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Category Archives: History

Narcissi, My Mum and a Song

05 Nov

I was in a lovely vintage shop today and on the counter were some beautiful narcissi, grown in St Keverne.

November 5th was my lovely Mum’s birthday. As a little girl she thought that everyone was celebrating her birthday with fireworks and, of course, I think of her especially on this day, though truth to be told, I think about her most days even though it’s many years since she died. At her request we also had fireworks at her wake.

Photo from 2016

I first heard this song  by Mama Nous a while ago but sharing it again today, remembering Mum, seemed right. Do click on the link to listen. It’s a really lovely piece.  I love this artist and if you’d like to learn more about her or hear more of her emotionally intelligent songs, click here.

https://www.facebook.com/reel/1433523254944548

 
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Posted by on November 5, 2026 in Cornwall, family, family history, music, Postaday 2026, singing

 

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The Concert, The Book and The Song

19 Oct

The Inglehearts’  Anniversary Concert last night was a blast! We had a couple of standing ovations, there were tears and laughter and the joy in the room was palpable.  Amazingly, we raised £1000.00 to be shared between our two charities, ShelterBox and Community Roots. What a generous audience they were.

Our wonderful committee have been working hard for months putting together a photo-book full of twenty years of singing for Claire. Here are a couple of the pages for you to see.

A very talented member of our choir wrote new words for the much-loved song ‘Cornwall My Home’ by the Cornish singer and song writer, Harry Glasson, who very kindly gave his permission to sing his tune with R’s words.  Here I give you the chorus:

But I’ll always remember as time moves along
The love and the laughter that goes with the songs
With good times aplenty and sad times a-few
When you’re part of our choir, our choir’s part of you.

 

 

 
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Posted by on October 19, 2026 in art, Celebration, charity, community, Cornwall, friendship, gigs, Happiness, History, Postaday 2026, ShelterBox

 

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Marmalade, The Collector and Sunset

17 Oct

This morning I made marmalade, still needing labels.

This afternoon I decorated the ten pots I’ve made in my pottery lessons. They’ll be fired in the week and we’ll collect in a couple of weeks – photos then if they are okay!

This evening we have been to a wonderful production, The Collector, that was moving and funny, full of imagination and of love. It was basically an homage to our dear friend, Bill Mitchell. It’s on at The Ladder in Redruth for a few more weeks.

On the way to the theatre  the sunset sky was very lovely.

 
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Posted by on October 17, 2026 in art, Cornwall, environment, History, nature, Postaday 2026, Redruth, theatre

 

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Redruth International Mining and Pasty Festival

12 Sep

That was a cracker of a day at the festival!
Our town was buzzing – live music, delicious cakes and excellent coffee, some wonderful outfits, meet ups with friends, bubbles in the park and, in the afternoon, two fascinating talks.

Beautiful cloak in Cornish tartan
Bubble fun for the youngsters in St Rumon’s Gardens
Redruth Town Band with the yellow trombone
Bubble fun for the youngsters in St Rumon’s Gardens
Three Daft Monkeys
Busy Bond Street

The first talk, by Sharron Schwartz, was about the Cornish miners who went to work in Mexico and Wisconsin in the 1820s. Cornishman were experts in hard rock mining and their skills were called for all over the world. The other talk, by Dr Lesley Trotter, was about the women who were ‘left behind,’ The Married Widows of Cornwall.

 
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Posted by on September 12, 2026 in America, community, Cornwall, embroidery, festival, History, Postaday 2026, Redruth, Tin mining history

 

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Flowers, Cathedral and Lucy Worsley

04 Sep

This evening we went to the Hall for Cornwall in Truro to listen to Lucy Worsley, historian. She was very entertaining. On the way we appreciated the gorgous flower displays and the view of the cathedral.

 
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Posted by on September 4, 2026 in Cornwall, environment, Hall for Cornwall, History, nature, Postaday 2026, Truro, Uncategorized

 

Another Feather, Metalwork and Flowers

19 Aug

We parked for Truro halfway up Chapel Hill this afternoon and walked into the city, a route I took many, many times as a youngster when we lived on the hill.
We passed a feather, caught in a hedge of Escallonia, spotted the name of our town, Redruth, on a short drain runway across the pavement and finally, the house we lived in, where there were flowers for sale with a piggy bank for the honesty payments.

 
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Posted by on August 19, 2026 in Cornwall, environment, family history, nature, Postaday 2026, Truro, Uncategorized

 

Sunflower, Butterfly and Plaque

21 Jul

At Roots today, a sunflower opening its petals

We’ve seen few butterflies at home this year so it was especially good to see a Painted Lady at Roots today.

I took the following photo when in Penzance on July 9th and meant to show you on 11th, the anniversary of the wedding of Dylan Thomas and Caitlin Macnamara in the house opposite the Acorn Theatre in Penzance.

