Vivian Opal

Vivian Opal celebrated her first birthday this weekend! She had a party at home with her mom and dad (who were celebrating their 2nd anniversary), several friends and Grandma and Bampa! I hear there were also yummy cupcakes and maybe a few gifts. Happy Birthday to Vivian!

Vivian Meets Vivian May 26, 2011

Liz and Van were in Colorado for a week's vacation and on Thursday, May 26, they drove to Loveland where they were dinner guests of Ken and Viv.  Ken Jr. and Barb were also present. A wonderful evening was had by all, and -- Vivian met Vivian!

Indonesia Journals from Ellen

Ellen and Bruce have been spending time in Indonesia. Please see the following Journals which Ellen has put together to share their adventures. I hope you are able to read the text, if it is too small you might try clicking on the document to open it in a new window, and then clicking on it again. That should make it show up larger. Unfortunately, this is the best format I am able to figure out at this time!

 

Catching Up

There are three extra significant birthdays in the Herr family this month, and it feels like an appropriate time to resurrect the Herr Blog. We in Deerfield just celebrated Peter's 70th, Dave turned 75 last Sunday, and Vivian will observe number 80 later this coming week.

HAPPY BIRTHDAY to all!

Henry and Clara watch Bampa stare at ALL of the candles!

The last blog entries were posted in June and July of last year, so we have some catching up to do. We'll include some highlights which we experienced with our immediate family and with various other Herr relatives. Then we hope to hear from you so we can post news and photos from YOUR families.. Some of us aren't on Facebook as much as others -- or at all -- so we still appreciate the blog entries!

JULY, 2010

Mary and Peter took a "working ship" cruise up and down the coast of Norway.

AUGUST, 2010

Ben and Allie's wedding in Schoolcraft, MI, south of Kalamazoo -- a lovely affair and it was very special to see Pat and several members of her very large family

SEPTEMBER, 2010

Liz and Van celebrated their first anniversary in a hospital, where Vivian Opal Taylor was born on September 5.

OCTOBER, 2010

Bruce and Ellen visited Chicago, and on this trip they played tourist instead of student, as they had done in the summer of '09. We spent a lovely autumn day in the University of Chicago area.

Does anyone notice family resemblances??

That's all on this end. We know Bruce and Ellen are about to depart for Indonesia, so we'll expect updates and photos from them. Vivian, do you have any special birthday celebration planned? The rest of you -- please send photos and updates and we'll publish them.

Happy Spring from Chicagoland! (It's been an extra long winter --- )

A Message from Rachel

Hello Everyone! It's so great to keep up with everyone's news and busy summers. I feel a bit remiss that we were not able to catch up in person with everyone during our one year back in the States - Noah's early birth caught us off guard for the reunion, and then Liz's wedding. We are hoping for more oppourtnities in the not-too-distant future when all the little cousins can meet! Eve is 3 1/2 now, and loves to read, play with anything miniature, and collect small plants and rocks. She is bilingual in Spanish and English since Guillo speaks to her only in Spanish and she attends a Spanish preschool here in Charlottesville. Noah just turned 13 months (amazing!) and is active and wiggly, and about as good natured as any baby I've met. He loves people and laughing. Guillo is READY to leave his job here, and will do so in just a couple more weeks. We will pack out of our house at the end of July and ship our things to Indonesia where we will be posted for the next four years!!! We will spend August visiting family in New Mexico and Florida, and then a week in DC before we fly out September 1. I hope the adventurous among you will consider a trip to Bali or Australia and see us along the way. Maybe the next reunion in Hawaii??? :-) We are well. Please stay in touch!

Rachel, Guillo, Noah and Eve.

From Pat Herr:

Hi everyone - It's that time of the summer for me to pack up and with Bonnie fly to the midwest and visit the three families there. There have been many changes in Andrea, Teresa's and Bob's families this year so obviously the grandchildren have grown and multiplied.
Starting with the oldest, Andrea and Mike have a new grandson when Tyler & Sarah had a son, Casper, in March. Mariah & Tony celebrated Silas' first birthday in Apr, so I'm looking forward to seeing the families. Sierra and Nick still are rooted in Ann Arbor, but still travel the world as he runs with Reebock support. Gyp and Don still love in Madison and he is now Father Don in the Episcopal church there. I hardly recognize their growing kids.
Teresa & Les saw Taylor graduate from Wabash in May while Patrick & Sarah have spent a year now in N Carolina where he has served his first year of residency. Right now Tate is living at home, has a job, a girlfriend and everyone is happy. We will be there June 24th and leave from there July 23. Terry and I will spend a night with my sister Kathy. She's in the St Louis area.
Joy is my rock and confidante here in Tucson. Joy, Hope and I went to NYC this spring to see Brooke in a performance at the college. We had two nights in the city and then two in Purchase which gave us time to enjoy a play, a trip to Ellis Island and some really great food. It's hard to believe both Brooke and Hope will be seniors next year. Starr is still working for the solar company, but also taking classes in the arts to find her passion. She and Jordan are still together, but in no hurry to tie the knot. Whatever works!
When Bob's Allie called me this spring to say that she was getting married, my heart just stopped. The wedding is in Aug so that will be my second trip to MI when Joy and I will fly in for the wedding. The three sisters will be bridesmaids so it sounds like a real tearjerker for me. I cry at every wedding as it is.
I am trying to condense this you all. I think about all of you often, so I am happy to see the blog resume. Joy, Dave and I met Bruce, Ellen, Sarah, Jeff and Jean (J's mother) for a 2 hr brunch several weeks ago and it was a steady stream of news being exchanged. It was a real treat. I hope you all have a nice summer and I'll look for YOUR news on the blog.
Love, Pat

Yes Dave and Rosalie have now been married for fifty years -- and we are celebrating!

The real date was June 18, but we are stretching things out to make the fun at a pace that we can handle better. We are having several small informal gatherings in our back yard over several weeks, and no big gala event. Plans are changing almost as fast as they are being made. On June 20 we had a family time with a combined celebration of Father's day and Marissa's graduation from High School. The photo shows the ten people who were at that gathering. Participating in Marissa's graduation and related celebrations filled our lives with as much excitement as preparation for our own events. But our parties are only a small part of how we will remember this anniversary. We have been preparing for the past year or more. We put together a set of eight memory photo books covering the fifty years of family history and presented them to our kids. They seemed to get a kick out of the pictures we selected from old photo albums and such. We also prepared a thirteen foot wall chart showing fifty years of history with time lines for homes, work, family, travel and so on, and small pictures scattered around representing the events of those fifty years. And we did a few other little projects like a small video of photos from our wedding along with excerpts from a recording made of our wedding, and some travel picture collections to summarize twenty five years of travel in a quick review. So our fun has been as much in gathering the material, reviewing our lives and compiling stories as it has been in just "celebrating" the arrival of the fifty year mark.

We had fun getting here and are still having fun. Now we plan to have more fun as the future unfolds.

Dave and Rosalie