Travel: Hugh and Dolores cruise the Danube (Updated 7/1)

Hugh and Dolores have returned home from their eight-day cruise on the Danube River in eastern Europe. They began in Budapest, passed through Vienna and Linz (with a side trip to Salzburg) and finished at Passau.

Hugh has sent along an account of their trip and a power-point presentation of photos. Visit the "Danube Cruise 2010" page for the full package. You can also see the photos and captions here:

Be sure to read the full story

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Andy heads for high school (Updated 6/22)

Andy and the rest of his 8th grade class at Park Middle School were honored at a "recognition ceremony" marking their advancement to high school.

Above, he receives his certificate from the middle school principal during Monday's ceremony in the high school auditorium.

Andy will join Christine at Scotch Plains-Fanwood High School in the fall. He has already started attending practices as a percussionist in the high school marching band.

UPDATE: At a Tuesday morning assembly at Park, Andy picked up awards for maintaining A averages in math and science and for "distinguished performance" in the school concert band. He also received a PTA performing arts scholarship, which he will use toward a week-long program this summer at School of Rock in Chatham, which he enjoyed last year. (See last year's School of Rock performance.)

Andy continues his Scouting advancement

Andy received a pair of merit badges in a Court of Awards ceremony held during Boy Scout Troop 33's annual picnic on Saturday. Here he receives the badges from his Scoutmaster.

Andy moved up to First Class rank in December. The badges he earned this spring (Personal Fitness and Citizenship in the World) are among those required on the path to Eagle rank.

A winning finish for Christine in soccer

Christine's Scotch Plains-Fanwood team defeated Edison 1-0 Saturday to take third place in Intercounty League U-17 girls soccer for the spring season. It was a fine finish for the team, which struggled in the early part of the season.

It also concluded Christine's youth league soccer career. Here she poses with her friend Allie, who has been Christine's teammate through the years.

Dan and Eyvonne's latest achievements

Dan and Eyvonne had a big day recently when Eyvonne graduated from the fashion design program at West Valley College in San Jose and Dan received an award for academic excellence at San Jose State University.

The West Valley graduation May 28 was followed by a fashion show June 11 where graduating students showed off their work.

During her studies Eyvonne had an internship at Fox Racing, a racing apparel company based in Morgan Hill. That internship has led to full-time employment there.


Dan meanwhile won the SJSU Communications Department's academic award, which carries a scholarship toward his final semester's tuition. Dan expects to complete his BA in communications this fall. The department chair has urged him to continue as a graduate teaching assistant, so that's a possibility for 2011.

Yes, Virginia: Another big move for Brian, Marie and Xander

An unexpected change in Brian's employment means he, Marie and Xander will be making their home in Fredericksburg, Va.

Brian has started work as a conductor for Keolis Rail Services America, the new operator of Virginia Railway Express, the railroad that delivers Virginia commuters to Washington D.C. Keolis won the contract to operate the service -- outbidding its long-time operator, Amtrak -- and is scheduled to take over the railway in July.

Last fall, Brian was hired by NJ Transit and began its locomotive engineer training program. He was about six months into the program when New Jersey budget cuts caused NJ Transit to abruptly cancel the class and lay off the student engineers. That was obviously a disappointment -- but he soon heard from Keolis Rail Services America, a subsidiary of a French international company making its first foray into the U.S. rail market.

"The company came to Newark to scoop up the laid-off NJT engineer trainees and managed to net about eight of them," Marie wrote. Soon Brian was in Virginia training to be a Virginia Railway Express conductor. (He could not have qualified as an engineer in time for the Keolis takeover of VRE service.)

VRE has two lines to Washington, one from Fredericksburg and one from Manassas. Brian will be working the Fredericksburg line and has begun settling into an apartment there. Marie and Xander will join him around the first of July.

"We got the unit we wanted, and Brian's very happy with the place," Marie reports. "The move-in has been smooth and the neighbors he has met so far are nice."

Saratoga update: Graduations and a birthday ahead

Pat writes:
Mary will be graduating from Empire State College on Saturday, June 12. She will receive her Bachelor of Science degree in Community Service. The graduation will be held at the "Egg" at the state campus in Albany.

Brennan will be graduating from Saratoga High School on June 24. The graduation will be at Saratoga Performing Art Center.

Shannon will turn 12 on June 13. She got braces on her teeth today and is ... thrilled?

Going up! Patrick lifts off (Updated with more details)

Fordham Prep pole vaulter Patrick heads skyward during the "Fast Times at Warwick High" track and field meet in Warwick, N.Y. on June 2.

Patrick cleared 12 feet at the Warwick event, but his personal best is now 13 feet. He jumped that high at the Catholic High School Athletic Association Championships on May 23 at Icahn Stadium in New York.

His dad, Ted, reports:
Last night (June 8) at Fordham Prep’s annual track and field awards dinner Patrick was given the award for most improved varsity field athlete.

This is the second year in a row that he won this honor. As a freshman his personal best vault was 9’-0”. As a sophomore he jumped 11’-0”.

The school record is 15’-6”.

Christine's team in spring soccer playoffs

Christine's Scotch Plains-Fanwood team has completed its regular spring season and won its first playoff game Saturday, 3-0 over Westfield.

This will be Christine's last season playing youth league soccer, which goes up to age 17.

For nostalgia's sake, below is a photo from the successful conclusion of the fall 2003 season. The team roster has changed from year to year, but Christine and her friend Allie, kneeling at far right in this photo, have played together every season since.

