Springtime for Grandmas

On Easter Sunday we ate the almost traditional lamb roast and the glorious mixture of lemon, orange, eggs and sugar that Mum had combined to make a fluffy pudding. Then we set off for a place I had tucked away in my memory as a suitable Nice Under Glass destination.

It was indeed, 'nice under glass' as Mum and Peggy tucked themselves into the Honda with walking sticks, tins, handbags, magazines and the small Easter gifts we had exchanged. The sun shone hard and we all remarked (several times) (per minute) how the weather had at also changed and the spring had definitely arrived. 

Our conversation alternated between how awful the weather had been in the recent past, evidenced by the lack of visible green buds on the trees and how mild it had been evidenced by the profusion of flowers. This type of conversation where they directly contradict themselves is not unusual: it is not the content of what they say that matters to them only merely that they are saying something. That something is acceptable so long as it had has a vague context to the immediate circumstances and that it is polite. Such is their way. Thus, a pleasant half hour passed while we negotiated the roads to avoid the A483 roadwork at Rough Hill at Chester and got into to the A51 towards Delamere.

Springtime at last!

I may (I hope gently) mock their delight at the wonderful spring sunshine, but I wonder if to them spring has a special significance? Winter with all its threats of ice, dropping temperatures and flu has passed and they have got through it without breaking a hip, getting a chest infection or ending up in hospital. It is well known that many elderly people meet their maker during the winter months and so spring with its herald of birdsong is perhaps reminder that they have triumphed again. 

Turning left past Delamere onto the A5152 to Frodsham took us through the forest road, busy and packed with picnickers and walkers. But the forest was for another day and instead we carried onto to reach The Lady Heyes Craft Centre .

This is a delightful venue packed with antique and curio shops, craft centre, and even a brewery, oh

Who knows what you might find
at Lady Heyes?

yes and and a campsite too...... The original Lady Heyes Farm dates back several hundred years. It is believed that in the 1800s it was used as a watering hole for the local gentry. No longer a working farm, it now comprises a complex of individual buildings providing over 15,000 sq. ft.to sell a whole range of products and services. The sewing centre also runs an intriguing array of craft classes.

We were not tempted by the beer at the brewery, inviting though it looked, and stuck to our tea provided by the café with chip shop attached (well, it is a campsite). We sat outside in the sunshine drinking a good pot of strong tea at £1.40 a cup. Just as good as beer to drink to the incoming new season. Cheers!




 

Iron Ladies

Mother's Day March 15th 2015 and my phone is buzzing with loving messages from my own offspring as I prepare a special Sunday Lunch with our Mums. Mother's Day lunch is an M&S feast of roast beef and sticky toffee pudding followed by the giving of gifts of framed photos of their families

Then we clambered on board the Honda and set off on another mystery tour. The weather was not even 'nice under glass' as gloom and cloud threatened rain, but despite this, the Mum & Peggy's conversation was in full flood. Peggy's about the latest happenings in Corrie and a convoluted explanation about complications with the collection of one of her umpteen prescriptions: Mum's about her TV telling her there was no signal, her shifts as a volunteer at Erddig Hall and how she has ordered more ready meals on the phone. Both of them chatting away quite happily on different planes….



Mum & Peggy enjoying their 'I never knew this was here!'
surprise outing....

As a treat for this special day our destination was a real gem - The British Ironworks Centre, Oswestry. I am sure that people pass this on their way to somewhere else (as it is on the very busy A5 leading to Shrewsbury and all routes south) and idly think that they will visit it someday, but never get around to it. Also they might think ‘Why would I want to visit an ironwork centre?’

But the first time you motor up the sweeping drive you are awed by the wings of massive iron eagles. Looking to your left you glimpse life sized metal animals of every description in the meadow and gazelles leaping over the fence. It is just wonderful and it is all free!

The centre provides metal work for home and garden and you can find unusual statues, benches, gazebos should you wish to buy. There is also a great showroom where you can buy anything from life sized figures to numbers for your garden gate - if it made if metal this is where you will find it. There is also a quirky little tea shop. Add to this specialist displays from onsite artists and a blacksmith and you have a very special way of losing a few hours.

