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Category Archives: family history

My Mum, Precious Words and Deeds

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.

 

Street Art, Sculptures and Statues

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.

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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Porcelain, Dumbbells and A Word

I have two beautiful little porcelain boxes. They were given to my parents on their Ruby wedding anniversary by the man who was their Best Man and who became my Godfather, Maurice Oldfield. These little boxes became mine in due course and I love them.

In November last year I joined an online exercise class designed for women over 60 and I am loving it! Feeling stronger and fitter and far less arthritic pain. We have just graduated from using cans of beans as weights to little dumbbells weighing twice as much and mine arrived in the post today!

We have rain again today, a soft mizzle and I turned to my beautiful book , Ninety-Nine Words for Rain and this one describes today’s drizzly stuff. I just wish I knew how to say these lovely words.

 

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Kite, Candle Snuffer and Chocolates

We’ve been sorting out lots of the toys kept for LiveWires and have been deciding where they are all to go now everyone has grown out of them. The kite has been claimed by our son for his twins, LiveWires 5 and 6. It came to us many years ago from family in America and was much loved and well used. I even have the original instructions that came to us in about 1983, such an unusual personalised present that the kids all loved and which gave the whole family lots of fun.

Our old silver candle snuffer is being used every day when the advent candle has burned the day’s date away.

We have an advent calendar that gives us two little truffles each day – a calendar for couples!

P.S. The big storm that is battering Cornwall and much of the UK today has been named Bram.  In Cornish, Bram  means ‘fart’ which has amused many of us as we hear the howling winds.

 

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A Lane, A Name and The Bench

After going to the garden centre to buy hyacinth bulbs, we came home the long way round, going down the very narrow lane, Sunny Corner,  where my Mum and Dad used to live in Cusgarne.

We went past their house, still named for the many chimney pots they had collected and which Mum used as planters. We have some now as do two of our daughters.

The bench we put in place to remember both of my parents is just a little further on. It pleased me greatly to see rings on the armrests where people on their walks have rested with their flasks. I especially wanted wide arm-rests for that very purpose.

 

On This Day……

On this day in 1937, two young students’ eyes met across a crowded cafeteria at Manchester University as my Mum noted in her diary. She was doing a special qualification in the teaching of deaf children and Dad was, that year, President of the Student Union and her diary records their meeting almost every day for months. They married on September 2nd 1939 and their four children had 12 children between them who have gone on to have another four, That’s twenty humans on this planet as a result of that chance meeting – love at first sight! The diary is, of course, a family treasure.

 
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Posted by on November 19, 2025 in family, family history, Postaday2025

 

Buttons, Knitting and Some Advice

I found both the patience and the time this afternoon to sew up another of the little jackets I am knitting for babies in Ukraine. I have three more knitted and all in pieces but so dislike sewing up that they’ve been waiting a while.  Happily the truck going to Ukraine isn’t going for a while.  I am using the mother-of-pearl buttons that were my Grandfather’s sample ones when he was a button salesman in the 1920s so they are 100 years old! It gives me enormous pleasure to handle them, to sew them on and to make every little jacket extra special.

Note to self from Sallie G – she’s right!

 

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Kindness Calendar, Coincidences and Sweetcorn

From Action for Happiness: “In a world that feels divided, kindness is a quiet but powerful act of hope. Whether you’re supporting a friend, helping a stranger, or simply listening with care, your actions matter. Every kind choice makes a difference.”

We went today to have the staples removed from my lovely Mr S’s new knee and had really interesting conversations with the two nurses who looked after him. They asked where we lived and when we said where, the older one said she’d been to St Euny Church just near us, to see a wonderful production in the churchyard in 2017.  That was our Until the Day Break! She said she absolutely loved it and that now she views graveyards in a very different light and likes to think of the real stories behind each gravestone.  If the production is new to you Dear Reader, check it out on the red links here.

The second coincidence was that when we were asked where we used to teach and said Doncaster, the younger Nurse said her father had been to Uni there at the old School for the Deaf as he is profoundly deaf. My Mum trained at that school in the 1930s but even more coincidental was the fact that when a youngster, her dad was taught at the special unit for deaf children at Roskear School in Camborne and it was my Mum who set up the unit and who would have taught him!  Ellie, the nurse is going to ask him if he remembers Mrs Wiseman. One of her old pupils commented on my blog when I wrote about my Mum and her work here.

Our Sweetcorn is coming along well, flowers on almost every 5′ high plant and some tassels indicating a cob getting ready.

 

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A Story, A Beach and Two Homes

Once upon a time, a very long time when I was maybe eleven years old, I cycled from Truro to Perranporth, about 10 miles. Sadly, I hadn’t realised how hot it was, had forgotten to take water with me so stopped at a farmhouse on the way to ask, very nicely as I was a well brought up child, if I could please have a drink of water. “No, clear off! ” was the response and I have never forgotten that moment. Today it’s a smart looking place that looks rather like a hotel.We lived in and around Perranporth for several years and today was a bit of a memory-jogger. I loved the beach and still do.

One summer, when I was seven,  we lived in the ground floor flat of a lovely big house, one of the terrace at the top to the left of the picture.

Another summer, we spent in a caravan and a tent on the Liskey Hill campsite and I loved every moment.

 

International Women’s Day

The following are from my post for International Women’s Day 2021 with notes from today.

I have today as on each March 8th taken a little posy to our friend next door for her wedding anniversary and in memory of her lovely husband.

Toady, the Guardian has devoted their letters page to all women correspondents. This was my letter in 2021.

And, as ever, a call out to all the women in my life, to my daughters and LiveWires, to my friends both in person and my blogging pals and to those who help to make my life better – love to you all.