it's december already

Hope everyone had a Happy Thanksgiving.

New month - new update.

December 2
Lori's birthday. How old is Lori this year? I know and it starts with a F. Could it be fifteen...forty...or FIFTY??? Must be forty :-)

December 17
Emily's birthday. Actually another F... four years old. Read it and weep, Lori!

Our get together - most voted for the end of December or February. Realistically we will probably try for February. Too much to plan in a few weeks especially with the holiday. Unless someone has suggestions regarding where to have party. I called a few restaurants but it has been difficult to coordinate from the west coast. Yes, we will open the party to any Fioriello, Speruzzi and Iaboni who wants to attend.

On a serious note, Uncle Phil is in the hospital and not doing well. Our thoughts and prayers are with the Speruzzi family.

Check out the pictures. Do you know who they are? Young ones may need to ask their parents.

ps

my email address is: Lauren.Messina@gmail.com

please feel free to email me the info - then i'll pull it together and summarize what I find and post a blog about it!

hello! family genogram

Hi everyone!
Glad to hear from everyone. First I wanted to send my condolences to the family, particularly patty and Kristy. I was very sad to hear about the passing of your brother/father. I hope you are making it through this difficult time with the support of your loved ones.
Second, I'm glad to hear everything turned out okay with Sarah. What a trooper, waiting in the ER for all those hours.....
And finally, I had mentioned a while back that I have this project I'm working on for school. I was hoping everyone would be able to help me out at this point.

The big project for my masters revolves around my own "family of origin," meaning you!!! I have to put together, what we in the therapy world, call a genogram - which is an elaborate family tree. It will include my immediate family, my parents' brothers and sisters and their children, and my grandparents' brothers and sisters and their children and grandchildren, etc.

I am hoping you can each email me as much of the following information as possible about your immediate families, and then any other family members (not included in our blog) that you know the information for of all the Leone's - the descendants of Giovanianna.

What I am looking for is:

• full names
• birth date
• nicknames
• place of birth
• dates of marriages, divorce, separation, or death if applicable

We have also been asked to pick 4 ares of interest to gather information about.
My four are (where applicable):

• diseases/illnesses (think high blood pressure, heart dieases, cancer, anything else)

• occupation title

• highest level of education (grammaer school, highschool, some college, college, Masters, Phd, etc.)

• eye color (blue, brown, hazel, etc)
• Any information you have would be greatly appreciated!!!! All the details are not necessary, but just as much as possible would be fabulous.
  

If you have any questions, please don't hesitate to ask.
Thanks in advance for your help with this!
I'll be excited to share the final product with everyone.

Thanks!!!!

Hey Followers put your picture in there

and the votes are coming in...

Is it Obama or McCain? No it's the Giovanianna's Girls!

It looks like we are close to making a few decisions. Don't forget to check under the first poll. There is a second one to fill out. A few people did not answer that one.

It seems that no one wants the Leone's at the party. Only joking. I agree we should start small. Maybe our next event.

But I did want to share that I spoke with Steven Leone and Michelle Leone at the funeral (we need to not make funerals our meeting place) and they are interested in getting together with the family. JoAnne emailed Michelle and got an update about her family.

Pretty soon we will need a larger site. I was thinking of starting the male counterpart-Guiseppe's boys. I think I have lost my mind. What I really need to do is to put all this time and energy into my work!

Wish me luck. Getting two little puppies tomorrow. That is unless I change my mind. No more month long vacations...

Don't forget to really vote on Tuesday!

Patricia

Some info on Sara

Hey guys, thanx for all the well wishes. I am feeling much better now. I went into the hospital on 10/17 with lower abdominal pain and after literally 13 hours in the ER found out that I had a severe case of Diverticulitis (an intestinal infection) and that the swelling caused me to get a hole in my colon. They would normally have done an emergency colostomy but being I am young & healthy and had been sitting in the damn ER for so long without collapsing they waited to see if the hole would wall off with heavy antibiotics and so far so good. I had one relapse in the hospital and almost ended up in the OR but I made it through. I came home from the hospital Sunday night after 10 long days and I will need to have surgery in the beginning of the year but as long as there are no further complications I will not need a colostomy and all will be OK. Thanks again guys and you can send any gifts like flowers or cash to me directly. HAHAHA just kidding! I hope to see everyone soon!

november highlights

Hello Girls,

October was not a good month. As most of you already know, my brother Joey passed away. It was so sudden and unexpected. I think we are all still in shock. It is very difficult to deal with the loss of a family member. Thanks for your support.

