Owen's party food

Icecream  cake

I had a lot of fun preparing the party food for Owen's First Birthday party.  I thought it would be a great idea to really put on a show for the kids party with lots of fabulous food. 

The family pulled together nicely with the preparations.  Grandma Penhall made the Cups and saucers, and Smiley face biscuits, Poppy Saunders made sausage rolls, my dearest friend Renae made biscuits decorated with lollies and I made Teddy bear cars, Icecream cake, Orange and poppy seed cake, and Frog in a pond. 



Cups and saucers

 It was not until later I realised how many lollies had been included in each recipe and the thought crossed my mind of parents quietly cursing me for hyperactive kids and never coming to visit ever again.

The day before the party on Friday I decided to put the boys in child care so I could prepare the food.  I hoped to have the strength not to be tempted to eat to much of it too.

So the first thing I did at 6am was to have some smarties for breakfast.  They were delicious.  What a great start for the day!

Tiny teddy's n cars

Then the boys got out of bed too.  I was completely horrified when Jamie gave Charlie a rather large bowl of Smarties before taking him to child care.  I wonder if he was bouncing off the walls when he got there.



Smiley faces



lollies galore



Renae's delicious delectables..



Owen's family dinner bday cake

Grandma's button is green



Charlie with cousin Kayne

 When we were eating our dinner at Grandparent Penhall's house last night, Charlie decided that putting his feet on the table was a good idea, and despite every effort of the adults in the room he still continued.

I whispered to Grandpa, "Charlie knows how to push Grandma's buttons", and Charlie responded "Yes I am pushing Grandma's buttons and it is a green button".

Jenkins from Pontypridd

Jenkins family a1920 Pontypridd Wales

Today I started delving into the Jenkins family history.  I had been in touch with a cousin about two years ago. 

She had comprehensively been recording information about my maternal grandfather's family since she was a child. 

So Rebecca had sent me some information and promised more but with the birth of her child never got around to it.

So I decided to follow it up with her again today by sending her and my other cousin Charlie a reminder email and to make a possible time to learn more about the family. 

She gave me some more notes on the family on the condition that if I publish information the source is cited.

Charlie's mother was my grandfather's sister to my grandfather and my mum's first cousin. He knows quite a lot about the Jenkins family being of age to know Kathleen and John Jenkins his grandparents my great grandparents.

So the reason why I don't know much about the family is my grandfather Tom Jenkins died of cancer when I was three years old.  It has been a real loss to the family.  I have virtually known nothing about his side of the family and only a few times met Charlie King who likes to keep in contact with us which is great.  I mainly saw my maternal grandmother's family but not my grandfather's.  We were a little disjointed that way, and Nanna was so close to her sisters so thats all she seemed to keep in contact with throughout the years.

It was a lovely surprise for Charlie to phone me tonight.   We had a nice chat and he told me an old story about the family.  We made a time to meet on the 11th April to talk about the family history and have lunch.  Something to look forward to.

He managed to tell me a story about the family.

The family lived on Maritime Street in Pontypridd Wales in the Rhondda Cynon Taff (link to google map) around 1910+. The street was named after one of the mines in the area.  These places were built for the mines employees.  John Jenkins worked in the mines.  He was a miner.  There are no mines opened these days and one stays open for tours. 

John Jenkins had quite a knowledge of mining law, and he fought for a year, and at the end a satisfactory result of striking due to his effort.  The family were starving because of this.  John had a cousin living in the mountains so he walked there to see if his cousin could give him food like cheese and bread.  They had a family of four-five children to feed. 

There are other relatives living in Brigend South of Cardiff and the sea but it very hard to track them because there are a lot of Jenkins in the phone book. 

John Jenkins father was a builder. 

Gran Jenkins came from County Cork in Southern Island with her brother.  Their parents died, so they were sent to an orphanage in Wales.  If you were poor Irish you were dependant on the charity of the church.  Life was tough.

It is amazing to hear this story about the family's hardship. Life was tough. Working in the mines and your family starving. Being a child orphan too would have been very difficult. They were lucky to survive this, and even more lucky to find a good life in Australia.

What a great start for learning more about the Jenkins family. I am eager to learn more about my maternal grandfather's family.


Websites of interest

Pontipridd History - http://webapps.rhondda-cynon-taff.gov.uk/heritagetrail/big_anthem_fawr/ponty_history.htm

http://www.pontytown.co.uk/history.html

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rhondda

County Cork - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/County_Cork

Banksy art




Flower chucker - Banksy

 
I love Banksy art.  He is anonymous (or she) and uses stencils to create his imagery. 

