Chapman Family Reunion - 50th Wedding Anniversary Celebration

Well, I mentioned family pictures in the last post.  We did, in fact, hire a friend of mine who is a professional photographer to take our pictures.  (50th wedding anniversary, every single family member gathered, and all.)  They turned out SO gorgeous.  If you are local and need some great photos, ask Effie Clayton!  I debated about posting the photos here, but I don't want to ruin it before I actually get my behind to the post office to mail the discs out to family first.  (Yes, family, I will be doing that next week.)  Maybe after I mail them out, I'll post them.

(we did enjoy the company of this road runner eating a lizard while we were having our pictures taken)

(and no matter where grandpa goes, there is always a pile of grand-kids on top.)

So, AFTER we got all dressed up and took pictures, we headed over to Joe's Pasta House in Rio Rancho for:

Barbara and Earl's 50th Wedding Anniversary!

June 15, 1962

(If you like that wedding dress, it's in the Salt Lake landfill - Grandma threw it away last year?!!!)

I sound like a string of commercials here, but I have to recommend Joe's Pasta House too.  It's this great little family-owned Italian restaurant about 2 minutes from Barbara and Earl's new house.  Joe was the BEST to work with.  He personally e-mailed and called me several times to arrange all the details.  They gave us the perfect combination of a great, but simple menu, servers, a private room (completely separate from the restaurant,) and just enough staff interaction that we didn't have to do any work, but could still do our own thing in an intimate setting.  They had a 50" mounted TV which was perfect for family slideshows and videos and allowed us to bring in our own cake (but served it for us.)

David should really write about this.  Come ON babe.  I'm just an outsider.  But, it was pretty cool to see each of the siblings say something nice or bring up a memory of the family.  Jane had asked everyone to write something about what they learned from being raised in their family and those were given to Barbara and Earl as gifts.  

Barbara and Earl also stood and each talked about the other.  That was pretty cool.  Even though Barbara loves to talk, she rarely gets sentimental and Earl is a man of very few words.  So, it was kind of a once-in-a-lifetime thing for the grandkids to see their grandparents get a little mushy and talk at length about their marriage and learn a bit about what makes them all tick.   Highly educational!  I tried to video it, but the lights were so low, the video is totally horrible and the audio isn't the best either with Harriet trying to talk to me in the background.

David and I made a slideshow out of all of Barbara's pictures and set it to 5 of the top songs from 1962.  We also looked up a few facts from the year:

1962

Sample of News and Happenings:

January:  Amber colored turn signals for cars approved – changing them from the same color as headlights

February:  8 of 9 planets align for first time in 400 years; John Glenn orbits the Earth

March:  Beatles TV debut (in UK)

April:  MIT sends TV signal by satellite for first time from MA to CA

May:  Christmas Island nuclear testing

June:   Barbara and Earl get hitched!!

July:  House passes bill requiring equal pay for equal work regardless of gender

August:  Nelson Mandela arrested; Marilyn Monroe dies

September:  JFK sends 3000 troops to integrate University of Mississippi

October:  Cuban Missle Crisis

November:  Great Britain and France decide to build Concorde

December:  first operational navigational satellite launched

How Much Things Cost: Median Family Income:  $6000 Minimum Wage:  $1.25 New House:  $15,000 Gallon of Gas:  25 cents New Car:  $2,500 Pack of Gum or Candy Bar:  5 cents Stamp:  4 cents Color TV set:  $400 Newspaper:  10 cents Refrigerator:  $500 Doctor’s Visit:  $5 Movie Ticket:  50 cents Popcorn at the Movie:  20 cents

Top 10 songs of 1962: Stranger on the Shore by Mr. Acker Bilk I Can’t Stop Loving You by Ray Charles Mashed Potato Time by Dee Dee Sharp *Roses are Red by Bobby Vinton The Stripper by David Rose Shelley Fabares by Johnny Angel *The Locomotion by Little Eva Let Me In by the Sensations *The Twist by Chubby Checker *(Surfin’ Safari by the Beach Boys was #100 on the Billboard list) *songs used in slideshow

I felt like I had already done some solid homework about life in1962 having become a fan of watching Mad Men lately.  What a crazy year!  No matter how you pack it - 50 years of marriage is quite something.

I think the sweetest part of the night was that Barbara and Earl both made hand-made gifts for each of the grandchildren.  Barbara made adorable Christmas ornaments and Earl made these awesome number games in his wood shop.  My kids could not believe they got their own to take home.  They both LOVE all of Grandma's ornaments we have on our tree and can't get enough of the number game! 

Much love to these 2 amazing people.  I'm so glad they got married and had that LAST child.  I kind of like that LAST one a lot.  The others are pretty cool too.

Chapman Family Reunion - Sandia Peak Tram

We got home late from the river trip.  Pretty darn late, especially for Harriet.  I think this is the only spot where we didn't think things all the way through.  We had scheduled to do the tram first thing the next morning.  I think I, at least, would have liked to sleep in a bit and do something later in the day.  But, we were pretty concerned with sneaking in a morning activity (oh AND an afternoon activity that quite frankly got canceled too) before we had to be all dressed up and ready for family pictures and fancy dinner.

I digress.  We went on the tram!  Truly, I was excited about this.  We have lived here 2.5 years and have not done the tram yet.  We see that awesome mountain every single day from our window and can sometimes catch the light glinting off the cables too.  It was just begging to be done.  The Sandia Peak Tram is the longest single cable tram in the world.  (I guess there are longer trams, but the tram actually switches to a new cable system in the middle - so we have the longest single string with a bucket of people hanging from it in the mountains... NM isn't all dirty strip malls and brown dirt decorated with gravel ya know.)

