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Joan, the key is actually to have enough reference photos of your subjects; it doesn't really matter where they live. I've done posthumous portraits from three poor reference photos; amazing what you can do when you have to, although the painting with the least reference material did offer a good picture of her face in a tiny school photo. I've also done photo shoots with subjects whom I knew I'd never see again, but thank heavens for one-hour processing; I could have the results almost immediately and know whether I had something that pleased the client and that I could work from. If you have enough photos of any of your nieces and nephews to give yourself a good face and a pose both with similar lighting it should be sufficient for a painting (although others may disagree). Still, if you're very new at this, as Chris and I said, you might want to make it easy on yourself and go for a fairly good face and pose with pleasing lighting all together in the same photo.
By the way, I use a Nikon with a 70-210 telephoto lens for my photo sessions. It keeps me from having to get right on top of the subject, thereby letting them relax better, and also reduces distortion. I can zoom in for a face shot and zoom out for the whole figure - or as much as I need for the kind of painting it will be.
Do keep us posted about what you decide to do and good luck!
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