A send-off for Christine and Jamie as they prepare for California move (Updated 12/3: more photos)

Members of Christine's family gathered on Sunday to wish a fond farewell to her and Jamie as they get ready to move to California next week.

Christine's parents hosted a brunch in a private room at the Stage House restaurant in Scotch Plains, N.J., bringing together relatives from New York, New Jersey, Pennsylvania, Delaware, Maryland and Virginia. Traveling farthest were Marie, Brian and Xander, who made a weekend of it by visiting Manhattan the day before.

Some of the attendees hadn't seen each other in person since Christine and Jamie's wedding in September 2019 - and in some cases, it was a first chance to meet.

In the official group photo, Jack, Bea, and Charlie are front and center. Seated left to right are Dan and Julie; Dolores; Christine and Jamie; and Andy. Behind them are Kevin; Kathy; John and Genevieve; Kelsey; Kathy; Vivien; Cathy; and Wren. And in the back row are Patrick; CJ with Austin; Hugh; Doug; Christopher; Stephanie and Jackie; Brian and Marie and Xander.

The move West comes as Jamie is now working as a game designer at Riot Games. She and Christine will move to an apartment in nearby West Los Angeles, minutes away from Riot's headquarters in Santa Monica.

Back on East Coast, Cathy has new job

After a little over a decade in Ohio, Cathy has moved back east and is now living and working in the Philadelphia area.

With daughter Stephanie attending Towson University, and son Christopher in Delaware, Cathy began planning to relocate closer to them and to her parents and siblings. She sold her house in Hilliard, Ohio, in the spring and moved temporarily to Riderwood, Md.

In July, Cathy accepted a position as a Compliance Specialist at Lincoln Financial Group in downtown Philadelphia, and moved to suburban Prospect Park, Pa. The job is similar to the work she had been doing at Nationwide Insurance in Columbus, Ohio - making sure the policies and products sold by the company's agents are suitable for the individual customers.

Cathy is now living in Prospect Park, Pa., within an hour-and-a-half's drive of Stephanie at Towson and even closer to Christopher in Newark, Del. She's already started doing some volunteer work in the community - and, of course, attending Towson University Marching Band performances whenever she can.

A summer day in Longwood Gardens

Cathy, Christopher and Stephanie spent part of the the first weekend in July visiting Longwood Gardens in Kennett Square, Pa.

"It was a hot, humid day," Cathy writes, "however we still enjoyed the flowers and fountains."

See more of Cathy's photos here.

Celebrating Easter with family get-togethers

Hugh and Dolores had an Easter get-together with their daughter Cathy and her children, Christopher and Stephanie.

Cathy has moved back to Maryland, where Stephanie is now finishing her first year at Towson University. Christopher lives not far away in Delaware and works in the technology services department of the Cecil County, Maryland schools.


Earlier, Dan and Julie traveled to Massachusetts a few days before Easter to visit with Christine and Jamie. They went over plans for the couple's wedding in September, and spent part of a day strolling in a local park. They also had an amusing time bowling - mostly badly, although Jamie had a decent score.

On Saturday, Dan and Julie were back in New Jersey, and Andy and Shannon drove down from Albany for a quick visit. The four went out for dinner at a favorite restaurant. Andy and Shannon then spent Sunday visiting Shannon's parents, now living on Long Island.

Azaleas and cherry blossoms at Birch Street HQ

We hope everyone in our extended family enjoyed a happy Easter!

A Roundup of Holiday Pictures

We hope everyone in our extended family is having a wonderful holiday season.

In this post we're rounding up photos from social media and any others that come our way.

Please send along any pictures, clips or stories you'd like to share!

At Birch Street Headquarters in New Jersey, Christine & Jamie visited for a few days with Dan & Julie and Andy & Shannon.

Gifts were exchanged with A&S on Christmas Eve before they went to Long Island to spend Christmas morning and afternoon with Shannon's family.

D&J and C&J exchanged more gifts on Christmas morning, and everyone was back together by evening.

Genevieve, John and Beatrice spent the holiday with John's family in Delaware. Here's Bea posing with two of her cousins.

Back in New Jersey, Vivien and CJ celebrated their first Christmas with Charlie, who turned three months old earlier in December.