Oh, and David had also planned to try to hike down.  Knowing him, I wasn't surprised by this plan at all, on the contrary, I expect these things after 15 years of marriage.  But, when Wendy (who is ALWAYS up for random strenuous physical outdoor activity) said, you wanted to hike down THIS?!
I knew no one would be hiking down.  Thank and you.  I had never planned to hike down myself, but I hate sitting there waiting for someone who should be coming "soon," but isn't, and I have to worry about their safety, and more importantly, I have to worry about everyone showing up for pictures on time in something other than sweat-drenched hiking clothes.   My priorities are cool like that.

Now, having said how much I wanted to do the tram, I also should include how incredibly scared to death I am of heights in my old age.  I was kind of nauseous the whole time.  But it was gorgeous at the top of the mountain in the trees with wild grasses and flowers growing everywhere.  The only unfortunate part was that a giant wild fire near Ruidoso completely ruined our view (not to mention people's lives in Ruidoso.)  From Sandia Peak you should be able to see clearly for hundreds of miles.  We couldn't even see the volcanoes near our house about 20 miles away.  (correction, David says 12-15 miles away. See, this is why HE should be blogging about this!)

 "view from the top"... of the mountain, or marriage?  50 years for these two.

15 years this summer for us.  We're like in the foothill category.

 what view?  I'm trying to read my texts.  

 what view?  I'm trying to read my book.

 I guess I can't blame them, the view really wasn't great with all the smoke.

Alec and Clare... I really do have a soft spot for these two.  They were my first nephew and niece experience.

 Poor Hattie, she fell and ripped the skin off her knee trying to keep up with big sis and big cousins.

possible Christmas card... except 2 have sunglasses and 2 don't.  hmm...

oh, and then we had a big picnic at Elena Gallegos.  What a pretty area!

Chapman Family Reunion - Rio Grande River Trip

David only has one sibling here in NM.  The rest all live in fairly nearby states after being scattered across the country for a couple of decades.  Grandma, Grandpa, and Christine live next door to us in Rio Rancho, Jane and family live in Denver, John and family live in Phoenix, and Brian and Family live in San Diego.  Even though we get to see them more lately, it is still pretty rare that all his siblings are together at the same time, especially the cousins who are growing up fast, starting to leave the nest and making little lives of their own.  Sadly, we kind of think it might be the last time we were all together.  I can't imagine we'll be able to round up all those young-adult cousins again, but who knows!

This was the 3rd family reunion since I married into the family.  The last was in Salt Lake and before that in Pittsburgh.  This time we gathered in good ol' Albuquerque.  David kind of took on the planning of everything and did a really great job picking activities that seemed to please most of the crowd.

Everyone drove (or flew) in on June 14th and 15th.  Friday night the 15th, we had Dion's catered dinner (btw - GREAT way to feed a bunch of people good food for seriously cheap) and then went on a guided kayak trip down the Rio Grande.  I was pretty skeptical.  The Rio Grande can be less than a foot deep in places and doesn't look all that scenic when you are driving over it on the freeway.  But, little did we know that just a little further north, the river is totally gorgeous with green vegetation on the banks and is totally undeveloped and untouched for many many miles.

We rented a couple dozen single kayaks and started our float.  A little paddling was required, but not enough to prevent too many of us from doing it.  The smaller kids did ride with adults, and Evan decided he didn't want to try to go.  But, 81-year-old Grandpa Earl paddled his whole way down and even Aunt Christine gave it a try and made it quite far by herself.

We went on a sunset tour in the evening which meant a lot of shade from the hot NM sun.  I was extremely satisfied to discover that even on a river in the evening, there are VERY few bugs here in NM.  It is one of the top 3 reasons I moved here - no bugs.  So, good thing NM continues to come through for me.

Harriet went in my boat.  Her favorite part was the tiny "rapid" area of the river.  She had my camera and did a good job of not getting it wet.  David was crazy and gave his really expensive Nikon and the same job to Grace.  Luckily, that made it through dry too, although she didn't have it on the right settings and took no less than 500 blurry pictures.

At the end of about 7 miles, the river guides pulled our boats out and led us to a spot they had all ready for us to sit by a fire pit, roast marshmallows, and have evening snacks until after dark.

This river company was SO great.  I would totally go back.  They did all the hard work for everything - boats, shuttles to and from the river, food, etc.  It made things so nice for us.

GEARING UP:

 awww... Clare and Alec... I remember babysitting these 2 when they were teeny tiny.

 

for real

my little skipper

David's mini-me

Grandma getting a nice ride with the guide!  She was too nervous to paddle.

David and Grace

(Harriet thought the water was beautiful.  Guess I should take her to the Hawaii.)

Grandpa

The whole crew.

 Aunt Christine!

 Janie and Jane

 Chelsea and Stephanie

 Natalie

Chelsea, Wendy

 The Hatsters and Me

 Clare, Alec

 Aunt Wendy

 Aunt Sue

 Jenifer's Husband, Luke

 Uncle John

 Jeremiah

Chelsea

Uncle Brian

Ben

 The oldest Chapman cousin - Jenifer.  What a trooper - paddling while newly pregnant.  (She announced the news around the campfire a few minutes later!!  Looks like she'll make a great-grandma and grandpa out of Barbara and Earl.)

Cousin Evan/Uncle Richard/Aunt Jane - even though Evan decided he didn't want to get in a boat he still met up with us for the campfire afterwards.

 drying out the buns

 might be the cutest paddler in our group

 whew!  And, that was only the first evening :)  more to come.