern, Hugh, Marge, and me. I’m the only relative. The rest are great friends. Apparently I’m talking.

Ovide, Ruth, and Barbara.

Lilly, and Diane. Lilly belongs to Heather. Heather is Cheryl’s daughter, and Cheryl is Ruth’s daughter.

Heather and Lilly.

Laura, Ariana, and Jeffrey. Laura is Cheryl’s daughter.

Me and Diane. Laura took the photo. She said to look like we were having fun so we did and didn’t even have to pretend. We were having lots of fun.

Elena, Lilly, and Heather.

Diane, Ruth, and Susan. Susan is Cheryl’s daughter

So, to recap, for those of you who are interested in genealogy, Ruth is the matriarch here. Her children are Larry, Cheryl, and Carol.

Larry is married to Valerie and they both have children from previous marriages. The one I’m most familiar with is Sarah who is a nurse. She moved to Portland and will, one day, call me. She works at St. Vincent’s.

Carol is married to Martin and they have a daughter Alicia. Martin was in New Hampshire riding his bicycle and Alicia left the party before I could get my camera out.

Cheryl is married to Allen and has three daughters from a previous marriage – Susan, Heather, and Laura.

Susan is in a relationship with Jay (different Jay) who wasn’t at the picnic. He has season tickets to UCONN games and was watching Syracuse win. Julia, Susan’s daughter, wasn’t here, either because she was with her Dad in Boston.

Heather is married to Justin. They have two daughters, Elena and Lilly, and Justin has a son, Gage.

Laura is in a relationship with Emory who successfully avoided having his photo taken. Laura has a son and daughter, Jeffrey, and Ariana.

Todd, Ruth’s son, father of Chris, sadly took his own life many years ago.

Tomorrow we depart Windsor Locks heading for Beach Haven, New Jersey.

See you there.