When I first heard the words “family reunion,” I was like, “No!”

I didn’t really know my family and the idea of a reunion wasn’t appealing. I kept picturing a huge mob of people I didn’t have anything in common with except for a last name. I imagined a reunion something along the lines of what a reader survey done by Reunion Magazine in 2007 indicated: about 35.1% of reunions had 51-100 people attending.

In fact, junior Tyler Lofftus’ recent family reunion fit in this group. About 100 people were at his reunion gathered at his grandma’s house to share their family history. “They were really prepared,” said Lofftus. “They had PowerPoints and everything.”

Even though my reunion wasn’t going to be traditional or as large as the Lofftus family, the idea was a bit terrifying for me. But when the day came, I was pleasantly surprised to see that there were only 14 people and my grandma’s dog.

Greetings consisted of awkward, yet sincere hugs and “I haven’t seen you since you were this tall,” and “My, how big you’ve gotten,” lines. And, as expected, I only had the vaguest memory of them so I simply smiled and nodded. The only two I truly hadn’t met before were my uncle David and uncle Bob.

After the initial hugs, we stood in a circle and stared at our shoes, not saying a word. You could feel the awkwardness radiating from everyone. Two minutes passed and then my aunt Cherilyn came out from my grandma’s house and asked my mom and I to come with her. I was relieved to leave the circle, but I became confused when we went into the bedroom and the door was closed.

At first I thought some sort of weird initiation was going to happen, but then I noticed cut-outs of paper hands and markers and crayons. I guess my imagination was getting the best of me, because I still wasn’t to comfortable being at the reunion/ family-meet-and-greet.

My cousin Amber explained that we were going to surprise Grandma. “Just trace your hand on the paper and then write a nice message or a good, meaningful memory that you’ve had with Grandma,” she said. That sort of thing caught me off guard. I need days to think of something good and meaningful, mainly because my memory sucks. What I wrote was pretty generic, now that I think about it, but it’s obviously too late to change that.

For one moment, we got scared because Grandma came into the bedroom asking why we weren’t outside with everyone else. Luckily she didn’t notice what we were doing and Amber escorted her out of the room.

Anyway, once we had everyone’s hand cut out, Aunt Cherilyn drew a tree trunk on some poster board and then used the hands as leaves. It looked really cute. The hands were orange and yellow, giving the tree a “fall” look. At the top was written “Grandma’s Thanksgiving Tree 2013” but later we realized the “k” was missing. It was pretty funny. Amber said to pronounce it like a redneck, “Grandma’s Thanksgiving Tree.”

Lunch was delicious. Turkey, stuffing, mashed potatoes, little bread rolls, and more. The adults sat at the dining table, and I sat at the “kids’ table” with my cousin Patrick and second cousins DJ and Hayden. The “adults’ table” was noisier than the kids’ table. They recounted stories from their past, joked and laughed — although I think my dad was the one who did most of the talking. My grandma said she was happy that no one was fighting and that everyone got along well.

After lunch, everyone went to go do their own thing. My dad’s brothers and sisters went to talk out on the deck. I thought about joining, but decided against it.

I had brought my DSi with me and I was so close to beating my game. I sat on the couch with my mom and turned it on. The sound caught Hayden’s attention so he sat on the couch too. I was pretty sure he would get bored of the game because it wasn’t Super Mario or anything like that, but he stayed and, at one point, took the system from me and started playing on his own. At some point my mom left and DJ took her place. He became the official reader of dialogue and we both tried solving the puzzles in the game.

Some time around four or five, all my cousins went out to my grandma’s backyard and made s’mores. The fire felt good in the cool air and the s’mores were warm and gooey, even though every marshmallow I had caught on fire and was burnt, which is what our conversations consisted of. My cousin Patrick kept giving advice to DJ and Hayden telling them to “Hold the stick higher,” or “Try turning it, so the marshmallow will be golden all around.” The funny thing was that he burnt his own marshmallow, helping the little ones.

We stayed out for about an hour until I heard that two of my aunts, my mom, and Amber were going to Wal-Mart for some pre-black Friday shopping (or whatever that’s called). I wanted to go shopping, see if there were any good deals, so I went with them.

Parking was insane. I never thought that a Wal-Mart would be so crowded on Thanksgiving day. Amber and Aunt Ruth went ahead of the rest of us and by the time my mom and I had found parking, they already bought what they wanted. They are really quick shoppers. When we got back, Hayden was opening and closing my DS asking, “Can we play now?”

The next day was my favorite. My parents and I spent the night at Grandma’s house. Everyone else was at their hotels. Around noon, everyone came back and we went bowling. The decision was a spur-of-the-moment choice, going against what Reunion Magazine’s survey said about 68% of reunions being planned one year in advance. In fact, my reunion was sort of last minute. My grandma had called everyone one month several times before we got together.

Junior Nick Ochoa’s second family reunion was also a small gathering. Even though his reunion was only for the afternoon, he said it was the most memorable. “Seeing everyone at once and seeing my cousins again was nice,” he said.

I agree with Ochoa. It’s nice to see your family together in one place. This was especially true for me when I went bowling. Everyone supported and congratulated each other when we did well.

One thing I learned from our family bowling experience was that the Hostetlers are pretty good at bowling. Almost everyone broke 100 in at least one out of the three games we played. I knew that my dad and uncle David were in a bowling league when they were younger and over the summer my dad and I would go bowling once a week. I surprised Uncle David when I suddenly started playing better after the fourth frame in the first game. “You pulled a lame duck on us!” he said.

The top three players would be Uncle Bob, my cousin Patrick, and then Uncle David. I’d like to say that I would be in fourth place, but maybe that’s just my opinion.

After bowling, we drove down to a restaurant and ate a lunch/dinner type of meal (linner?). This time we ate together, I felt closer to everyone. Maybe it was because we weren’t sitting at different tables? Whatever the reason, it felt good to be together. Thanksgiving day, Aunt Cherilyn and I went around asking everybody “What’s your favorite Thanksgiving memory?” Answers consisted of “family,” or “doing scratchers on the front porch,” or having a certain family member come home for the holiday, but I never gave an answer.

Nothing really stood out — except going to Texas and seeing my grandpa — until this past Thanksgiving. I’d definitely say that my all time favorite Thanksgiving memory would be spending this thanksgiving with my family in Florida at my grandma’s house.