It is with a heavy heart that we must announce there will not be a Rizzles Family Weekend in 2013.

Please read the following messages from Joy and Liv:

Joy

All,

After much soul-searching, Liv & I won’t be organizing the RizzlesCon Family Weekend in 2013. Due to an increase in responsibility, I now have work obligations which impact my ability to fully commit to this event. I’ve also taken on the running of a local soccer club, which my 7 year old son plays for.

We know that many of last year’s attendees have already met up, and are connected in ways we could never have imagined 12 months ago, so the RizzlesFamily legacy does live on. My work does take me travelling globally for various events, so I feel that I will be seeing many of you again in 2013. I’ve already had one visitor from Canada. I’m even hoping I will be at Café Brazil in Dallas with Liv over the 29/30 weekend in late June.

~Joy Thomas

Liv

Peeps,

As you know, Joy and I’ve been talking about coordinating a fan meet up of some type or another this year for those in the fandom who wanted to just meet with each other and hang out for a weekend.

I really wish this is something we could make a solid reality. Unfortunately, real life has collided with what can actually be accomplished this year, and I’m very sorry we cannot head up coordinating a meet up. We have various work and personal life items that clash with our ability to help with this event. As you can see, Joy’s life is crazy busy, and mine is about to get that way, too.

That’s not to say we wouldn’t love to see someone pick up the idea and do a fan meet up somewhere, and it’s always wonderful to see when a bunch of us can manage to see each other and go do something. We’re still a big family, after all, and, like Joy, I’ve managed to catch up with some of you since the con. That’s always a very fun and very exciting thing when it happens.

There’s going to be a lot of talk about the “real reasons” why we’re not coordinating this even this year. You’re going to see speculation that we feel too burned by the powers that be, and I’d be lying if I said that’s wasn’t a small part of it, but it’s a very small part. You’re going to see speculation that we finally realized we’re not “part of the team,” our delusions of grandeur have been squashed, and that’s why we don’t want to do this anymore. That’s not it at all. We very much wanted to do this so everyone could come together again. We simply don’t have the right schedule or resources to make this a reality.

We’re both very sorry we couldn’t pull this together, but we wanted to let everyone know now so that, if you’ve set time aside, you can rework it.

That said, I’ll be in Dallas that weekend, and my dog and I love having company at Café Brazil with friends. My invitation to come have coffee with me and maybe go do something before or afterward is always open. J

If you have questions or whatever, you can always shoot me an email at info@rizzlesunlimited.com and my tumblr page has anon turned on.

~Liv

You can still get your Rizzles fix at Rizzles Unlimited

Well you seem to have decided on not one weekend, so let’s make it a little hard. Pick one of two! These dates were really close in the initial poll, which always makes it hard for us to pick on.

Feel free to post questions about the event here. The plan is to have it in Southern California again, if that helps you narrow things down.

It’s been nearly four months since RizzlesCon 2012, and there are a few things that Joy and I have learned. They are as follows:

• “Omni-“ should likely be in the dictionary as a prefix
• Karaoke is best when everyone attempts a song (group singing is allowed)
• Tess Gerritsen is, possibly, one of the best people around
• Michele Mulkey has one of the coolest jobs ever
• Twitter Jane should probably be allowed to write all Hallway Sports rules
• IHOP makes an amazing strawberry milkshake
• FlatJane, FlatMaura, and FlatNotJanet get around… a lot
• No one hears the actual words to “Edge of Glory” when it comes on the radio
• The Rizzoli & Isles fandom is one big family
• We all miss the Family

With that in mind, Joy thought we should do something about how much we miss the Family. I could not have agreed more. Our solution? A reunion of sorts, but, really, it’s something even better than that. It’s a Family outing for the weekend, or, as we’re going to call it, a RizzlesCon Family Weekend.

We’re looking to hold this Family gathering in June of 2013. Right now, we’re trying to lockdown a date, which is where this poll comes in. Vote and show us what dates work best for you, and we’ll try very hard to get the best date for the most amount of people.

This time is different. We learned from our past, and we plan to focus much more on making the event interactive with lots more games, a few Family outings, and possibly guest speakers in the same vein as the people we had this year such as Ed Winter. We want to hear from you. What would you like to do or see at the gathering? Tell us your thoughts. We would love to hear them! We also want you to know that the pricing will be very different, and we’re trying very hard to make sure that it is affordable for everyone.

This is a Family gathering, a weekend to come and spend time with people you talk to everyday online, the people you’ve met, you’ve wanted to meet, and maybe even a few you didn’t even know you knew. If you didn’t get to come this year, this is a great chance to go next year, and, if you did come this year, you already know it’s going to be a blast next year!

Are you ready?

It’s a RizzlesCon Family Weekend. Everyone’s invited! Who’s bringing the coffee? ;-)

~Liv Moreno