I keep remembering when we were little kids. He was always smiling and laughing - so easy going. I think that is the message my brother left...to smile, laugh, and not be so hard on yourself.

Although many of us do not get the chance to see each other often, I always feel we can count on each other. So if you see or talk to Kristie (and family), Gail, Joey, and John (and family)- give them a hug and let them know everything will be OK.

Also, Sarah is in the hospital. Stomach problems and will probably need surgery. Not exactly sure of the details but she will be fine. I don't know if she is checking her email but send her good wishes!

On a positive note, Roseann and Joe went to London to visit son Joseph. They made a few stops along the way and also met up with Leah and Bill.

Ann Marie and Ben Faletra celebrated birthdays.

Did I forget anything?

I added a little flavor to the blog. The red and green was meant to represent the Italian colors but for some reason it reminds me of Christmas. Oh well, go to the side bar (on right) turn on the Italian music and answer the two polls. We are very close to a final decision!

After you answer the two polls, go past the calendar which I still have not done anything with it :-( and learn your Italian word for the day.

November Highlights:
November 1- Michael's birthday (Sara's son)
November 4 - Roseann and Joe's 30th wedding anniversary- oh my god!
November 8- Jennifer and John's anniversary
November 11 - Nicholas' (Emily's brother) birthday

What else is happening in November?

Keep in touch!

Patricia

become a follower

You all have admin privileges and can now make layout changes if you want. Are you going to become a follower?

Hi Everyone! I am just checking to see if this works ;)

October News

Hello Girls,

Figured I'd try and start writing the beginning of each month so that we can get on a schedule for those who do not check the site often. Hope everyone is well.

A few things:

1. Notice the poll. Thought we could try and set a date for us to get together. We need a response from everyone. I have no way of checking who responded, just the total number of responses - so the magic number is 12. For those who do not (or cannot) check the site often (Roseann, Lori, Ashley, and Emily) maybe someone can get their response and enter it. It would be best if we can get a commitment from everyone to attend. Since many of us do not live in Westchester (event would be somewhere in the old neighborhood) the sooner we can decide, the easier it would be to make arrangements. I tried to pick dates around the holidays and winter/spring breaks because I thought it would be best for the college students. Once we decide the date, we can decide what we want to do and who we want to invite. Let me know if you want to consider other dates.
   
2. Notice the calendar. I was going to start posting birthdays and other events but don't know how to enter the information. Can anyone help? In October, we have Antoinette's birthday on the 16th, Ann Marie on the 17th and Ben Faletra (Kristie's son) on the 18th. Anything else happening in October? I figured we would just include "the girls" and their children but if someone wants to post other birthdays/events - go for it!
3. I also included an area for YouTube and slideshare. I don't know if you have access to the layout of the blog. JoAnne said that she could not find that section of the blog. If you can access it, please add what you want. If you cannot, let me know how we can change it or what you want to add.
4. I know I put the google ads in. I am sure some of you feel it is totally incorrect. You know how some feel about pay per click...but you never know, you may want to click :) on something that interests you :) - if you know what I mean :)
   

HAPPY BIRTHDAY!

Happy Birthday Aunt Patti!!! I hope you've had a wonderful day. Love you!

some old pics

Kristie,
I couldn't find any pictures of us at Fox Hill so see if your mom can dig some up I would love to see them!