Joy in the simple things.. a good cup of tea at
The British Ironworks café

I hope you will forgive the rather contrived title to today’s blog, but seeing the resilience of some of the figures sitting outside the Ironwork Centre I am reminded of them and I think it is somehow appropriate to describe my Mum & Peggy as Iron Ladies. They have lived through a war and often tell me how hard it was literally living with death and destruction and the very real fear that Hitler may be in charge very soon. The small daily hardships such as rationing which went on for many years after the war – how bananas and nylons were a luxury and a teaspoon of butter was your week’s ration. Peggy and Mum both agreed that the blackout was terrifying as you had to stumble your way through the dark if you were out at night.

They are now are waging their own battles with the challenges of aging, the loss of friends, the horrible ways that their bodies let them down, facing up to their twilight years. But spending an afternoon with them is not a gloomy experience, they face up to their lives with the fortitude and resilience they built up over those difficult years. They laugh as they realise how others see them old and decrepit – although they don’t feel it. They take joy in small things, cups of tea, a decent night on the telly and an afternoon out in good company – perhaps we should learn from them.

Abakhan & Peggy's Extraordinary Recall

This Sunday we set off for the Deeside Estuary to find a place which has a huge reputation amongst anyone who knits, sews or does any sort of crafting. In a former life, I was very involved in the Operation Christmas Child shoebox appeal and many of the volunteers who made goods for the shoeboxes loved this place and visited from all over the UK.

The Abakhan fabrics, hobbies and craft centre is the attraction of many coach parties and visitors from all the over the UK. It was started by the Abakhan family over thirty years ago and I remember it in my teens as a place where dressmakers flocked to as it sells some of its fabric by weight not length.

As well as a successful 'hobbyist' retail outlet it is also a site of considerable local historic interest, the company has taken great care to preserve the buildings resulting in the presentation of an award by children’s play area was added. With tea at £1.40 a cup it was a pleasing destination for us despite it being some years since my elderly companions have picked up a knitting needle.

It has to be said that the site – not too far from Saint Winifred’s Well (the fascinating story of which is for another post another time) is in a rather unlovely part of the coast, but I can’t help but admire the area’s determination to succeed. There is the Greenfield Heritage site, a regular Sunday Market and lots more on offer, despite the broken down buildings and the ugly hulk which has had so many set-backs that is ‘Fun Ship’ at Mostyn.

The drive home towards Chester is enlivened by the beauty of the estuary and the way that it has so

The Dee Estuary viewed from the A55 homewards
towards Chester

many colours embedded in its environs. Our conversation drifts and Peggy tells us about the happening in the lives of people she know and who she met that week.

I do greatly admire Peggy’s constant ability to remember people and their family connections. The other day she was sitting on a bus next to a middle-aged chap and passed the time of day. Then she said to him, “Are you Edna’s son?” and he looked at her in surprise and said that he was. Edna was someone she had known long ago and had actually recognised him as this woman’s son from over 50 years ago.

Sadly, apart from being a good way to make a bus journey go quickly, Peggy's talents go largely unnoticed and underused. She would have made a fantastic networker in today’s world and how she would have loved and taken advantage of LinkedIn, Friends Re-united and Face Book. But mostly we tend to ignore this tremendous flair she has for remembering all the people she has met in her life.

My husband, who has a very poor memory for faces and people, is always at a loss when she asks him if he remembers Rosemary who was in Primary School with him. Or tells us that the driver of the bus which took his brother Dave down to meet his cruise at Southampton was the nephew of Alan who used to be in school with him…..

Peggy, who seemingly remembers the
name of every person she has ever
met

Perhaps some of these connections will always remain buried only to be revived by people like Peggy who have no real way of recording them. Perhaps you suspect, as I do, the internet and digital media will somehow lose and swallow up our blogs and precious photographs.

Last week however, I saw a really good idea which goes a small way to solve the problem of lost family memories. Family Legacy Cards* are a way of encouraging people to write down their memories, family stories and history. They are printed on long-lasting - printed on special paper with a minimum longevity of 200 years. The cards have different themes and thought provoking front covers, intended to rouse different memories. Christmas sorted!

My lasting thought is that it is sad that are not more people like Peggy in the world as we may pass people in the street to whom we might have an interesting connection or to whom we are related and never even know about. I resolve to talk to people a bit more and stop being so insular, you never know I might discover a connection.....

