French Canadian families of my parents generation were large.  Genealogical historians indicate that  King Louis gave instructions to those bold families striking  out to settle the new world that each family should strive to have 12 children to populate “New France”.  Those were times when  it was typical for families to be large and to lose  children at childbirth, and from horrible diseases with no cure. My maternal French grandmother lost six babies, and two young children.  She raised ten who all married and had children. Oh, my!  My cousin Vicky Buelteman, left,  is the daughter of my mother’s brother. She lives in Scottsdale, AZ.

We spent an afternoon remembering the past. Vicky’s father taught me to dance when I was a pre-teen,  so I could dance at his wedding.  Vicky and Rod’s daughter,  Michele is studying microbiology in college. She was always fascinated by microscopes and didn’t get turned off by seeing things crawling around in her drinking water. Her goal is to work in a medical capacity.
We spent a couple of hours chatting and at one point tried to figure out how many cousins we have?  It was a half-hearted effort because we have so many. We don’t really know all of their names or where they are. A fun endeavor anyway.
We contemplated how many of us didn’t go to college or graduate from high school and how much better educated the  next generation of cousins is.

We move to a new location today, and Jim spent the morning before our visit  plotting the State Parks of New Mexico on a map, since we plant to spend a great deal of time there in 2012.