Blog Your Heart - September

Another month where a little late is better than never......is it just me, or is this year going by VERY quickly....I just don't know where it's going! Every month when I do these Blog Your Heart postings, I have to look at my calender in Outlook to remember what happened.

This month has had three defining areas.....Maxine beginning secondary school, going to a friend's wedding, and scanning slides.

I couldn't have asked for Maxine to have settled into secondary school any better than she has. She is LOVING the bus ride every day, and has adjusted flawlessly. I am so proud of her, and am yet again reminded of the strength and courage of our little girl.

I attended a friends wedding a few weeks ago.....only because someone cancelled, and she needed the place to be filled, and asked me, but I was pleased to be a part of her day. The only problem was that I didn't have any suitable dresses I could wear, and I only had a week to get one.....I think I went through seven in the end, with 'the one' arriving the day before the wedding!
I realised that, over the years, I have stopped trying to be feminine.....I don't know why, but I never wear skirts for work anymore.

The wedding also made me think a lot about how Trevor and I chose to get married, in Vegas, without all the pomp and ceremony......in truth, I would do it all again, exactly as we did then.

And finally, scanning slides......just over 1150 so far. I have never thought of myself as being obsessive before, but I realise I must be in order to have scanned that many, in my spare time, in two weeks!
What a mixed bag of emotions they have brought for me.....most of the slides are pre-children, and a fair few of each of my parents before they met each other in Rhodesia (Zambia) in 1967. I feel so privileged to have them and to be able to share them with my mom, and also with other members of our family (I have recently connected with one of my cousins who was a young child in Rhodesia at the time when my parents met, and I was able to share some beautiful pictures of her parents with her).

I feel as though I know my parents so much better now, and I am in awe of both of them. I was finally able to see pictures of my mom's flat in England that she shared with her first husband, and of her two cats. These are things I remember her describing to me so many times, and I had all these pictures in my head of what they must have looked like. Now I've been able to share the memories with her, and I cannot explain how wonderful that has been for me.

I've also got to see what my parents house in Pietermaritzburg looked like when they moved moved there in December 1967.....I always knew my dad was passionately proud of his house, but now I know why when I see just how much work was done to the house...he truly made it his own.

I could go on and on about so many things, and with time I will still do some photo posts so I can share some of them with you, but for now I feel as though I am even further in this journey of mine. It's like I was meant to have the slides to scan, and I was meant to have done them now.......I don't know if 'transformed' is too strong a word, but I certainly feel moved by the pictures I have scanned in the last couple of weeks. And because I categorised the slides in date order (where possible) I have been able to plot their lives before they met, and their time together....so many things make so much more sense to me now!

What also amazed me is the quality of their photographs....both my mom and my dad's....considering they date back to the 1960's, some are really beautiful!

Here are a couple of my favourites of my parents :

 

 

 

 

And, in closing, here is a beautiful picture of my mom's parents, dating back to July 1967.

 

 

Last point to mention is that I have also booked to go and watch P!nk with an old school friend, next year April.....my first live concert since 1990!!!