Usually his art has some sort of message aimed at society, anti-establishment, anti-war, anti-capitalist and anti-government. Subjects often include rats, apes, policemen, soldiers, children, and the elderly.  It's very clever.

The official Banky site http://www.banksy.co.uk/ otherwise check http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Banksy

Some more of his art:

Beautiful dutch iris flowers

Dutch iris

During our big walk today I bought some beautiful Dutch Iris bulbs to put in my garden.

First thing, Charlie and I went for a massive walk up Reynell Road, to Biards Rd, to the Happy Valley shops and home again.

On the way up Reynell Rd, there was a man standing out the front of his house watering his garden. He had the most magnificant garden, so I made comment to him about this, and then asked him what some of the flowers were.

I really loved the big pink lilies that stood out. The flowers were massive, at least 15cm in length like big bells hanging of the end of a long stem about 50cm.  The man told me they were a variety of Lily called  Bella lily, Easter lily, Naked Lady and to come back later in Winter to see the Ox eye daisy, apparently also very beautiful.

Naked lady

So when Charlie and I arrived at the shops we went into the garden section of Mitre 10 to see plants and bulbs.

Unfortunately none of those that were in the mans garden were there so instead I bought myself some Dutch Iris bulbs in a variety of colours.

I'm looking forward to putting those in the ground in approximately 4-6 weeks when the weather cools down a little and then watching them grow into the most magnificant flowers.  One of my favourites.

Next time I am at another garden centre I will make an effort to find more beauties like naked lady, bella, and easter lillies.

Le baiser de l'hotel de ville paris (kiss by the hotel de ville)

One of my favourite photos of all time is Le Baiser de L'hotel de ville Paris (Kiss by the hotel de Ville) taken in 1950 by Robert Doisneau.  It has been an international symbol of young love in Paris.

I fell in love with it many years ago.  An exboyfriend spent many hours searching Parisian shops for this photo because he knew I loved it.  What a wonderful surprise to receive it by mail.

My secret desire to be married in Paris... How romantic! 

I love the imagery of the scene.  Taken in black and white, a man and woman standing in the middle of a busy Parisian street embraced in a kiss.  The people dressed in clothes and hair styles unique to the era of the 1950s.

I was told me that the photo was not planned, just a spontaneous moment in time captured by photography. What a romantic dream.

Since then I have found the identity of the couple remained a mystery until 1992. It was planned by the photographer because it was against French laws for photographers to take photos of people without their consent because people owned their identity. More on this below - it raises some important points about photography ownership.

Despite this, the photographer managed to capture a sense of spontaneity of a kiss.

"The marvels of daily life are so exciting; no movie director can arrange the unexpected that you find in the street." Robert Doisneau.

You can read more about the photographer if you follow this link to wikipedia:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Robert_Doisneau

History on the couple and the photo (from Robert Doisneau autobiography wikipedia see above link to read more)

Jean and Denise Lavergne erroneously believed themselves to be the couple in The Kiss, and when Robert and Annette met them for lunch in the 1980s he "did not want to shatter their dream" so he said nothing. This resulted in them taking him to court for "taking their picture without their knowledge", because under French law an individual owns the rights to their own likeness. The court action forced Doisneau to reveal that he posed the shot using Françoise Delbart and Jacques Carteaud, lovers whom he had just seen kissing but had not initially photographed because of his natural reserve, but he approached them and asked if they would repeat le baiser. He won the court case against the Lavergnes.[1][3][10][11]

“ "I would never have dared to photograph people like that. Lovers kissing in the street, those couples are rarely legitimate." Robert Doisneau. 1992[9][10] ”

The couple in Le baiser were Françoise Delbart,[12] 20, and Jacques Carteaud, 23, both aspiring actors. In 2005 Françoise Bornet (née Delbart) stated that "He told us we were charming, and asked if we could kiss again for the camera. We didn't mind. We were used to kissing. We were doing it all the time then, it was delicious. Monsieur Doisneau was adorable, very low key, very relaxed." They posed at the Place de la Concorde, the Rue de Rivoli and finally the Hôtel de Ville. The photograph was published in the June 12, 1950, issue of Life.[11] The relationship between Delbart and Carteaud only lasted for nine months.[10] Delbart continued her acting career, but Carteaud gave up acting to become a wine producer.[9]

In 1950 Françoise Bornet was given an original print of the photo, bearing Doisneau's signature and stamp, as part of the payment for her "work", and thus her subsequent attempt at litigation in the 1990s was rejected by the court.[3][9] In April 2005 she sold the print at auction for 155,000€ to an unidentified Swiss collector via the Paris auctioneers Artcurial Briest-Poulain-Le Fur.[3][9][13] (from wikipedia)