went to a wild reunion in the oklahoma panhandle, the tip of the finger, you could say, not more than a stone's throw from the new mexico border. our drive was over seven hours, almost entirely along the edge of the border, in eastern new mexico, with four teens and two dogs. it snowed a bit so the roads coming back were patchy and especially the last mountain.

we have a good reunion crew: my oldest daughter, husband, two kids; my wife's oldest daughter, husband, three kids; my sister, and us - four teens, two dogs, my wife and i. they rented an old bunkhouse out in the panhandle = boy was it flat, and cold, but very nice. i came to like the wild western decor as now i have a little more experience with it. and the people were from the panhandle, several generations. a real panhandle experience, i'll try to find you some pictures.

january popped up pretty quickly; not much chance to go back over family pictures for the year, and put things in their place. now that it's the heart of january / heart of winter, maybe i'll get to that. it's a fact, and you might not be aware of it, but this very blog is quite the repository of family pictures, but they're all hidden, and they aren't labeled - or rather, you can click the links to get to them, but you won't see the name with the picture, and that's to protect the privacy of the people involved.

i asked the step-grands about the quilt. they liked it, ok, though i think they're still a little suspicious of anyone who would give them a quilt. they look at me with a look sometimes. my question for them was whether they used it. but i can't be surprised if they say "yes" even if "no" is closer. i have to bring that motivation back and do the quilt for the next step-grand.

the food was delicious - lots of grilling, and a roast brisket bought from the local folks. fabulous. lots of times i sat around, dog on lap, and just watched all the kids. there was a passel of young girls - twelve, eleven, ten, all over the place - a few others too. my grandson took a shine to the puppies. kids tore around and went from one place to another.

the road back was icy, as i said, especially the last hill, after we'd picked up the two larger dogs, and now had four dogs, four teens and us in the car. i came down the icy hill very slowly but who can blame me? seems to me you don't want to drive all the way back from oklahoma only to go off a cliff eight miles from home. the poor larger dogs were traumatized by the kennel but glad to be back. me, i was expanded by the expansive pancake-panhandle horizon, and came back a little more relaxed, with a lot of fresh air in me.