Thanksgiving

How did you spend Thanksgiving this year?  I’m going to venture a guess that it wasn’t with 158 of your closest relatives.  Well, guess what, I did spend Thanksgiving with 158 of my relatives.

Thanksgiving in my family has always been celebrated in this manner.  Let me start at the beginning…  Frank and Bertha Bertram are my great-grandparents.  They had 14 kids (yes, you read that number correctly).  Every Thanksgiving, the descendants of Frank and Bertha gather at the American Legion Hall in Colome, SD. 

Five generations of farm wives (and a few husbands) cook their finest Thanksgiving fare, and we all enjoy a good old-fashioned pot luck lunch. 

Color-coded shirts (see the Larsen family light blue below) are to be worn based on which of the 14 kids you belong to.  This is supposed to help everyone figure out who’s who, but I’m not kidding anyone.  I only know my immediate family and about 10 other people by name! 

That’s what the Bertram family calendar is for.  The calendar you ask?  Why yes.  Many years ago one of Frank and Bertha’s grandkids (Kathy) thought it would be a good idea to organize this madness into a family directory complete with birthdays, anniversaries, contact information, a family tree and so much more.  Kathy is amazing.  As of this year, there are almost 400 descendants.  I don’t know how she keeps them all straight, but she does. 

After we have all stuffed ourselves way beyond what is necessary, we take family pictures, talk about the old days on the farm, and generally try to keep our eyes open long enough to make it back to Grandma’s for a nap.  Our immediate family (Grandma, aunts, uncles, and cousins) usually spends the rest of the weekend, doing projects around Grandma’s house and shopping in the bustling metropolises of Gregory and Winner, SD.  This was the highlight of this year’s shopping trip. 

Nice huh?