Well here it is another monday morning, and a beautiful Auckland morning with a hint of spring in the air.
We had a Mondayitis morning this morning and after us all losing our cool, I finally got three kids to school on time. When I dropped them off I went for a walk - it is so great I leave my car at school, plug myself into my ipod and then hit the pavement. We have a nice park down the road with a walking track that takes me about 8 minutes to do the circut - so I sometimes go down and pace round there several times or else I go for a walk down to the local wharf and then finish with a lap or so round the park.
I call it my mental health break. It is very meditative, I just have the music on and think, plan, daydream and enjoy the beautiful scenery. Though I didn't do that this morning as I was trying to catch up on some Podcasts - I am really enjoying the Muggle cast which is what I was listening to this morning. I only did a half hour walk because I have got a list of things to do as long as my arm!
So home it was and embarking on preparing for the final session of the class I am teaching tonight. I also have study to do and then onto working on a scrapbook album I am doing about my grandmother, which is my topic for today.
To fill you in on the background. I have until recent years had a very close relationship with my nana. She has always been a really important part of my family and of my life. Sadly she was diagnosed with alzheimers several years ago and we have watched her slowly lose her memory - she now doesn't know me at all.
A couple of weeks ago she became very sick and mum got the call that this was probably it..so her and my uncles spent a lot of the next two weeks sitting by her bedside and having some memorable time with her. Despite the alzheimers robbing her of recent memory, she comes and goes so she sometimes will remember her kids, which she was doing during that two week period.
Now my nana has had a hard life and she hasn't really enjoyed the latter part of it, but she is a tough cookie and a stubborn old thing (she's 84), so when the doctor told her she was dying she decided no she bloody wasn't and has made a recovery that was nothing short of a miracle! Having said that, she was up to hospital last night because she had a fall - so who knows. So mum and uncle are back to their usual visiting schedule as the "death watch" is temporarily over.
In the panic that Nana might be dying, it was decided by my dear family that I should make an album and a DVD about nana for her funeral. So photos were hastily sorted, family stories written down and supplies purchased so I could make a start.
So here I was on Saturday sitting with mum going through the huge box of family photos that haven't made it into albums. A trip down memory lane from the 1920's to the present. My ancestors through to my kids. Wow.
We found photos and certificates. We laughed alot and enjoyed figuring out who was who and what year it was. The kids were excited to see their great grandparents and grandparents as young people. We laughed at the fashion changes throughout the years, from the very bleak and conservative 20's to the outrageous 80's! The cars, the hairstyles the fashion...how life changes.
So now I have a heap of photos, certificates and letters..... and a huge and daunting but exciting project. I feel huge responsibility scrapbooking the family history and all those old, precious photos.
I ended up looking through my own box of photos for a picture I knew was in there of nana, and ended up spending about an hour going back through my own little history. There were pictures of old boyfriends, some whose name I remember and some whose names I don't, there were sports events, parties, family christmasses, my mum in hotpants! And what was I thinking in the 80's - I never took myself to be a follower of fashion, but lets just say I'm not embracing the 80's retro! There were photos of loads of people I can't even remember yet who were important to me at the time, and photos of my DH as a young 15 year old boy (the way I still see him!). Talk about nostalgia - it was bittersweet! I guess that is part of getting older, the trips down memory lane take longer and a little more energy as you become old enough to have a life that is longer than your memory!
So here is a little tip remember for future generations, and your own memory, it is really important to label your photographs - people in them, the event, the date. Even the digital photos, if you are downloading them to disc don't forget to make sure that you are labelling them well so that you will know the details and the people in the photo.
Well that's my rant for this week. I think it is time for a cofee outside in the sunshine for 10 minutes before I embark on my study.
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