Oh grad school

Hi everyone - I just wanted to check in and see how September is treating everyone. I successfully made the move to Maryland and began graduate school last week. Its been intense so far and quite overwhelming but i'm looking forward to getting into a schedule and getting the degree underway. I actually have a project to work on which I could use all of your help with. I have to make a genogram of my family for 3 generations - so my own family, the families of my parents and their siblings, and the families of my grandparents and their siblings and their offspring (aka you!). I'm not sure how in depth the info needs to be - i think names, birth/death dates, place of living, and occupation. I still have to get the details but I just wanted to throw it out there - to see if you'd be willing to help me fill in some missing holes! of course I'd be happy to let everyone see the final product if you're interested.
Have a great day!
Lauren

Jenna's dance recital

Here is link - Jenna is Sara's daughter. I guess the Speruzzi's got the dancing gene.

jenna dance

Pictures from Sara

new post from Kristie

"Sara, I can't believe you went back to Fox Hill (and that it still exists)!!
I have such great memories of us all going camping- remember the time we were playing in the car and almost ran over my brother who was sleeping in the tent???
I'd love to see pictures of how it looks now. I'm trying to convince my husband we should take the boys there but so far it's a losing battle...
I was visiting my parents in North Carolina this past week and showed them the blog..they loved all the old pictures and promised to look thru their stuff to see if they had anything worth sharing (particularly pictures of us kids when we were young...)"

Message from Lori

It was so great to hear from Lori. I know how she feels about the "GOOD TEARS."

From Lori,
"hi patty just got brave to watch the video.still crying,but they are good tears. the video and the work that you did and are continuing to do is amazing!!!! hope things are well with you and shelly.say hi to her. love lori"

Update from the Speruzzi's and a video too!

From Jennifer,

Ok Patty here is an update on the Speruzzi girls:

Ann Marie works in productions for SI Communications which includes 3 newspapers in lower Westchester. She is also doing Freelance graphic design on the side.
There is really nothing new on my side. My oldest daughter Samantha is going to be going to pre K 5 days a week in Sept. and she is very into dance! She takes dance lessons throughout the year and she had her first big dance recital in June. My baby Serena will be 2 next month(time flies)!!

You can check out my youtube videos of my kids. Here is a link:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=e4xQNesK4Ec&feature=related

That was her dress rehersal for her recital. If you click on more from jmiller1674 you can view all my videos of the kids that I have on youtube. My girls are quite the entertainers!!


Check out the video. It is adorable!

Patricia

New picture sent by Ann Marie. Good job. I see what you mean about the size. I think you recommended 72 dpi. I know who will be in charge of our photos!

I wonder what Pepe that was? How many did Nonna have and outlive? It looks like this one is about to kick the bucket!

Patricia

Sounds like Greek to me but the young ones know!

Thanks to Ann Marie! Here is how you take and send pictures for the web. Hey, what's new with you Ann Marie? I told your sister and aunt that we need an update from the Speruzzi girls.

In Ann Marie's words...

In order to send pics to be posted on the web they should be around 72 dpi and about a 5x7 give or take a few inches, if you are planning on printing any of the photos quality needs to be at least 300 dpi.

Also for the girls who may not know the blogging world, if you want to make a comment go to the end of the particular post, enter where it says comments, and add whatever you want to say! Join us!

Patricia

And the pictures keep coming in!

Meet Emily the youngest member of our group.

More pictures to share

Jennifer and Sara's kids



Lauren, Leah, and Ashley



Leah and Lauren


Lori and Ashley


Roseann and Leah


Roseann and Lauren




More pictures! Thank you Joanne. Other families please send pictures to share and I will post them. We need current pictures of all!

It's me...I'm back!

OK Girls-

I have not forgotten about us or given up hope that one day we will complete our documentary about the women before us.

Figured everyone needed a break and it was best to just enjoy the summer. Well I'm back!

I had an excellent time in Italy and Spain. Didn't want to come home. Just wanted to keep adding one more city. I know that there are many changes with us. Some I know firsthand but others I'll need to rely on the Seniors (that's you - Joanne, Roseann, Lori and I guess me too!)

New News: Kristie is working at Boston University, Leah got married, Lauren is starting grad school at the University of Maryland, and Ashley is leaving for college in Boston. Don't cry Lori. I think half our family now live in the Boston area.

Senior Joanne - fill us in on your side of the family. And let's not forget Emily. Although somewhat younger and still in preschool, she is officially one of the girls.

Check this out NOW

Patricia