Tag Archives: Family

Tall, taller, tallest…

How many of you get that patronising pat on the head from your kids as they overtake you in the height stakes?

Bekah shot past me a couple of years ago and I finally had to concede to Dan today. I am now the shortest in my family bar one, little Caitlin…

Now I’m not exceptionally short, I’m 5’5″ and always been happy with it, still am…but my children are all going to be taller than me!

Bekah hopes she’s peaked at 5’9″ and we’re waiting to see if, or maybe when, Dan catches up with Vince and his older sister. Bekah shot up at 15 and 16 and Dan’s following in the same fashion. Caitlin is keen to be taller and her time will come…

Vince was chatting about height recently and discovered an interesting theory…

Apparently…if you take the height of a child when they are two-years-old and double it, you’ll have their eventual grown-up height…

Fascinating…and how could you not check that out? So I dug out the childrens’ records and a tape measure.

I ran my finger down my handwritten height records and noted that Rebekah was 87cm at two-years-old…double that and she should be 174cm. So the tape measure unrolled and guess what, dead on 5’9″.

Quickly we checked Dan, 91cm which meant he should reach 182cm (5′ 11¾”) just short of six foot.
Caitlin measured 86cm when she was two, so ultimately she should grow to 172cm, one inch less than Bekah at 5’8″. As a result of this Bekah should now have reached her final height…which she would be pleased about, and I can deduce that I should have been 82½cm at two years.

All in all it’s a thought-provoking theory…and one that will prove or disprove itself over time, but sounds like a pretty good guide to me!

Rebekah 1995 Daniel 1997 Caitlin 2002

So these cute little two-year-olds above will all grow-up and tower above their mother!

‘For a tree to become tall it must grow

tough roots among the rocks.’

(Friedrich Nietzsche)

(Please do not copy or use these photographs)

Loving Hands…

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I love hands for many reasons…creativity, the ability to hold things, expressiveness. Hands can have a calming influence, think massage and caresses…they can protect, and they are mechanically amazing!

I loved drawing my hands when I was doing my GCSE’s…(not so keen on drawing my feet though!)

My father has big, strong hands…hands that made me feel safe no matter what. In fact, it was straight into his hands that I was delivered as a newborn baby…

When I was a child I loved slipping my hand into his and feeling his fingers close around mine with warmth and security. His hands, though calloused and scratched at times, were always soft and smooth and comforting. It was his hands that blessed me when I was sick, held mine while I cried and taught me the principles that I should live by. I loved that his hands always held my mother’s.

When I first met Vince, I shook his hand, a month later that hand took mine and led me onto the dance floor, from that moment I didn’t want to let go…

The strength of his hands and forearms are the most attractive part of a man to me…
I love being held, and hand-holding is a universal way of showing affection. When two people walk side by side and their hands search for each other and take hold, don’t let go of the feeling that ensues…that rush of love and closeness…

If you ever get lonely,

look at the spaces between your

fingers and remind yourself

that mine fit in there perfectly.

My husband’s hands are like my father’s, large and firm… I smile when our fingers touch and when his hand holds mine I feel as though I am where I belong. His hands hold mine when I need comfort and assurance, they help me when I’m burdened, they guide me when I need it and catch me when I fall.

More than that they do the same for our children…

The most beautiful thing in the world is to watch your child walk hand in hand with their father…

Photograph: Two Hands by Lisa Shambrook (Please do not use without permission)

I hope my girls seek out a man with strong hands, hands that work hard, that comfort, that teach and love…

My son is a hand-holder, an affectionate young man, with hands that are growing and learning. I love holding his hand and take pride that he is not ashamed to do so! I love watching my son grow…his hands are no longer the hands of a boy, but have an assuredness and firmness of a young man. Hands that I know will cherish and love in the future…hands that will hold newborns, hands that will bless his family, hands that will teach and lift and inspire…

I love hands…

All Together Now…

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I love having my photo taken and it’s accompanied me into my adult life…not so much the vanity of photos of me, but photographs of my family.

I’m a perfectionist, so family shoots, taken with a tripod at home, have sometimes been somewhat stressful, but I love documenting our family and growth!

I have many, many family group photos to choose from to document my own family over the years. Check out our latest offerings: Steampunk and Post-Apocalyptic…

Now, my Dad was a photographer, and I loved the shots he got of me when I dragged him out to accommodate my teenage posing…but I am surprised that we don’t have many family group photographs from my childhood. Not always easy, I understand, as there were 15 years between youngest and oldest, so to get all four of us together probably wasn’t easy over the years…so I searched to see what I had…

This is the earliest I have, Dave, Mark, Jules and I, back in 1983 when Jules was almost 7, Dave was 11, Mark was 22 and I was 12.

