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Millennium Reunion Celebrations
Many
reunions are making special plans to mark this momentous time throughout the new year.
The new millennium may not legitimately start until January 1,
2001, but few people seem too concerned about that small detail
in the frenzy to celebrate the roll of the calendar to 2000.
Special millennium party ideas
Just as you can celebrate Christmas in July, you can also celebrate
or re-enact the new millennium anytime.
Even if your reunion is not December 31-January
1, you can re-enact a countdown to a new day and pretend it's
the new millennium. Use a giant clock for everyone to count down
the last seconds before balloons, confetti and cheers help usher
in the dawn of a new day.
Every celebration is a blast with fireworks. If
fireworks are illegal where you are, schedule an event around
someone else's legal fireworks, if not in person, then on TV or
make and play a video tape.
If your members are particularly musical, memory
lane has much to fill it. How about a dance program that demonstrates
dances during the last century; flappers, Charleston, rock and
roll and hip-hop? From your members or a local dance studio, enlist
a high energy person to teach the latest swing dance steps: a
tribute to what your grandparents were enjoying in the 40s and
50s and in vogue again among the younger generation.
Choose a favorite era or time in millennium to
re-enact and celebrate. The Renaissance, for example, featuring
Michelangelo's many accomplishments or Elizabethan England with
much ado about Shakespeare (including soliloquies about your reunion's
future). Or choose from many events in American history ... starting
with the lives of your own ancestors. Fashion shows of styles
over many decades or centuries is an opportunity to share treasures
from many closets. Re-enact your ancestors' emigration, migration
or settlement.
All this emphasis on the past makes us flash into
the future for but a second. Every millennium reunion party should
end with some special predictions for the next year, – century
and the only time in many lifetimes that you will also be able
to make predictions for a new millennium. Reunions deserve long,
well-conceived predictions for the future, their growth and, for
families in particular, that they flourish and multiply in the
new millennium.
Millennium celebrations
The ten children of S.L and Mae Moore already meet every four
years all over the country. The millennium holds special promise
for them and they'll break their mold just this once to bring
in the millennium together. Viki Yoast, Goliad, Texas, reports
that the growing Moore Family Reunion helps keep their family
close-knit while expanding to "a multitude of kiddos and
in-laws." The family is spread throughout the US and Yoast
is "always thrilled by the number of members who make the
effort to join special occasions." The reunion will be the
week prior to and through the New Year.
In the planning stages are 42 sports and golf
tournaments and scheduled mealtimes together. New Year's Eve festivities
are scheduled in Victoria, Texas, considered "home"
for the majority of the ten Moore children. A hotel ballroom is
reserved as the "gathering" place for the week, topped
off by a big dinner/dance on New Year's Eve for family members
and attending friends.
Kris Meinershagen, Bedford, Texas, whose branch
of the Nelson Family Reunion is responsible for their big millennium
reunion, created a theme that certainly says it all. They're calling
the reunion N2K as an acronym for Nelson 2000. The Nelsons have
kept reunion scrapbooks but plan to start a new book to mark the
beginning of the new millennium.
Jackie Utley, Jackson, Tennessee, reported that the Utley Family
Reunion assembled a time capsule to be opened in 2049. She listed
what she though the time capsule should contain including the
Utley family tree and current mailing list printed on acid-free
paper. Every family was asked to bring a postcard from their hometown
with their names and ages printed on the back. Those who did not
attend the reunion were also asked to contribute a postcard.
Filling the time capsule
These are Jackie Utley's instructions to fill the Utley Family
Time Capsule – 1999-2049. Items must be acid-free and archival
quality. No newspaper clippings, but photocopies of clippings
on acid-free paper. No color photographs because they only last
about 50 years. Black and white photographs last over 100 years.
Video and audiocassettes have a life of only about 20 years. Most
craft stores have a huge variety of acid-free papers, both plain
and with designs.
To end the century, the Hibschman Family Reunion
members brought special mementos or pictures to be placed in a
time capsule box to be opened in 2019. For their millennium reunion,
organizer Sharon Menk, Delavan, Illinois, plans to portray family
founders in costume, as well as read the family history. There
will be copies for everyone.
Over 300 Clinkscales will celebrate the turn of
the century with some extra special touches according to reunion
coordinator, David E. Clinkscales, South Florida, Florida. Their
picnic will be in international waters on board the Port Everglades
Sea Escape cruise ship. Their family banquet at the Ft. Lauderdale
Marina Marriott requires after-five wear ... a formal family,
indeed.
Jeanmarie E. Weston-Diehn, Michigan City, Indiana,
felt that even though her Rogers High School Class of 1978 reunion
did no materialize, ideas for their theme "Moving into the
21st Century" are worth sharing. Memory book entries were
to concentrate on predictions and aspirations for the new millennium.
A fortune-teller was hired for private consultation and for encouragement,
10 door prizes would be having fortunes told. Decorations were
to include crystal ball centerpieces and fortune cookies at place
settings.
Early farewell to the century
At their 32nd reunion, Lisa Alzo described the 32nd ALAFFA Family
Reunion at South Park in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania to bid farewell
to the old century with reflections of picnics past. They also
rang in the new millennium a bit early with a toast to their future.
Sixty family members held a New Year's celebration
and toasted the new millennium and their long history of "theme
reunions." Some members dressed in costumes from their favorite
theme while others designed t-shirts or wore items of clothing
that reflected a bit of all the themes. ALAFFAs, too, made a time
capsule. Family members brought props/memorabilia/paraphernalia
and a scrapbook with photographs collected over the years for
display during the reunion. These items are preserved in their
own ALAFFFA Hall of Fame housed by a second-generation member.
A Real Millennium Idea!
A personalized time capsule will be an exciting addition to any
reunion's special millennium celebration when it is filled and
opened later in five or fifty years! The strong polyethylene capsule
is 45 " long, 6 3/4" in diameter and has a 5 1/2"
opening. Directions to prepare and store your capsule are included.
If you are not the fortunate contest winner, contact John Mallory,
Time Capsule Specialist, 12258 Kirkdale Dr, Saratoga CA 95070;
408-252-7447; Mallory58@aol.com;
www.word-art.com/timecapsule
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