What To Do: Holiday season roars in with new, family-safe events

By Denny Dyroff, Staff Writer, The Times Thanksgiving has passed and Black Friday has arrived. That means the Christmas season has reached the top of the holiday rollercoaster and is now slamming downhill – full force at faster miles an hour. Even though COVID-19 restrictions have eliminated a lot – a whole lot – of traditional area holiday activities, there are still holiday events everywhere...

What To Do: A holiday season like no other gets under way

By Denny Dyroff, Staff Writer, The Times  Longwood Gardens The number of days left in the countdown to Thanksgiving 2020 is in single digits. We all know that Thanksgiving is the traditional “unofficial” start of the Christmas holiday season – even though the season commercially “started” when Christmas items were being stocked on stores’ shelves on Labor Day Weekend and “Black Friday”...

What To Do: Christmas events begin to ramp up

By Denny Dyroff, Entertainment Editor, The Times  Holiday Magic at Brandywine It is the middle of November and that means many of the area’s traditional Christmas activities have begun – including a highly anticipated event in Chadds Ford. “Holiday Magic at Brandywine”, which was formerly known as “A Brandywine Christmas,” is running now through January 10 at the Brandywine River Museum...

What To Do: Winterthur reopens house, galleries to the public

By Denny Dyroff, Entertainment Editor, The Times Winterthur Museum, Garden & Library (5105 Kennett Pike, Route 52, Wilmington, Delaware, 800-448-3883, http://www.winterthur.org) is  welcoming visitors back to its stunning house and galleries beginning October 1. In the Galleries, “Winterthur’s Lady of the House,” Ruth Wales du Pont explores her life as wife of Henry Francis du Pont,...

What To Do: A look at difficult history at Brandywine River Museum

By Denny Dyroff, Entertainment Editor, The Times  Brandywine River Museum The Brandywine River Museum of Art (1 Hoffman’s Mill Road, Chadds Ford, www.brandywine.org) has been hosting a pair of special exhibitions since February 1 – “Votes for Women: A Visual History,” and “Witness to History: Selma Photography of Stephen Somerstein.” With regard to the former – if you snooze,...

What To Do: Tired of lockdown? Go visit a prison

By Denny Dyroff, Entertainment Editor, The Times  Eastern State Penitentiary With COVID-19 still in full throttle attack mode, one of the last places you want to be is a prison. Actually, under any circumstances, one of the last places you want to be is a prison. But there are exceptions – such as Alcatraz Island and Eastern State Penitentiary. Alcatraz Island was a federal prison from 1934...

What To Do: Museums among a few options reopening

By Denny Dyroff, Entertainment Editor, The Times The Barnes Foundation COVID-19 restrictions have been relaxed and area attractions are beginning to re-open. If there are attractions that you wish to visit, it would be a wise move to do it as soon as possible. Other areas of the country are seeing spikes in reported cases of the coronavirus – mainly because ignorant people have been refusing...

What To Do: As area opens, a few more options for outings

By Denny Dyroff, Entertainment Editor, The Times Car Concert: The Big Takeover As we head into July, many of the restrictions caused by COVID-19 have been removed or at least relaxed – just as the pandemic’s numbers are starting to surge in the wrong direction. Still, you people who have been waiting to get out for months can now get out. You can break the chains and finally get “out and...

What To Do: Coronavirus takes toll on St. Patrick’s Day & other area events

By Denny Dyroff, Entertainment Editor, The Times St. Patrick This is the strangest of weekends – and Friday the 13th is just the beginning. Ordinarily, figuring out what to do for weekend fun would be relatively easy – just pick an event from a wide array of options. But this weekend has been greatly impacted by the arrival of the Coronavirus. So, if you’re trying to figure out what to do,...

What To Do: Snow? What snow? Orchids are in bloom at Longwood

By Denny Dyroff, Entertainment Editor, The Times Longwood Gardens Every year when January arrives, Longwood Gardens (Route 1, Kennett Square, 610-388-1000, www.longwoodgardens.org) celebrates one of the largest families of plants in the world. If you did a Google search to find out which are the largest families of flowering plants in the world, this is the answer you’d receive – The three...