Julie marks 25 years in Girl Scouts

At the Girl Scouts Heart of New Jersey Council's annual volunteer recognition dinner May 26, Julie received a pin marking 25 years of Girl Scout membership. That counts her 10 years as a scout and three as a young leader, and then 12 years as a leader since daughter Christine became a Daisy.

Earlier Julie received a pin recognizing her 15 years of leadership service. She is currently Service Unit Manager for the Fanwood-Scotch Plains Girl Scouts (Service Unit #56).

New Yorkers visit the Heartland (Updated 6/5)

Kevin, Kathy, Shanna and Kevin are back home after a week-long Road Trip vacation that took them to Indianapolis, Chicago, St. Louis, Memphis and Nashville. Along the way they passed through portions of 13 states.

Shanna has now supplied us with photos, and her dad with a full account of the trip. We've created a special Feature Page to display them.

Click here to see the photos and read Kevin's report.

A field trip to Cedar Point Amusement Park

Chris writes:
"Recently I went on a field trip with my school band to Cedar Point. We were supposed to perform, too, but one of the buses crashed, so we didn't have time."

(Yes, that's right, one of nine chartered buses taking Heritage Middle School band, orchestra and choir members to the amusement park drove off the side of a road and into a ditch. Fortunately no one was seriously hurt, and the students were placed on other buses to continue the trip. Chris was not on the bus involved in the accident. The driver was charged with being drunk and unlicensed, causing a local scandal.)

Chris' mom and sister Stephanie drove to the park separately and met Chris there. "Even though we arrived later than expected, we rode some rides, visited some shops & walked around a lot while we were there," Chris writes.

"The weather was cold and wet in the morning, but the rain let up in the afternoon. My favorite part was getting to eat Dippin' Dots.

"Hopefully we can return again next year and do even more."

Memorial Day 2010 in NJ

In honor of Memorial Day, neighboring Fanwood and Scotch Plains, N.J. hold an annual parade along a 1.2 mile route from downtown Scotch Plains to the center of Fanwood.

This year Christine joined other members of the SP-F High School marching band in playing the "Star Spangled Banner" during ceremonies before the parade and Andy marched with fellow members of Boy Scout Troop 33. Julie, who is service unit manager for the Girl Scouts of Fanwood and Scotch Plains, marched with more than 200 Girl Scouts and parent leaders from around the two towns.

How did you spend Memorial Day? Let us know!

If you're really interested, click the "Continue reading" link below to see videos of all the Boy Scouts and Girl Scouts in the parade.

A great day of riding for Christine (Updated with video)

Christine had a very successful day at the Watchung Stable Spring Troop Horse Show, winning blue and red ribbons and taking part in a Drill Team performance.

The three-day horse show features dozens of judged events in which troop members exhibit their skills riding and controlling horses, which they draw at random from more than 50 school horses at the stable. On Saturday (May 29) Christine was entered in two events for A-level troopers 16 years old and up.

In the first event, riding a horse named Chowder, she won the blue ribbon, which automatically promoted her to AA level. In the second event she won the red ribbon for second place. Those ribbons made her eligible for a "ride-off" Sunday against about ten other 1st and 2nd place A and AA winners; she did not win that trophy but was happy to have made it that far.

Christine has been taking riding lessons at Watchung Stables since she was nine. This spring she was invited to join the troop's Drill Team, which meant a second lesson each week to prepare for the show. The team performed a 15-minute routine of precision riding - quite impressive. Here's a look at the highlights (about 3 1/2 minutes worth):

Genevieve and John's 'most amazing' Hawaii vacation

Genevieve has posted some photos on Facebook from a trip she and John took to Hawaii in early May. Maybe if we're lucky she'll send along a bit of description too! Meantime here are just a few of the photos.

More springtime concerts

The spring concert season continued last week with shows by Andy's middle school band and Christine's high school chorus.

At the Park Middle School concert, the jazz band repeated its performance of "A Band's Gotta Do What a Band's Gotta Do," finishing with Andy's drum solo. He also played on two numbers with the full band, including snare drum on the impressive final piece, "Pulsation." This clip has the ends of those two numbers; as you can see, they were crowd-pleasers.



At the Scotch Plains-Fanwood High School choral concert, Christine sang soprano with the Concert Choir on several numbers, including the two excerpted in this clip: "How Can I Keep From Singing," a Quaker hymn, and "Africa," originally done by the rock band Toto in 1982.

Fun and games at annual Preakness Party

Doug, Lisa, Liz and Rebecca continued the decades-long tradition of holding a party at the family homestead in Riderwood on the day of the running of the Preakness Stakes.

Doug and Lisa flew in from Las Vegas, where Doug's design-build highway project is well under way. Liz drove down from Troy where she's finishing up her junior year at Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute. Rebecca, finishing freshman year at Rochester Institute of Technology, rode down with her aunt Susan and cousin Kathy, who's about to graduate from Ithaca College. They were joined by scores of other relatives and friends on a beautiful sunny-and-mild afternoon.

Along with plenty of food, drink and conversation, there were games of badminton, croquet and frisbee...

...and the crowd gathered around the TV to watch the race, won by Lookin' at Lucky, to the disappointment of those hoping Super Saver would contend for the Triple Crown.

Watch the watching of the race:

Paparazzi capture stars heading to junior prom

Here are Christine and Matt looking marvelous as they headed out to their high school Junior Prom on Friday evening (May 14). Notice how well they coordinated their attire. They had a fine time dining and dancing with their friends at a catering hall until close to midnight.