Hi Classmates,

Our class reunion was a huge success!   We had approximately 77 classmates, plus spouses and six teachers attend the Friday Night Pizza Party.  When I arrived to set up on Friday night, I was told to set up in the far back room even though I had reserved both rooms.   I was told that 1968 was a long time ago and they doubted that we would need both rooms.   Boy, did we prove them wrong as both rooms were packed with standing room only.   The pictured name tags that Della made were truly embarrassment-savers.   Some of us had trouble seeing the name tags, so I guess we will have to have them made into a 5x7 size next time (giggles).

Saturday the Golf Scramble was attended by 13 classmates, and I was told that they had a great time.   Our hopes are that we have a huge scramble at the next reunion.

The Saturday night dinner was attended by 73 classmates/spouses.  Ilene Austin and Ken Shelton as MCs - kept us in stitches with their witty ways. 

The Sunday picnic was also a hit with about 30 classmates attending.   Janice Grant insisted that we have a picnic and she was totally correct on this.  

If my numbers are correct, we had 81 classmates attend at least one of the events.    The website that Arlene created and has worked so hard on (www.meridian68.com) has been instrumental in connecting classmates and keeping everyone informed.   Thank you, Arlene!!!!!

Chris Walton and Kay Williams have both talked to me about gathering recipes from all the classmates and creating a cookbook.   As soon as I hear from the gals on how they want to coordinate it, I will pass the word on to you.

I would like to gather suggestions for the next class reunion from all of you.   What went right?   What went wrong?   How can we improve to get more classmates to attend?     When do you want the next reunion?   Five years?   Ten years?    What time of the year is best? 

Some of my personal suggestions are going to include:  
1.  Charge $2.00 per classmate (spouses are free) to attend the no-host, Friday night event.   This will help cover postage, name tags, etc.   This will also reduce the cost of the "dinner" if we choose to do it. 

2.  I also will propose a $2.00 per classmate charge to attend the picnic to cover the cost to reserve the park, table cloths, etc.    This year all of the costs for the reunion were piled onto the dinner - which made it very expensive and eliminated some of our classmates from attending.   It also allowed some classmates to enjoy the "free" events and not help in what I call the "administrative" costs to pull the reunion together.

3.  I would like to see the "dinner" turn into an affordable gathering at a location which would be free (maybe an office building) or a minimal cost to rent and cater something less expensive, such as lasagna, pizzas, sandwiches, ----- I have not figured this out, but I don't want anyone to be excluded.

Our Suggestions for the Next Reunion Meeting is going to be on Thursday, October 30, at Idaho Pizza at 6:00pm.    Every is welcome to attend the meeting, or if you would prefer you may send you suggestions to me at:  sherrie.ewing@ewingcompany.com.    I will compile the responses and send them to everyone.

Staying in touch.   It is imperative to send any changes in your email, phone number or address to me so that we don't loose the great strides that we made in finding everyone.   Vickee Larson Poole was instrumental in finding a lot of you.    We still have 30 classmates who we have not found.   Please glance at the attached list one more time and let me know if you can contact any of them or give me some clues so that I can.  

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Thank you to all of you who traveled from far away places to attend our reunion - you are truly the warriors!!!!   And thank you also to all of you who helped in planning the reunion, by finding classmates, organizing parts of the reunion, attending the meetings and making suggestions …… and just being there for the committee to bounce ideas off of.   I appreciate each and everyone of you.    The Class of '68 is truly an AWESOME class!!!!!!

Have fun today,

 Sherrie Aldape Ewing