Here's hoping for a good year ahead

Dan writes: Before January passes by without a fresh post, I thought I’d share some New Year’s thoughts.

Buh-bye, 2020

The year past was difficult in many ways. There were happy highlights: Vivien, CJ and Charlie welcomed baby Austin; Andy and Wren purchased and moved into their home in upstate New York, and announced their engagement; Genevieve and John took ownership of the Noyac cottage that has been in the family since the 1960s. 

But there was also loss: Wren’s mother passed away, an early casualty of Covid-19. Family events were canceled and we missed one another's company. Risk of contagion forced us to limit our activities and made anxiety a backdrop to ordinary life.

The start of 2021 has brought hope for progress against the pandemic that is now in its 11th month in the U.S., but also doubts about when life can get fully back to normal. The development of vaccines provides hope; their disorganized distribution and the emergence of new virus strains create doubt. The formation of a government dedicated to overcoming the health crisis, and the hard work of healthcare providers, bring hope; the continued resistance from anti-science and anti-social forces raises doubts. 

While we hope for common sense to prevail, I wish all our extended family continued health and safety, and look forward to a time when we can again visit one another in gatherings large and small. In the meantime, please keep us posted on your activities so we can share them here on the Birch Street Web and continue Keeping In Touch. 

Thanks, and have a wonderful year!

Merry Christmas to all!

The Birch Street Web marks its 11th anniversary

It was on St. Patrick's Day weekend of 2007 that Dan created a web site, on a now-defunct platform called Googlepages, to post stories and pictures of events and activities from around his extended family.

The Birch Street Web's very first entry, posted on the night of March 17, announced the move of Marie, Brian and Xander from Nevada back to California, a couple of years before they returned to the East Coast.

The site, which later switched to its current format on Google's Blogspot, now contains more than 1,100 posts, along with links to feature pages, photo galleries and videos.

Dan writes: "Eleven years on, I'm proud of what the Birch Street Web has become: An extensive collection of our history, cataloging family gatherings, everyday events and milestones. It's a resource for remembering where we've been and what we've done together and individually."

"I hope to be able to continue this for years to come - and I ask everyone in the family to help me by continuing to share photos, videos, news and other tidbits.

"While Facebook and other forums connect us with family and friends, their mysterious algorithms and other limitations make it difficult to find specific items from the past. Only The Birch Street Web provides a single, chronological archive of our extended family, which I hope people will continue to use for many years."

To sum up: Keep in touch!

Wishing a wonderful Thanksgiving to all

Here's hoping everyone's travels, feasting and other activities are the best they can be.

Please share stories and pictures of your Thanksgiving fun!

Happy Halloween from Birch Street HQ

Pumpkin carvings by Christine (left) and Shannon (right)

We're catching up on August posts

Your editor had a chance this week to catch up with some of the events of the past month or so, and posted a fresh batch of articles. You don't want to miss them - scroll down to see!

• Courtney and Chad are engaged 
• Andy celebrates important birthday 
• Stephanie selected to All-State Band 
• Visiting cousins and new friends on Cape Code and Long Island 
• We catch glimpses of the solar eclipse
• Dan meets the other Dan in the Hamptons 
• Dolores teaches portraiture; Hugh assists 
• Balloons and music at annual festival in NJ 

The Birch Street Web is 10 years old!

Ten years ago, The Birch Street Web debuted on the internet as "A Family Site for Keeping In Touch."

Dan writes: It was Sunday evening, March 18. I had made a weekend project of creating a space, on a platform called "Googlepages," where I could collect news tidbits, photos and videos of family members and their activities. It was sort of a digital successor to a printed newsletter called "The Mail" that I operated for a while several years earlier.

As the Birch Street Web grew, it became difficult to manage as web pages, so on Nov. 11, 2008, I relaunched it as a blog on Google's Blogger platform. Today, there are more than 1,000 entries in the blog, plus links to expanded articles, special-feature pages, photo albums, YouTube videos and archived content. (Unfortunately, changes by Google over time have broken some of the links, especially to photo albums; I'll try to restore them as I can.)

Thanks to everyone in the extended family for sharing words and pictures. The result is an ever-growing chronicle of family events - which, as time goes by, turns into family history. Please continue to contribute, and I hope you'll turn to it often as a resource for remembering big and small events in our lives.

HAPPY SAINT PATRICK'S DAY!

Statue of St. Patrick with Croagh Patrick in background,
County Mayo, Ireland.
(Britannica.com)

We wish all our family and friends a Merry Christmas!

May we all be blessed with a joyous Christmas and a safe and happy New Year.

Happy Thanksgiving to all the family!

We wish a wonderful Thanksgiving Day to all!  

Please share pics and stories of your holiday gatherings 

with the rest of our extended family 

on the Birch Street Web!