 
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Posted by on July 21, 2026 in butterflies, community, Cornwall, environment, flowers, History, nature, Postaday 2026, Uncategorized

 

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My Mum, Precious Words and Deeds

04 Jun

My lovely Mum died on this day in 1994 and  I still want to tell her stuff that excites me or that I need her wisdom on. That  doesn’t go away. She was a very special person and supported me every way  in everything I did.

Regular readers will have seen this photo before, a favourite taken at Carn Brea Castle on the occasion of Mum and Dad’s Golden Wedding celebration in 1989

I have been going through some treasures and found some letters from Mum, all relating to her care of me while becoming a mum myself.
A story for you – Very early in my third pregnancy , I knew that I was expecting twins. I had wanted to have twins since I was 9 years old! My GP told me I was being silly and that he would tell me if/ when this was so. My lovely parents believed me and bought us ‘multiple birth’ insurance at 8 weeks and the GP wrote a letter to the insurance company saying that he was sure it was a single birth.
Roll on eight months or so to September 9th 1977 and the doubting GP sent me to see the consultant at the hospital. She listened to me, sent me for an x-ray and there they were, arms and legs everywhere! Before taking the plates back to her, I phoned my lovely Mr S and my Mum to share my utter delight. What follows is the letter from my Mum that came the next day:

Letter dated 9/9/1977

Just a week later, our twins arrived on 16th and 17th September, and so did my Mum to help look after our other two, 4 and nearly 2 years old, while I was in hospital and then three more weeks to help – but that is another story.

 
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Posted by on June 4, 2026 in family, family history, friendship, Happiness, Kindness, Postaday 2026, Uncategorized

 

Quirky Bits in Amsterdam

21 May

There were shops all over Amsterdam selling plastic ducks. After passing several , I went in to one to ask ‘Why?” It seems they are simply a retail opportunity to attract tourists!

One of the Duck shops

Information re ducks

I loved the decoration outside a shop selling children’s clothes, the decoration comprising of painted bicycle parts and enormous knitted strawberries!

On the corner of the street near our hotel, Roemers Hotel, was a house beautifully decorated with blue and white tiles near the top of the building. Lower down was a plaque to Maria Tesselschade Roemers Visscher. She is described by her friends mentioned below as  “attractive, musically talented, and a skilled translator and commentator from French and Italian.They also praised her skill at singing, painting, carving, glass engraving and tapestry work.” From Wikipedia.  

Here’s a translation for you:

If Tesselschade is unfamiliar to you, then you may know
That she was a friend of Roemer Visscher,

That she sat in the circle of singers
And with her stylus wrote wittily on the glass
And if you wish to find more merit and gifts
Speak to Huygens, Hooft and Vondel, her friends

PIETER HUISINGA BAKKER
Maria Tesselschade Roemers Visscher 1594 – 1649 poet

 
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Posted by on May 21, 2026 in art, craft, History, knitting, Netherlands, poetry, Postaday 2026, travel

 

Street Art, Sculptures and Statues

20 May

We came across lots of interesting structures around Amsterdam.

Against the Tide by Rini Hurkmans  is a memorial sculpture honouring murdered Dutch journalist Peter R. de Vries who was shot on July 6, 2021, and died on July 15, 2021.

 

It’s worth reading this, if a bit of a struggle.

In the gardens of Begijnhof
One of the lizards in a grassy patch by the street
Loved the goblin
Loved these two on the roof of a club
In silhouette

Gerardus Vossius and Caspar Barlaeus were pioneering Dutch scholars and the founding fathers of the University of Amsterdam. In 1632, they opened the Athenaeum Illustre, a city-sponsored academy that challenged Leiden’s academic monopoly and eventually evolved into the modern university I found this in a hidded garden off the book alley I told you about a couple of days ago.

We went to Amsterdam with our friends A&K and just had to find A’s Great Grandfather, Ferdinand Domela Nieuwenhuis, 31 December 1846 – 18 November 1919) who was a Dutch socialist politician and later a social anarchist and anti-militarist.  Just learned that we share a birthday!

A translation of the plaque:  Ferdinand Domela Nieuwenhuis  sculpture represents the rise of the labor movement in the 19th century. Prometheus is depicted in the relief. This Greek hero stole fire from heaven and gave it to mankind. In earlier designs, Polet had placed the Greek myth at the center, with a subordinate position for Domela. Only in a third design did Polet allow himself to be guided by the form of a statue on a pedestal. In his time, Polet was an important exponent of Expressionism within Dutch sculpture. Artist Johan Polet 1931

 
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Posted by on May 20, 2026 in Amsterdam, art, family history, Netherlands, Postaday 2026, travel

 

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