Family picnic.....

So this coming weekend is our family picnic, now this is not your grandma's back yard kinda family reunion. This is and has been my hole life a BIG, BIG event!
See it all started with my Grandma & Grandpa, they had ten children (yes I said 10). My momma is the youngest. So one summer way..... back when they started to gather every summer for a picnic. Now if you can imagine how big this family was then? Just take i minute and wrap your mind around the size now! 10 kids all had kids, they all had kids and now they are starting to have kids!!! Not every one of them come every yr. life gets in the way, but for the most part we have an attendance of roughly 100 people! For most of these people they have to travel from all parts of WA into ID and down to CA. We all meet here in Poulsbo at my Aunt & Uncles property. They live on 20+ acres off of bound road. We are blessed to have this place to go to, it has the space for those that camp (many do). There has always been a lard group of us that head over Fri. for the weekend, we sit around the bonfire catching up on the years events, roast many different types of meat and then move on to the marshmallows....... YUMMY! People have been known to break out into song or play a guitar, laugh a little to hard, eat to much and of coarse there is the yearly idiot that drinks to much and ends up doing some thing stupid. Sat. morning the rest of the family starts to arrive. Quit some years ago we decided to build a nice big covered area were we can crowd under in the rain, have a dry place to put our massive amounts of potluck dishes, a cool huge brick and metal fire place to keep food hot and people warm in our lovely Aug. weather. You can't imagine just how many picnic.s have taken place in the rain, pouring down rain!!! It is lined with picnic tables, and my Aunt went and got those cool outdoor party lights to stream along the log beams and it gives this cool mellow feel : ) Now with all those people were do we all "go" well we started to rent 2 port-a-potties and to pay for those potties? We started having a raffle for a fun way to make money for the expenses. People bring items new, used & bought. It is a lot of fun! There is a big pond with a dock for swimming, a nice huge grass lawn for the all day volley ball, there is a sand bank for the kids to play. We have an egg toss and a pie eating contest and a penny hunt : )
But probably the most entertaining is our family tradition....... see one of those first picnics years ago at the end of the picnic when all were packing up there sat a camp stove with a pot sitting on it and in the pot sat a lone some hot dog. Well it being the end of the picnic & all two of my uncles were in a good mood and one bet the other a couple of bucks that he couldn't bring home the weenie, keep it safe and bring it back the fallowing year. Well it was brought back with a little poem about sitting in a freezer for the year and the money was exchanged. Then it went from there to a crazy tradition.
Every year that same hot dog (Weenie to us) has gone home with a lucky drawing winner and is to care for it keeping it safe, bring it back with a poem/short story and a little display in it's shadow box some one built it! LOL This is know joke to our family, we even had to create a rule book for the lil guy because words and fist have been thrown over him! Oh your "reward" $5.00 from every single person that has had the weenie OR is eligible to draw for the weenie. Last year the pot wast crazy big, about $200 big ones!!! $200.00 for sticking a petrified hot dog in a shoe box and keeping it out of harm....... Well that sums it up, that in a nut shell is our second Sat. of Aug. All I have left to leave you with is our family quote..... "We're not just any hot dogs, we're WEENIES!"