The days here at home are short for me before I take off to Canada for our book launch so I’m going to try to capture the beauty of our time celebrating with family and friends in Southern California in my next few posts. There will be a lot of photos because a lot happened and a lot of people were together that aren’t together very often. So get your scrolling finger ready!

They arrived in waves to John Wayne Airport in Santa Ana on Thursday. Katie had to fly into LAX and I’m happy to report that the freeways proved smooth sailing for my drive to pick her up. We arranged a meeting at the hotel to get together with Dear’s only brother’s family. The only one who was missing was our oldest niece Jenna who lives in New York with her husband and grandniece.

The restaurant at the hotel was very dark so you’ll have to excuse my photos!

We had such a good time together catching up and laughing. It was good to hug and console My SIL Christina as her mother Virginia Wicks just passed away at age 92. Chris shared some things she has come across while she and one of her brothers have been sorting through Virginia’s papers. You can read about the amazing roll Virginia played as a publicist and in the jazz world in particular by clicking here and  here. She was also one of the Goldwyn Girls and was featured on one of the covers of Look magazine in 1954.

Our beautiful nieces and sweet grandniece and more shots of our families together in the past year…