It was also "baby's first Christmas" on Cape Cod, where Gerrit, Angela and big brother Nolan celebrated with five-month-old Josie.

Also on Cape Cod, on the weekend before Christmas Day, Christine and Jamie joined a gathering of relatives at Jamie's mom's home.

Backing up to Thanksgiving weekend - Doug and Lisa returned from their temporary residence in Denver to host their annual "black Friday" gathering at their house in Maryland.

Dan, Julie, Christine and Jamie joined that get-together after celebrating Thanksgiving Day with Andy and Shannon in New Jersey. As Dan and Julie were temporarily without a dining room table amid redecorating, they dined out for a change, enjoying a fine buffet at a local restaurant.

Also at Thanksgiving time, Kathy had the chance to take a couple of photos of both of her grandchildren, Bea and Charlie...

...as well as Leo, who joined them for this Christmas-PJs pose.

Visiting Grandma & Pop at the beach

Cathy, Stephanie and Christopher spent a July weekend with Hugh and Dolores at their summer residence in Rehoboth Beach, Del. Cathy and Stephanie were on an East Coast college-visit tour (Stephanie is entering senior year of high school). Chris joined them for the visit to the beach and the grandparents.

Cathy writes that they packed a lot into the weekend, hitting all their favorite Rehoboth spots. "We shopped at the outlets, walked on the boardwalk, bought some taffy at Dolle's, browsed at Browseabout Books, had brunch at The Back Porch Cafe, swam in the ocean and ate some Thrasher's fries."

Click here for more photos

Dolores shares her expertise on samplers

Hugh writes: Dolores gave a lecture May 17 at the Rehoboth Beach Historical Society on Early American Samplers.

The talk was on the closing day of the Historical Society's fifth annual needlework exhibit that has been at RBHS since March.

The lecture was well attended, and the many intelligent questions during the Q & A period indicated a knowledgeable and appreciative audience.

Dolores is the author of a book titled "American Sampler Designs," now in its second edition and available from Stemmer House Publishers.

Viewing and creating works of art

Dolores and Hugh were busy last week with a visit to Winterthur in Delaware and a "paint-off" in Western Maryland.

On Wednesday, Hugh reports, they joined a coach tour sponsored by Trinity Church to tour Winterthur, the family estate of three generations of the DuPont family. The 1,000-acre estate and its mansion are preserved as gardens and a museum. "The current exhibits are a wonderful show of antique needlework and an exhibit of the costumes from the TV show 'Downton Abbey.' Both were worth the trip," Hugh writes.

Dolores adds that she and Hugh have never watched "Downton Abbey." "Everyone (on the trip) was all gaga about it, and some were appalled that we had not seen the show!

"Anyway, we really enjoyed the day," Dolores adds. "We saw the fantastic costumes, which were really presented with great style. An adjoining gallery had a marvelous show of New England 18th Century embroidery, so that was a real bonus!"

The next day they decamped to their home at Deep Creek Lake, and on Saturday, Dolores went to Grantville, Md., to Spruce Forest Artisan's Village at Penn Alps for a day of plein air painting. It was the "second annual" event; Dolores also participated in the first, which was held to mark the 200th anniversary of the stone-arch Casselman River Bridge. "I guess they aren't waiting for another 200 years," Dolores remarked.

About a dozen artists took part in the event. Dolores notes that such events are "now a BIG deal. I am invited to plein air events about once a month now. I have worked outdoors for over 35 years, and now suddenly it's a 'plein air event!'

"I painted one of the buildings in pastel. It all fell into place nicely as I worked, and to my complete surprise, I won second prize."

Dolores in annual Rehoboth Art League show

Cape Gazette photo

August means Rehoboth Art League Show for Dolores, the show's former chairperson and long-time exhibitor. The photo above, showing Dolores talking with a visitor from Virginia, ran in the Cape Gazette. 

The 41st annual show was held Aug. 9-10 and 16-17 and featured more than 130 artists. Read the Gazette's article here.

Dolores gives lecture on quilting

Keeping busy as ever, Dolores was in Delaware last weekend for the Rehoboth Beach Historical Society's Embroidery Show, which she chaired.

She also gave a talk on Amish Quilting Design. (Photo at right)

"There was a pretty good group there, and a lot of enthusiastic questions after I finished," Dolores said.