 

*Disclaimer Disclosure: I have not been given any free goods to recommend this product nor have I any connection to the company.

Erddig's Place in a Child's Memories

....and the band played on...
Erddig's Apple Festival Oct 2014

The large country house and its surrounding estate, Erddig Hall served as a backdrop for many of us growing up in the town. My generation knew it when it was in a state of sad decline in the 1960s. This once grand house was cracked and literally falling down around the ears of its last owner, Philip Yorke. My impression had always been that he had a sad end to his life – living his days in one tiny back room with a black & white TV surrounded by the remnants of the former glory days of the house.

However, this was not the case, as the facts (unknown to me at the time) have emerged as I research this piece. Philip, as the last surviving Yorke, had actually started negotiations with the National Trust to hand it over to them in the 70s and, restored, it opened to the public in 1977 just a year before Philip died – so he lived to see the wonderful transformation begin. Now it is one of the jewels in the National Trust’s crown, illustrating perfectly the relationship between the servants and the family down the ages. It has a fascinating array of pictures, antique furniture and soft furnishings and extensive well-maintained gardens and grounds.

But as a child who lived nearby in the 1970s for me, it always felt like a somewhat hellish place. Rumours of the eerie ‘cup & saucer’ being haunted by a child who once drowned (untrue I think) there cowed my childish imagination, not helped by the muted banging which could sometimes be heard nearby. The river sometimes ran blood red. Add to this memories of a bloody afternoon when my middle sister, (always the one to get into scrapes) gashed her foot on glass in the river when we had trespassed there for a picnic.

But forward to the 1990s when Mum, newly widowed, became a room steward at Erddig. She has been a stalwart volunteer there twice a week ever since. Thus, she has an encyclopaedic knowledge

A display of the various apples grown
on the Erddig Estate

of the place and is always ready to take us there when we are short on anything to do. Even better, she knows she is valued and needed and at 92 that is a rare thing.

Erddig is a splendid place to take any elderly person on a Sunday afternoon. The grounds are perfect for an afternoon stroll and there are rare fruit trees and formal 18th Century Gardens of great historical importance. But you don’t need to have a knowledge of garden history to enjoy them as the NT puts on special days such as Teddy Bears Picnics, Christmas Fairs, walks and markets.

The first weekend in October is reserved for the Apple Festival, so for once, the suggestion for our ‘Nice Under Glass’ trip came from Mum and so we made our way along the long country lanes to get to the house which is just 2.5 miles the town centre. The band played and the unseasonable sun shone as people sat in deck chairs and queued for tea. The smell of the apples belied the sunshine with the promise of the Autumn to come.

As I looked up at Erddig's great façade I reflected how my feelings for the place have changed. As a child its very name gave me nightmares, but now thanks to the stories of a happy and wonderful place that my Mum regales us with every week and the knowledge that it has given her a reason to live…. well, I have real reason to be grateful to it and I expect the many thousands of visitors would agree for reasons of their own.

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Loggerheads and King Arthur’s Unlikely Leap

I am aware that my last few posts have been wandering off the primary objective of the blog - to give people ideas about places to take the elderly for a short afternoon out. So this week I will redress the balance and ask you to take one of the many roads out of Wrexham towards Mold and thence the A494 towards Ruthin.

On a day like today, we bask in the smugness that only a sunny day in mid-September can bring. We talk about the strength of the sun and the pleasantness of riding through the countryside. It is indeed, 'nice under glass' as we are warmed through the glass of the car by the sun giving its last display before autumn must surely take hold.

We pass the standing stone that is known as Carreg Carn March Arthur - The Stone of Arthur’s hoof. Like many areas in the UK, Wales has associations with the ubiquitous King Arthur. The stone is said to bear the hoof print of King Arthur's horse as he leapt from a nearby cliff to escape the invading Saxons. Although my preferred version – the best legends always have to have a magical quality about them – is that the horse leapt from the adjacent Moel Famau mountain to thus mark the old Flintshire/Denbighshire boundary - presumably without breaking its neck.

