One amazing woman.

Since joining KC Willis Collage Camp I have been planning more work and thinking about all the inspiring women who could feature in my future work.

As I pondered on such women,'Florence Nightingale', 'Marie Curie'And even 'Coco Chanel' I also thought about what a great woman my mother was.

She was born one of nine children and her early life was hard. She told tales of being sent to a home because she was so underweight and being given spoonfuls of cod liver oil and malt extract. Eeuk!

Here she is aged sixteen. This would have been in 1940.

  She worked for various wealthy families in her home city of Sheffield, all of whom seemed to be fond of her. She talked about these people often and had many memories.

When WW2 broke out she joined the Wrens. Some of her training was in Scotland, she was then stationed in Southhampton and drove launches.

She recounted tales of being alongside American ships to collect the crew and being given lots of luxuries(soft white bread) that wasn't seen in war torn Britain.

On one occasion she was reprimanded for giggling when she took part in a march past the King.

  

                                    Here she is happy and smiling, my favourite picture of her.

                                         This picture was taken aboard a Polish Destroyer.

          She was very proud of her Navy days and treasured her badges, beret and service medal.

 I think these days were some of her happiest if her stories are anything to go by.   

After the war she met and married my Dad,  I was born on Christmas Day 1948 at 11.55pm by C Section and my brother was born in 1951.

  I always remember her as a hard working lady , who's favourite phrase was to hurry up and do the work so that we could sit and do nothing .     

Unfortunately she got her wish as she was diagnosed with Dementia and spent the last years of her life in a nursing home sitting doing nothing and being beautifully cared for.   

A brave woman to the end suffering the indignity of dementia but also leaving her brain to Medical Science so that research could be done to discover more.

Eventually we found out that she had a rare form of dementia and the scientists were so grateful for her donation.        

So that was my Mum, a great lady who would be the first to say she didn't always get it right but she loved her children, she loved her dogs and she loved life!