Beautiful Girls (and don't they grow up quickly?)

I'm just back from a day visiting my 2 beautiful stepdaughters in Hastings. I may not have a husband any more, but I sure as hell hung onto those girls....

Every time I go down to see them, I spend the drive back to London feeling all warm and fuzzy. I don't see them as often as I would like (shift work, boyfriends, social life etc), but thanks to Facebook, texts and phone, I generally manage to keep up on their goings on. More or less.  Or as much as they will admit to me.

(Never mind - I was 19/20 once too you know...)

Watching these kids grow up is an experience.  Seeing their wins as well as their mistakes and fumbles - and we all had them at their age. One has found her path for now, the other is still struggling to find hers.  I can only love and support them (and provide a bit of intellectual rigour) through their choices. A distant step-mum makes quite a good sounding board, we've discovered.

Anyway - God Bless'em. You've got to love them. C and E - big up to you....

Remembrance Day

On Remembrance Day I think of my Great Auntie Margaret, a VAD (or volunteer nurses aid) who left the farm in rural Kaiparoro** NZ, to sail for the Middle East during WW2. My mother was very young when her auntie left, but remembers waving her off from the Eketahuna railway station.  And her auntie wrote to her family on the farm regularly and sent her presents bought in the souks. The stuffed toy camel was thrown away as it was very smelly and filled with reeking camel hair, but I have one of those presents today - a gold bracelet shaped like a snake, with inlaid gems on its head.

Her journey from a green and fertile patch tucked under the Tararua Ranges, across the world to the relentless heat and dust of a hospital camp near the Suez Canal in Egypt touches me. And a tragic truck accident, while on the way back to the hospital after manning the soldiers canteen one evening, killed her and 3 friends. They were buried in a grave at the Moascar Cemetary, far from home... It is described in more detail here:

 Margaret McAnulty was from a prominent early Kaiparoro family and had been a member of the New Zealand Women's Army Auxiliary Corps (WAAC). In 1941 women's auxiliary service groups began to be established based on male military models, and for the first time 'New Zealanders were confronted with the sight of women in military uniforms.' These women worked mainly as medical support staff, clerical workers, or in the servicemen's clubs in Egypt and Italy. McAnulty spent much of her time posted in the Suez Canal region in Egypt and was killed, along with three colleagues, when her transport vehicle was hit by another vehicle. She is one of only approximately ten WAAC members who were killed during World War Two.

Service Number:	72117
Rank:	Private
Regiment:	New Zealand Women's Army Auxiliary Corps
Cemetery:	MOASCAR WAR CEMETERY, Egypt
Grave Reference:	4. D. 17.

**Kaiparoro was a loud and violent wind from the ranges, that was followed by heavy rain which usually caused flooding in the Kaiparoro and Rongokokako area. Kai = eat, paroro = the wind."Ka hu te paroro, paroro kuri, ka kai, ka waipuke te whenua."
"The howling dog of paroro that eats the land, when you hear the howling dog move to high ground, paroro is hungry."

A big knees up..

I have been organising an event for a local charity.  Basically gaining support from locals and businesses and hopefully a bit of fundraising along the way.  However, the event has grown, from 60 to 140 people. Argh.  Quite a lot of work then. A challenge to my event management skills in fact. 

As well as the talking, wheedling and persuading that I am going to be doing on the night, I am also running the catering side of things. Today I will start juggling shopping lists and doing some advance food prep.  Have already spent a couple of days designing registration forms, hand outs and membership certificates.

But am sure it will all go well.  We have a very impressive venue - the Wandsworth Town Hall. We've done a couple of recces down there already and we have bags of space...

So fingers crossed for Thursday.  And keeping my head down for a busy week in the lead up.