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The Gallery – Faces

I haven’t done a Gallery post in a while; in fact, I haven’t done a blog post in a while, at least not one which required me to commit my own words to a page. Those of you who know me will know that my family lost a member last week, my stepmum Lorraine. Lorraine had been battling cancer, melanoma to be precise. She was 42 when she died, in fact it had been her 42nd birthday just ten days earlier, which she’d spent in hospital.

I still can’t believe she’s gone. When I think of my Dad, I think of them as a pair – Dad and Lorraine, it just trips off of the tongue. But sadly, so fucking sadly, my father is now just ‘Dad’. I cannot even begin to tell you all of the emotions that have gone through me in the last two weeks, I’m utterly, utterly devastated, as is Husband and of course the rest of the family. Unfair just does not even begin to cover it. I’m not quite able to write about this in the way I’d like to, not able to do Lorraine justice with my words as I still feel largely in shock.

A few days ago, I was going through my emails and I found some pictures of Sausage that I’d emailed to my Dad a couple of years ago and one pictures stopped me in my tracks.

It’s a picture of Lorraine holding Sausage.

You can’t see Lorraine’s face, only Sausage’s, but the look on my infant daughter’s face says everything you need to know about how she felt about Lorraine. Indeed, how we all felt about her.

I hope, in time, that I’m better able to write something that does justice to the woman who touched our lives and whom we already miss so much. But for now, I’ll let this picture and Sausage’s face do the talking.

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The Gallery – Dads

The title for this week’s Gallery posts is ‘Dads’ and it’s quite poignant that it’s plural, because I do indeed have two.

The one I was born with wasn’t much cop. He was young, he’ll admit himself to having been selfish and there were a lot of occasions where he let me down and wasn’t there when he should have been. He was only 20 when I was born, and though in some cases that may have been old enough to deal with the responsibility of fatherhood, for mine it wasn’t. He and my Mum split when I was 5 and I only saw him a handful of times a year, mostly birthdays and Christmas.

Although it was painful for me to have an absent father, my step dad more than made up for it. I was a bit of an odd kid, I didn’t really play well with kids of my own age, I just didn’t find them stimulating and things like Barbie largely bored me. My step dad seemed to know how to get through to me, how to engage me. One of my fondest memories is when he gave me an invoice book that he’d got from work, and we’d play ‘Antiques Dealer’ where he’d come into my ‘shop’, pretend to buy items of our furniture and I’d write him out an invoice in my invoice book. Hey, I told you I was odd! Sunday afternoons were my favourite times as we’d go to a bootsale in the morning then come home and while Mum did housework and cooked dinner, Dad (I’ve called him Dad since very early on) would sit with me while I went through his huge vinyl collection and let me choose whatever I wanted to listen to. It was a fantastic time and a real education. I couldn’t be more grateful.

As the years went by and my bio dad grew up, he became a much better father, and has really stepped up in the last few years. He’s a brilliant grandad to Sausage and visits regularly, even though he’s had a lot on his plate. He’s a great Dad to my little (half) brother too, and far from being bitter that he gets a version of Dad that I didn’t, I’m just super stoked for my little bro.

So, I guess you could say I’m lucky. I get two Dads.

But what makes me feel luckiest of all is watching Sausage with her Dad. I could not imagine a more doting father, and it warms my heart to witness their growing relationship. When people used to say “Oh, isn’t she a Daddy’s girl?” I’d feel a pang of jealousy. I now just feel a huge amount of pride, for both my husband and my daughter. She idolises her father and he returns that love and adoration a million times over. It’s palpable, when they’re in the same room together, or just sat at Husband’s desk, drawing a picture. Two peas in a pod. And they’re both mine.

I’m definitely the lucky one.

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The Gallery – Chilled Out

When it comes to chilling out, no-one does it better than my boy:

Although, Husband and Sausage do a pretty good job too…

Don’t get me wrong, I’m pretty good at chilling out myself, only this is what normally happens after about three and a half minutes….

Delightful image captured by Husband. Yeah, thanks for that babe!

You can see more ‘Chilled Out’ snaps by visiting Sticky Fingers.

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The Gallery – April

The theme for this weeks Gallery is April, and the photo I have included sums up April perfectly for me.

I took this photo on a trip to the park over the Easter weekend, and although it just looks like a picture of a tree, there are a couple of things I like about it. Firstly, if you look closely you can see St. Mary’s church, which is appropriate for an Easter photo and it’s special because it’s one of the oldest buildings in Southend on Sea, with parts of its architecture dating back to Saxon times. The tower you can see is from the 15th century. I like the way it looks like it’s peeking over, keeping an eye on us all, like an elderly relative!

The other thing I like is the fact that the tree in the middle has no leaves on it (it’s not dead, I checked!), which really illustrates a British April for me, a month that can bring beautiful spring sunshine, but can also revert back to wintry weather in a trice.

Head over to Sticky Fingers to see the rest of this week’s entries.

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The Gallery – Tomorrow

This week’s Gallery over at Sticky Fingers really got me thinking. How can we take a picture that represents tomorrow? But if I’m honest, I’ve been thinking about tomorrow quite a lot lately. Finally writing and publishing my birth story has made me think about a lot of things, especially the prospect of having another child and I know Sausage would love a little sister (though I’m under strict instructions to not have a boy!).

I worry so much that having another child would dilute what I have with Sausage, but at the same time we would be giving her so much more in a sibling. A year ago, I would never have even considered having another child, but I’m getting to a point now where I know that I would be strong enough to not allow myself to be pushed around by doctors and consultants, so what is there left to fear?

I’ve also broken one of my blog-rules by publishing pictures of Sausage on here,  it won’t be a regular occurance I just wanted one chance to show her off, my beautiful little darling.

Anyway, these pictures represent our ‘tomorrow’, a tomorrow that I feared I’d never get to have and maybe the prospect of adding another person to our tomorrows.

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The Gallery – Mother Love

This is my first ever entry into The Gallery, and the theme this week is ‘Mother Love’. This picture was taken three days after Sausage was born, and was the first time I ever got to hold my little girl. When I read the theme for this week, I knew that this picture would be perfect. I think the look on my face conveys more than I could ever say here.

Why don’t you hop over to Sticky Fingers and have a look at all of the other gorgeous entries?

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