Rockwell, updated

Listen to Dan's musical mix on Birch Street Radio

Logo by Christine

Dan writes: Some of you might remember that, nearly three years ago, I started up an online radio station, Birch Street Radio, on a service called Live365. There's been a link to it in the right-hand sidebar of this blog ever since.

The station attracted a small but greater-than-zero number of listeners who apparently liked my peculiar assortment of old and new rock, folk-rock and other types of music.

Alas, Live365 shut down on Jan. 30, for reasons having to do with a new royalty rate structure for web-streaming of copyright performances. Having gotten a few weeks' warning of Live365's demise, I quickly latched onto another webcasting platform, called Radionomy, and rebuilt Birch Street Radio there. It's worked out pretty well so far - and again, has been getting small handfuls of listeners from out there on that world wide web.

There's a catch: As a commercial-supported operation, Radionomy requires its stations to reach a certain level of listenership within nine months to stay on their platform. So I faced a choice: Give up on my little radio hobby - or step it up and work to build an audience. Well, hey, I've always wanted to run a radio station, so I'm giving it a try. The station now has its own web site, its own Facebook page and a Twitter feed where I've managed to get it noticed by some small record labels and indie artists.

So I have two messages for readers of Birch Street Web:

• First - Please have a listen! Maybe you'll like it! It's a mix of new rock and rock-ish music, classic rock and folk-rock, bands and singer-songwriters from the 60s to now. You'll hear well-known and obscure songs from stars and unknowns. Once in a while you'll hear me say something pithy.
• Second - I called the station Birch Street Radio when I started it as a sort of spin-off of this blog -- but now I'm being careful to keep it completely separate, with no connection to this family-only site. So I'm not even posting a link to it here. You can find it easily just by Googling "Birch Street Radio" (but skip any old links to Live365). The Birch Street Radio web page gives you various ways to tune in and listen. 

Thanks for your support!

Sharing Merry Christmas images (Updated 12/25)

We're collecting Christmas-related images from around our family. Send us yours! We start off with the tree at Birch Street Headquarters, nicely decorated by Christine and Andy.

Kathy sends along this picture of decorated trees at the New York Botanical Garden, after a Christmas Eve visit there along with Patrick, Genevieve, John and Beatrice.

This photo of Kathy posing with Bea and Leo was taken earlier in December, but it certainly belongs in a Christmas-photo collection.

Gerrit posted this Christmas Eve photo with the caption: "The face you make the moment you remember that Santa is coming tonight! Nolan is ready!"
Nanette is visiting daughter Courtney in Florida, where they posed for this photo with two of their friends.

In Maryland, Hugh writes: "Dolores and I are at Deep Creek Lake for Christmas. We have a small tree here--not quite like Charlie Brown's.

"Though Christmas has come, winter has not! The ski slopes are green, and the temperature is more like Christmas in New Zealand. Dolores says that if we can't make a fire in the fireplace and watch it snow this year, we will have to make a fire and watch it rain." And back to Birch Street, where Andy and Christine carried on the Christmas tradition of opening presents under the tree.

Merry Christmas to all our family

Happy Thanksgiving! Please share your celebration

We wish a wonderful Thanksgiving Day to all!  

Please share pics and stories of your holiday gatherings 

with the rest of our extended family 

on the Birch Street Web!

Rockwell, updated

Happy Independence Day in the USA

Summer at the Village Green, by Tish

Happy Easter to all

From NJ-MA, we're bracing for blizzard

Here's hoping everyone in the Blizzard Zone is safely hunkered down! Stay safe and warm -- and share your stories and photos!

Where we live: A map of the Birch Street Web

Just for fun: Here's a map of places where members of our extended family are living. See how many places you can match to people you know!

Fun fact: Google Maps says it would take 97 hours to drive this 6,225-mile route non-stop. Road trip!

Here's a closer view of the Northeast. Click either map for a larger view. And let us know what we've forgotten to include!

Celebrating Easter 2014

"... And behold, I am with you always, until the end of the age.”

Happy Birthday to the Birch Street Web

Webmaster Dan writes: It's been seven years since I decided to try using that newfangled internet thing as a way to help connect the various strands of my extended family - to use "the web" to create a family web of communication and sharing.

The Birch Street Web was created on the weekend of March 17-18, 2007, as a sort of on-line newsletter. It took on the current format in November 2008. As of today, there are over 800 posts on this blog, along with links to feature pages, photo albums and videos.

If you haven't lately, take some time soon to browse back through the pages of this virtual family album. I'm sure, like me, you'll be surprised at some of the memories it contains - some of which you forgot you remembered.

Please, whenever you can, help me continue building this archive of moments and milestones, tidbits and trivia. All contributions are welcome and feedback is appreciated. Write anytime! Let's all Keep in Touch! Thank you.