New class New blog!

So after a week of taking part in the stories in hand class with the amazingly talented Jessica sprague over at www.jessicasprague.com I thought it would be a good idea to start a fresh blog for some place to keep these stories while they are awaiting printing or scrapping. The class has been fantastic so far starting with making the neatest little binders that you ever did see, and then filling them with memory sparks.Now we are on to the real stuff and learning how to turn these memories into words and making sure that you give enough information in them to not only make them interesting to the kids (who my file will be for of course!) but so that they can also get a real sense of the things you are talking about. I promise to post a pic tomorrow of my binder but for today here is my first go at getting those stories out. This one has even more meaning to me as today while I was writing this all out, I thought I would ring mum and ask her what she remembered of this story only to find out that she was just about to ring me to say that my Uncle Ray, my grandads brother and partner in crime, while they were growing up, died last night. This has given this class even more meaning for me and made me realise how important it is to get these stories down while the people who feature in them are around to answer the questions. Ok as always Ive rattled on lol. Here is my first story:

My Grandad David Whitehouse was a family man and very close to all of his grandchildren, well he had to be we all lived with him at one point or another with our mums growing up, I remember as a child that every remembrance Sunday Grandad would take a handful of us kids down to Riversley park to watch the old war heroes parading along the streets, with their jackets looking heavy with all the medals that they wore, towards the war memorial. Once there we would stand alongside all the scouts, girl guides and brownies that looked bored and cold trying to keep their huge flags upright, and sing hymns or say prayers thanking god for the soldiers that fought for our country. The best part for us was when, just as the clock struck eleven, the men from the army would bring their huge cannons forward and explode them. The noise was deafening and made the ground shake as one after another they exploded smoke into the cold air. This would make us children giggle and choke with the noise and smell. Grandad always had an extra job after this of keeping his grandchildren still and quite for the 2 minutes silence to remember all those that had fallen in the wars. For a lot of the years that I attended I cant say that I really understood the point of it, I knew little of the war and what these brave men had done. It was not until we were around 7 or 8 that we even thought to ask. It was walking back home after the memorial one year that we approached the subject. I'm not sure now who started the questions or which ones were asked but what I do remember from that quick walk home was the story that Grandad told. He began by explaining that during the second world war he was still quite young and also along with his brother Ray a little bit of a terror. After one night raid by the Germans a lot of the houses in the near by Manor court road had been bombed and destroyed. Thinking this was the perfect opportunity for them to explore the rubble him and Ray set off early the next day. It wasn't a long distance from their house and once there they started to try and climb the huge piles that were only yesterday someones homes. Stopping every so often to look through the debris, hoping I'm sure to find lost toys or other items that they could play with or exchange. Only after one of these stops Grandad saw a child's red wellington just sticking above the rubble, deciding that he would look closer he started to pull the boot out. Only he was to discover that horrifyingly the child's leg was still inside. Nothing else Grandad said just a leg. He then said how he and Ray had to take the boot and its contents to a police officer and explain how he had found it. As Grandad told us this story although he smiled, his eyes didn't hide the sorrow. And I remember thinking oh no we have made him cry and immediately tried to change the subject. The others thought this was a great story and wanted to ask more gruesome questions to which I have forgotten the answers. Looking back now I don't know if it was the horrors of the story or the horror of seeing a man I loved so much upset that has made me remember this day in more detail than any other remembrance Sunday that we attended.