Then three years later in 1986, recreating the pose…

And 1989, another three years later and I’m eighteen…

The next time together was for my wedding in 1991…

Seven years later Mark came over from Switzerland, I came down from Wales and we all met up back in Brighton…1998

Another big gap of thirteen years and we have all just got together again just this month, August 2011…

So there we are my siblings and I over the years…

When it comes to complete family pictures it’s the same story…I can only find two with all of us and my parents and a twenty year gap between each photograph…my wedding and this month…

The family is one of nature’s masterpieces.

Families are like fudge –

mostly sweet with a few nuts…

…and that says it all…

A Decade of Growing Up…

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Sometimes it’s hard to imagine your children ever growing up…then, all of a sudden they’ve gone and done it…

I’ve noticed my older two maturing, it’s hard to miss when one towers over you and the other measures himself against you almost daily – ready to point out that he is taller than you – the very moment he is, he’s not yet, I’ve still got a few millimetres on him…but today it was the turn of my youngest. It was time for me to stand back and allow her her own decisions.

I’m a control freak…hard to imagine, but no really, I am…and my ‘control freakiness’ has sometimes got in the way of my children’s freedom to choose.
There’s been the odd Christmas, over the years, when my choice of present for a child seemed much better than the scribbled choice on their list…I bought my choice, then couldn’t understand when it didn’t get played with as much as I’d imagined it would! I learned that one the hard way and bought their choices after that, better value, even if I didn’t like it!

Today Caitlin and I were going through her wardrobe, chucking out clothes that are now too small, when she picked up one top and said, ‘You know I’m never going to wear this don’t you?’ I gave a sideways smile, and replied, ‘But I really like it.’ ‘That’s the point,’ she said, ‘you like it, but it’s not me.’
This happened several more times, with a dress and with a pair of boots. The boots were difficult. I bought cute Clarks, black leather ankle boots in a charity shop for only £2…a bargain! They were a couple of sizes too big when I bought them a few years ago and I put them away for Cait when she got older. It didn’t bother me that she disliked them on sight when she was eight…she’d appreciate them one day…
So every year or two I got them out and said, ‘Try these on…they’re lovely…’ and with a grimace and humouring Mum she’d try them on. ‘Ok, maybe next year.’ I’d tell her ignoring the unhappy expression on her face…after all, they were Clarks, and leather and only £2…
Today, I tried again…but though she tried them on and they fitted, I think they’ve fit for a while…it dawned on me that they weren’t the bargain I’d thought they were…
I asked myself how I would feel if I was coerced into wearing something that wasn’t me, or even that I just didn’t like…and I realised that Caitlin was completely able to choose for herself.
The boots went into a charity bag…and maybe they’ll be someone else’s bargain…

I noticed as my daughter tried on clothes and chatted away that she wasn’t my ‘little’ girl anymore, she was a burgeoning rosebud, blossoming into something more than even she can imagine…and it’s about time I noticed!

My children are becoming themselves…

In the ten years from 2001 to 2011 Caitlin, Dan and Bekah have grown up, Caitlin from one to eleven, Dan from five to fifteen and Bekah from eight to eighteen…

I love watching them grow…I love watching them change, I love hearing their opinions develop and evolve, I gain pleasure from the knowledge they collect and from the wisdom they share, I learn from them, I love watching the adult form within them…

I love them and love the way they love me back…

(Please do not use or reproduce any photographs of my children)

Christmas Snow…

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Snow at Christmas…hasn’t happened for years here in West Wales, but this year we got to enjoy my favourite holiday season with lots of the white stuff!
Roxy loved it, racing and ploughing through it and skating on the ice…
This is the best time of the year!
I love spending time with my family, enjoying the extended holidays from school (last Christmas the children had two extra weeks off school due to snow and this year a good selection of days across December due to early snow!), decorating the tree, the baking…and the giving.
This year we made a big Christmas pudding and four small ones, the mini ones were delivered to our neighbours and some of our favourite people on Christmas Eve.
Vince has two weeks off work and I love the uninterrupted bliss as a family…late nights and late mornings, Christmas films, snowy walks, chocolates and the appreciation of Christmas gifts.
This year the boys went tech mad, X-Box 360 for Dan and a much longed for ipad for Vince…we wouldn’t see alot of them over the next few days! Us girls went a bit Pandora mad…the beads are pretty addictive, and very expensive if you go the official route! So we cheated and went the fairly inexpensive ebay route! Got the most beautiful beads to make up our own, very individual bracelets and necklaces… We were all very happy with our Christmas gifts!
So, now here we are…enjoying an excess of chocolates, roast dinners, lovely desserts…(namely roulades, profiteroles, cheesecakes and trifles), pretty decorations and time together…which is, after all, the most important thing to do during this magical season…

‘And she brought forth her firstborn son, and wrapped him in swaddling clothes, and laid him in a manger…’ (Luke 2:7)

‘I still get wildly enthusiastic about little things… I play with leaves. I skip down the street and run against the wind.’ (Leo Buscaglia)

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Back in 2005 I wrote a list of 60 things I wanted to do… I’m a ‘list writer’ and with all good intentions I wanted to see how much I could do and tick off… The list included things such as: learn sign language, paint a dragon, eat a box of chocs on my own, spend an entire day just listening to my favourite music, sleep outside, fly in a helicopter, build a big sandcastle, kick autum leaves, bike ride, build a snowman, get soaked standing in heavy rain, get pampered, fly in an aeroplane, write a letter to myself to be opened in ten years, take a maths GCSE, parachute, and much more… looking back, that year I ticked of seven things, and that did not include a maths GCSE…there are much more exciting things to do in life than maths!

