Portrait of my mother.

Saturday 1491 – 31st Dec 2011 – New Years Eve

I did some visiting today. I hadn’t seen my mum over the festive period because, as you know, I was away in Venice at Christmas  . Mum lives 3 1/2  – 4 hrs away so I don’t go too often. She is 85 now and was born the same year as the Queen, but I’d say she’s had a somewhat harder life having been widowed in her mid 40’s, when I was 17.

She has never had brilliant eyesight but this is now fading rapidly: an enormous source of sadness as she has always loved to paint and do needlework.   She has to use a magnifying glass to read now and has all but given up painting.

She had very good hands and nails (still has) which was always surprising because she worked in kitchens for a big part of her working life. She has washed more dishes and saucepans than most of us could imagine.

Each year, up to the age of 10, my mum made my 2 children birthday cards out of cloth. They were much looked forward to and somewhere in the design she always managed to make a little suitcase/pot/ boulder/barrel or some such into which she would place chocolate money or sweets.

In homage to my mother’s talent I have photographed 4 of my favourites – 2 of my son’s and 2 of my daughters. ( It was going to be just 2 but it was very hard to choose)  

1st 2 of Katy’s – Paddington Bear for her 8th

                    

and Eygpt for her 10th

Then 2 of Steven’s – Arctic one for his 8th

and Captain Pugwash for his 6th

Treasured possessions which my children will get eventually 🙂

Ps added later – I should mention that my children are now 31 and 27!

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Spent some good time with my friend Kay today too and also with the lovely Lisa and her husband Darren…a big thank you to Darren for helping me choose a tripod… so watch out for crisper images. What Darren doesn’t know about camera equipment isn’t worth knowing and he becomes wonderfully animated when he talks about it.  😀

That’s all for now. Happy New Year from the Saturday girl…see you next week

Ps  If you haven’t already, take a look at my photography blog –  Helen’s Photomania Blog