Funky Family

On Saturday we had the biggest family gathering we've had here in Melbourne for AGES! It was rather impromptu, text messages and phonecalls flying around only two days previous. Kelli, my cousin, and Bruce, her boyfriend, decided to go out for dinner with Bruce's parents and my parents (Kelli is living with my folks). And then more of us Berkeleys lobbed in, so in the end there was Mum, Dad, Kelli, Bruce, his parents, Gina & Con (they're Greek, did you work that out?!), Michelle (my cousin from Canada), Daniel (my brother), David (my cousin, Kelli's brother, who I haven't seen for at least a couple of years), Gord, Piper, Jasper and I.

That's a big family gathering, for us! Michelle and I were commenting after on what a special experience it was, because we both grew up in contexts where there was hardly any, extended family living close by. And I was talking to Gord about it tonight and worked out something else, that the space was dominated by the kids, the cousins, rather than the parents. Not saying this is better or worse, just a different dynamic than usual.

Dave and Dan have a real quirky dynamic going on between the two of them! Fun to watch, if occasionally bewildering! Mum, Dad, Dan, Dave and Michelle hung out at our place at either end of the dinner (the restaurant, where Kelli works, just happens to be a couple of blocks from our place). I managed to start and finish a little gift for someone, while other people cooed over my baby, so that was lovely for me!

The food at the restaurant was great, the chips were perfect, Gord introduced the concept of a napkin race, and then he and Dan proceeded to gulp paper, much to the amusement of everyone. And to top it all off, we ordered two slices of lemon meringue pie, to feed everyone, cos really, at that point in the night we didn't need more food. Blow me down if Piper didn't eat at least half the slice that was down at our end of the table. I was boggled, groaning about the sugar intake but laughing at her incredible capacity! When she wants to eat, man, she can eat! She is a Funk after all!

We took lots of photos, and had lots of fun doing so. I'll put the first three here - if you want to see all of them, you can check them out on our web album: http://picasaweb.google.ca/beckatack/