‘List’ people are generally not spontaneous people… I overthink everything, but last year I learned about spontanaeity!

I think the first thing was getting a dog! Vince always wanted one, but weighing up the pros and cons was my speciality and the cons would almost certainly outweigh the pros. Then Delia, who owns Roxy’s sister Sheba, offered us Roxy… and would you be able to say no to something that looked so cute and cuddly?

So in a very unusual move I said ‘yes’ and we became Roxy’s proud owners!

It snowballed from there… during Bekah’s study leave in early sum

mer we dropped off the younger children at school and drove out, on a whim, to Aberieddy, to the Blue Lagoon. 300ft of water and the feeling of swimming and diving into this quarry pool was unbelievable and totally life affirming!

After that we took a helicopter ride over Carmarthen, arranged by Vince. I went on two youth camps, in the rain… and we planned a mystery day out for the children. Edinburgh for the day! The children’s first plane trip, and an amazing experience!

But anything can be fun and create an experience, a memory… we got caught by the tide on Llansteffan beach and had to wade through the incoming sea to safety, well, our wellies were waterproof, they didn’t leak out once they were filled with sea water!

We queued for Five hours to see a Banksy exhibit at Bristol Museum… five hours in a crowded queue with three children, you

either bond or you end up wanting to strangle each other, thankfully it was the former this time!

So there are still things I want to do: parachute jump, sleep beneath the stars, eat a box of chocs on my own, build a huge sandcastle… and the message is to do it… don’t wait for the right time, the dog I put off for years is my constant companion, and she has opened up so much for our family, fun walks in the snow, autumn leaves, sand etc…

After all, life is meant to be fun…and I’m planning some more spontanaeity!

‘Life should not be a journey to the grave with the intention

of arriving safely in an attractive and well preserved body,

but rather to skid in sideways, chocolate in one hand,

wine in the other, body thoroughly used up,

totally worn out and screaming

WOO HOO! What a ride!!’

(anon)

I find ecstasy in living; the mere sense of living is joy enough. (Emily Dickinson)

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I’ve often wondered what brings real happiness… after all a couple just won £56million on the National Lottery, would that bring me happiness? Erm…probably! Yet I don’t have a fraction of that and I’m happy.

There’s no doubt that a million or two would contribute to my happiness, but money won’t be my ultimate path to happiness!

‘All you need is Love’… maybe, but not necessarily that recently celebrated Valentine love…it does help to have a soul mate and a friend, but the love I’m talking about is the love you have for yourself.

‘ To love oneself is the beginning

of a lifelong romance’

(Oscar Wilde)

I turned from a quiet and shy schoolgirl, into a teenager caught within a cage of responsibility, desperately trying to assert and rebel, to a young woman finding love and needing acceptance, but I had no idea who I was… I had become a wife and a mother, but who was I?

Are we ever truly happy with who we are? Seven years ago I extricated myself from a breakdown and set about discovering myself…

Back in 1989 I wrote: ‘I want to be everything everyone wants me to be, but I’m not sure I know how, I don’t even know how to be me…’ then in 2004 I began to exorcise my demons: ‘I wanted to be everything everyone wanted me to be, but I didn’t know how to be me, so I tore off my mask and ripped out my heart, and left my soul bare to bleed. I clenched my fists tight and screamed out loud, now I’m learning how to be me…’ It took another four or five years before I could close that chapter: ‘My heart is now open and clear to see, and I don’t feel the need to please. People can take me for what they want me to be, but I only need to be me. My heart can soar in a world of its own, and no one can stop me at all. For over the years there’s a lesson I’ve learned, and I know exactly how to be me.’

So what makes you happy? I think it’s knowing who you are and making the best of yourself and finding joy in what is around you…allow yourself the freedom of being who you are meant to be.

To me, that’s recognising your greatness within.

‘To be a star you must follow your own light,

follow your own path,

and never fear the darkness

for that is when the stars shine their brightest.’

(anon)

Happiness for me is…family, a walk in the snow with a loopy dog, throwing snowballs, laughing and being together…it is writing and losing myself in the story within my head…creating scrapbook pages full of memories…painting and drawing…knowing who I am in the great scheme of things…and sharing that love with those around me… and yes, I found myself. ♥