Next: Dolores and husband Hugh are preparing for a European vacation. We look forward to their overseas dispatches.

Snowstorm covers the East Coast (Updated)

Tuesday brought heavy snow to much of the East Coast. At Birch Street Headquarters, where it snowed from early morning until late at night, there was around 8-10 inches of snow on the ground when Dan took these photos around 11 p.m.

The heavy afternoon snowfall pretty much paralyzed New Jersey roads, and it took Dan more than three hours to get home from work - normally about a 50-minute trip.

We've seen just a couple of other snow pictures from family members -- perhaps many of us are too tired of winter to bother snapping pictures. But here's a nice scene shared by Brian's mother, Barbara, in Trenton, N.J.

Hugh and Dolores were in Rehoboth, Del., which did not get the full force of the storm. "There may have been 6 inches here, but it looks to be closer to 4 inches," Hugh writes.

"It was enough snow to close the local schools - and to close The Rehoboth Art League, where Dolores was to teach a watercolor workshop Wednesday. She will have a make-up class on Saturday. It is cold on the day after the storm, with morning temperature 7 degrees - and since the wind always blows at the beach, the wind chill temperature is in the minus single digits."

The snow reached as far south as Elon, N.C., where Lizzie attends Elon University. The school posted scenes of its lightly-dusted campus.

Dolores exhibits at annual Rehoboth show

The Rehoboth Art League is holding its 40th annual Outdoor Show this month, including works by one of its mainstays, Dolores.

The league's Facebook page carried these two photos of Dolores at her exhibit during the first of the show's two weekends. The photo above accompanied a post that read:

"Day 1 of the Outdoor Show was a GREAT success! Visitors had a great time interacting with the artists/artisans one-on-one and learning about their passions. Pictured here is Dolores Andrew (Outdoor Show Veteran!) talking with some fans about her work!"


This photo was captioned: "Couldn't resist getting this beautiful shot of the lovely Dolores Andrew at the Show on Sunday. How does she manage to look so cool, even in the heat?"

As a former chairwoman of the league, Dolores organized the show for a number of years. Now she concentrates on exhibiting her own work.

Renowned artist exhibits in Rehoboth

The Wiberg Gallery in Rehoboth Beach is currently featuring works by Dolores. Above, she stands with gallery owner Jack Wiberg at the show's opening earlier this month.

"I have been a member of the gallery for just over a year," Dolores writes. Her works will be featured for about two months, and then move back to one of the other spaces in the gallery.

Also this month, Dolores exhibited at the Rehoboth Art League's annual Outdoor Show. She's a long-time participant in the show and its former chairperson.

Visit Dolores' web site to see more of her work.

Empty boardwalk: Winter in a beach town

Dolores and Hugh are in Rehoboth Beach this week while Dolores teaches art classes for the Rehoboth Art League and the Art League of Ocean City, Md. Things do look different in January than they do in July. There is almost no one on the Boardwalk, but the good news is there is almost no one on the roads either.

The construction equipment on the beach has to do with a beach replenishment program. There will be a nice wide beach for the summer -- if a nor'easter doesn't take it away before then.

Thanksgiving, home and away

How did you spend Thanksgiving?

Dan and Julie had a relaxed holiday at home with Christine and Andy. Christine has finished her first trimester at RIT, and after wrapping up all her end-of-term projects, was able to fly home for a 10-day visit.

RIT junior Rebecca, meanwhile, has been spending much of her break traveling and curling, Her team competed in a bonspiel in Boston and another in Washington D.C.

Marie, Brian and Xander opted for Thanksgiving at home, with Marie and Xander just back from their visit to Disneyworld.

Genevieve and John spent the week in Delaware visiting John's mom, grandmother, sisters Kellie and Lindsay and Lindsay's husband, Marc. They also helped put up the family's Christmas tree (seen at right). Yep, one holiday season leads right into the next!

Vivien was at work making sure Thanksgiving dinner went smoothly at Brookdale Senior Living's Hallmark of Battery Park City. But we hear she got up to Scarsdale in time to have pumpkin pie with parents Kathy and Ted and brother Patrick, who was home from Johns Hopkins.

Where was everyone else - and with whom? Please share your holiday stories