As we come in sight of the mighty Moel Famau with its iconic Jubilee Tower on the top, we turn right into Loggerheads Country Park. Mum tells me that Loggerheads used to be run by the old Crosville bus company who bought it in the 1920s to run bus tours from Liverpool. They handed it over in the 1970s and now it is run by Clwyd CC. It has a real draw for walkers of all abilities as Loggerheads is the starting point for walks which explore the rolling gentle hills of Clwydian Range. There are many times when I have dragged myself there footsore, weary and happy having completed another 6 miler.

Lovely flat, even walk through the trees.

Our time of arrival was 3.30pm when many walkers were ending their walks with a visit to the centre. It has a good car park but we were still quite lucky to find a spot. As well as walkers, there were families with small children, buggies, babies and dogs playing on the grass with no thought of walking anywhere.

The site is beautifully maintained site at the base of imposing limestone cliffs. It has a lovely and mercifully flat, walk through the river valley under dappling trees.

There is the occasional bench on which we sit and watch the parade of dogs, children and all forms of life in between as they debate how far to go before turning back for an ice-cream or cake at Caffi Florence. We strolled for about 30 minutes before we went in search of refreshment.
We sat outside with our tea to take advantage of the sun I would like to say that we shared our thoughts about King Arthur and more on his legends, but we didn’t. But we did decide that Caffi Florence served up the best cup of tea we had had in a long time….

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The Sad Story of Uncle Frank and Tea at The Plassey

Last day of summer  - Sunday 31st August 2014

The further our 92 year old Mum gets from her childhood, the more she seems to retreat back to its memories. Over our Sunday roast chicken this week, she brought up (in the random way that memory does) the sad story of Uncle Frank. She and my mum in law Peggy’s stories often go back to Wrexham in the early 1930s when their respective families knew each other.



Nana & Pop - hard working business people
who lived to make money
 

Mum was the youngest of 8 children of staunch, cold and teetotal Roman Catholic parents (pictured) whose only focus (apart from having too many children) was their fish, fruit & veg business. My only memories of them are the smell of Pop's tobacco mingled with the smell of fish and a complete lack of physical contact or regard from either of them for me as a small child.

Of her 2 brothers, Frank was Mum's favourite by far. He was very popular and well-liked by everyone he met. Despite an early aspiration to go into the priesthood, he ended up running the transport for his father's business. Frank was fit, strong and handsome and played for a local football team. Peggy too remembers Frank as someone special – the unspoken implication was always that Frank was the direct antithesis of his parents and he was that way despite, not because of, his parentage.

Although he attracted the attention of many local girls, Frank remained unmarried, until at 31 he at last met a girl and told my Mum that he planned to marry her. But then he cut himself shaving, contracted septicaemia and died in Wrexham War Memorial Hospital all within a few days. Legend has it that the streets of Wrexham were lined with mourners such was the shock of his sudden death and his huge popularity.

In the great scheme of things (especially during the war that followed a few years later) there are probably many more terrible stories to tell, but every tragedy of loss is no less terrible simply because others exist. All deaths (ones like this so very common in those days before anti-biotics) still mar and strike at the heart of a family life and remain there forever with repercussions throughout the following years impacting the following generations.

On Sunday, with this sad tale still ringing in our ears, we set off along the country roads on the North East side of town, turning right to the Crewe-by-Farndon road through Worthenbury and turning right towards Bangor On Dee.  Despite this, on a sunny day such as this with the green lanes surrendering their late summer wares of butterflies, birds with bounding flight and brightly coloured petals, the ride was pleasant and enjoyable with roads free from traffic. I idly wondered whether Uncle Frank ever took his lorry along these lanes on his day off with his new love and how little and how much has changed since then.

Our final destination today was The Plassey. Uncle Frank might have driven past it and seen its


Still smiling - outside the new children's
playground at The Plassey Leisure Complex

Edwardian glory, or perhaps it was one of the places on his deliveries list? A former farm set around a striking large red brick Edwardian house, it has successfully made the transition to another business entirely - a 5 star leisure complex complete with pool, shopping arcade and much more. As well as an a la carte restaurant (imaginatively converted from the old shippon) there is a small snack bar where we had our refreshing cups of tea.

A small silence ensued and I reflected that although Frank’s sudden demise was sad, at least he did not end up old and frail with few friends and only memories of loved siblings for comfort - he will be forever young. I resolve once again to treat Mum’s memories with respect as she relates her past. It’s the least we can do for the older generation.