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Two-and-a-half-year-old Roman stood up from his colorful plastic Wal-Mart chair and began dancing to the singing and drumming of the four men on the plaza.

Earlier, he and his 4-1/2-year-old brother, Tristan, had focused their eyes intensely on their first view of the Laguna Pueblo buffalo dance. Now the rhythmic music stirred his reflexes into a dance mode for a few minutes.

That dance, performed by the same family for as long as I can remember, is done with great precision, with all dancers making the same movements at all the right times. Two male dancers were dressed all in black, with headdresses of dyed black goatskin, protruding horns and a colorful fan of feathers. Each one carried a gourd-rattle to mimic the sound of falling rain. The maiden dancer wore a black Pueblo manta with a white hand-woven Hopi shawl across her shoulders. On her legs and feet were white, doeskin moccasins, and in her hands she carried carved wooden flowers. For the two young boys, who had never seen anything of this nature, it must have been quite an amazing sight.

It was Sept. 25, St. Elizabeth's Feast Day in Paguate, one of Laguna's six villages on the rez, situated about 10 miles north of the mother pueblo. Each year, I take a few guests with me to my birthplace for this feast day. So several months ago, the boys' mother, my granddaughter, Rhiannon, and I planned this outing.

The children - of Mexican, Spanish, Laguna, Acoma and Taos descent - have been to Mexico and Taos to meet their relatives, and now it was time to introduce them to a Laguna feast day. Three members from the family home were dancing the harvest dance, so Tristan saw his godmother, Maria, from a different point of view, dressed in traditional Pueblo attire and hands painted with white clay for the ceremonial dance. My niece, Maria, and her sister, who live in Albuquerque, dance at most of the Laguna village feast days and during the Christmas celebrations.

Leaving for the countryside was a treat. A summer storm had transformed the brown and golden desert into a blanket of lavender and yellow flowers along I-40 west, while far-off mesas toward Laguna and Acoma became more accentuated with pink and purple colors. Near the village of Paguate, any evidence of the 1950s Jackpile Uranium Mine seemed to have dissolved into a wonderland of wildflowers, flourishing cedar trees and cactus plants.

Upon arrival at the village, we headed for the plaza through the smells of grilling hamburgers wafting from food stands and past trucks of horno-roasted corn, melons, squash and the usual peaches and apples from Seboyeta, a nearly Spanish village. Of course, every pueblo feast day now has vendors selling cheap toys "made in China" along with cotton candy and sodas.

Very soon, it was lunchtime, and our house was filled with friends and relatives who had been invited for a lunch of red and green chile stew, antelope stew, ham, chicken, several kinds of salads and desserts. While playing in the yard, Roman greeted guests by telling them his name, followed by a bit of conversation. The feast day is a time when everyone who can do so comes home to visit with family, friends and clan members. These folks may come from as far away as San Francisco and New York City to take part in the village dance and festivities.

Dancing ended at 4 p.m. with a procession to the Catholic mission to return St. Elizabeth, who had been in the plaza arbor since morning Mass. Packing up with the two kids, loaves of horno-baked bread and roasted corn, we departed for Albuquerque, leaving behind the still-bustling crowd in the usually small community.

Sunset began as we cruised down Nine Mile Hill in time to see the Sandia Mountains turn from pink to magenta. High up in the southern sky a thin, crescent, silvery moon made its appearance. It had been a majestically wonderful day.

Augustine, an Albuquerque resident, is a member of Laguna Pueblo, a retired nurse and a volunteer at the Indian Pueblo Cultural Center. Her column runs the third Thursday of each month.