A Raised Eyebrow!

Here's my latest layout - of my Great Aunt Nellie, who died when she was 15 years old, we think from the effects of rheumatic fever. I've made this using the Time To Remember kit by Junianas Designs (and Junianas Flowers For You), both from DigiScrapShak. The vellum alphabet is by Miss Mint from Peppermint Creative, and the font is used is P22 Monet.

Anyway, I digress ... I'm having a bit of a raised eyebrow moment. I went off to have a look at our Tribalpages website to check on roughly when the photo was taken (as Grandma had written on the bottom of it that Nellie was 1 year and 9 months old), and as I looked at her entry, underneath that of her parents, it struck me ... my GreatGrandparents were married in May 1887, and Nell was born in October 1887. Shock Horror! I know these days that shotgun weddings are largely a thing of the past, and nobody really cares whether you're preggers when you get married or not, but to be four months pregnant on your wedding day must surely have been a big thing back 120 years ago.

Ooh! Just had another thought! Their wedding date was 17th May, which is fast approaching - I can celebrate their 120th wedding anniversary!

Do you ever wonder what life was really like all that time ago? These days we sit with our laptops and mobile phones, Ipods and plasma TVs ... but how much richer would our lives be without these things (if they hadn't been invented) if we had to make our own entertainment? I'm sat here now in the living room, with my laptop on the arm of the chair as I type away, with my Ipod cranked up nice and loud through my headphones, while Colin is sat on the couch watching Mythbusters. There has been very little conversation all night (am I bovvered? No!). How did they spend their evenings back then?? Well, at the risk of being facetious, I think we all know how my GreatGrandparents spent their evenings .... ahem!

Anyway, back to my Tribalpages website mentioned above - I started one up a few weeks ago as Genes Reunited is very unreliable and Mum has lost loads of the info that she saved on there. I'm sure no-one out there is remotely interested in my family tree, but in the very unlikely event that you are looking for any of the following names, please feel free to have a look:

Martin (Crossmaglen, N Ireland)
Carr (London/Exeter)
Clark (Aylesbury/London)
Shevlin (Crossmaglen, N Ireland)
Fennell (Wiltshire/London)
Hastings (London/Middlesex)

In particular, if you are a fellow scrapper reading this and you are in the US and you have any Martin connections from Ireland (originating in Crossmaglen and emigrating to America sometime between 1900 and 1940) then you definitely need to get in touch as other than knowing that some of the Martin clan upped sticks and went, we haven't got any other information.

Clark - we know that there was a prevalence for brickmaking in the Clark family, and it seems that they've worked the Brickfields in Aylesbury before moving to London and making bricks there. The Hastings also were Brickmakers, with one branch of the family actually owning a Brickworks about half a mile from where Mum and Dad now live in Chingford.

The Martin Family - but you can't get in without the password. There's no point in me having a password on it and then just posting it on my blog, so if you are interested enough to want to have a look, please let me know and I'll give you the password.