What is a Meet an Greet? + The Day Family Reunion + The Riley Family Reunion

What is a Meet and Greet?

The name of the first event at many reunion meetings is self-explanatory. The Meet and Greet event serves an excellent purpose, the kickoff, for any reunion. Often registration is the first step into the Meet and Greet, but most important are the smiles, hugs, kisses, squeals of joy and delight in seeing one another again. Some Meet and Greets are just that – an opportunity to say hello – but more often there is food, beverages, a program, introductions, getting to know you games/icebreakers (lots of examples @ reunionsmag.com) and announcements, including the reunion program. The Meet and Greet comes up prominently in many reunion reports, so we asked some reunions to elaborate.

The Day Family Reunion

Day Family Reunion

The first Day Family Reunion weekend began with a Meet and Greet on Friday. For many, this was a first time meeting other family members. They met in a building with a beautiful lake view at Poverty Point Reservoir State Park in Delhi, Louisiana, to enjoy a fish fry, along with music and a family history lesson. They shared ancestral information handouts from Ancestry.com and photos. They are looking forward to a second reunion in Las Vegas in 2019.

Day Family Meet and Greet

Shared by Carolyn Scott, Columbia, Mississippi.

Umoja Dono, Unity Talking Drum, performing Libation, a ritual pouring of a liquid as an offering in memory of those who have passed on. Reunion members call out the names of ancestors to open the Banks Hill Outlaw Family Reunion in Washington, DC.

Shared by Thelma Harper Jones, Washington DC

Burtschell/Burttschell Family International members from Germany, France and the US (mostly Texas) at the reunion site – a restored 17th century cognac distillery in Bonneville, France, home of reunion planners Remi and Valerie Rodier. Everyone took advantage of time to relax, enjoy refreshments, and meet and greet the cousins.

Shared by Arliss Treybig, El Campo, Texas and Remi Rodier, Bondues, France

The Riley Family Reunion

Riley Family Reunion planners made special plans for the kids. At the Friday Meet and Greet, the kids colored and decorated flowers to hang on the Riley Kids Family Tree and answered questions “about me” to get to know their cousins.

Riley kids expressed their creativity by coloring and decorating paper hands that folded into a card. The girls’ hands had lots of bling. “Hands” were handmade by the reunion committee.

The Rileys put flowers on the tree and hands around the tree, and displayed it at the banquet night event. It was a huge success.

Walthall-Gregory-Berger Family Reunion

Authors in the family, each holding copies of books they or other family members have written. (L-R): Muriel Miller Branch (Pennies to Dollars: The Story of Maggie Lena Walker, The Water Brought Us: The Story of the Gullah Speaking People, Dear Ellen Bee), Dorothy Marie Rice (Pennies to Dollars, The Seventeenth Child), Angela Dodson (Remember the Ladies), and in memoriam Lillie Margaret Walthall Connor (A Lily Blooms: Mud Between My Toes).

The Walthall-Gregory-Berger Family, whose ancestral roots descend from Pittsylvania and Campbell Counties, Virginia, come together biennially to celebrate our rich family legacy. My grandmother, Missouri Virginia Walthall Miller, was one of 22 children of George Washington Walthall and Pency Ida Gregory Walthall. There are cousins we have known all our lives, others we have recently connected with, and still many we do not know. That’s why we value the Meet and Greet period held during reunion weekend.

Our Meet and Greet and weekend activities vary, depending upon the theme for the gathering. Prior to the Meet and Greet, organizers set up a history display table.

In the past, we have involved family members by arranging book signings for the authors in the family; assigned teams for our Family Olympics and allowed teams time to gel and make team flags; hosted fish fries, and other creative, interactive activities.

During the Meet and Greet we also have a time during which we introduce/re-introduce ourselves, including which ancestral line we belong to on our extensive family tree; this helps tremendously when “First Timers” attend a reunion. At the end of introductions we sing our welcome song.

Reported by Sonja Branch-Wilson, North Chesterfield, Virginia.

Selfie of Sylvan Crimley (5) and Isaiah Dionisio (11)

Carmen Allen, Grayson, Georgia, reports about her successful icebreaker at the Johnson Family Reunion in Las Vegas, Nevada. Everyone received an envelope with a card in it with the name of a person to find and take a selfie with. The selfies will be made into a video montage for the next reunion!