Snapshot: The grandchildren my husband never saw
This beautiful photograph is of my family, which consists of me, my four married children, their spouses and their 10 children, making 19 of us. It was taken in Devon on a family holiday last summer. It was quite job getting all the young ones to gather and pose for the picture.
All the grandchildren came along after my husband died. All my children got married after my husband died. There have been so many wonderful occasions since Alan died – including my son’s heart transplant four years ago.
I thought I would be terribly sad when I became a grandmother because I wouldn’t have Alan with me. I would have to be a grandmother on my own – no Granddad to accompany me. But I was wrong. I wasn’t sad. I was overjoyed. Absolutely overjoyed. I was there at my first grandchild’s birth. I even helped hold one of my daughter’s legs while she pushed her son into this world. That was in 2005.
Come 2008, two more grandsons arrived safely, and in 2009, two further grandchildren breathed themselves into life. In 2010, dear, sweet baby George did not arrive safely. In 2011, two more grandchildren followed. In 2012, on Valentine’s day, another beautiful grandchild arrived, late but safe. Then in 2013, the twins were born.
The joys, the ups and downs, the worry, the fear and the hardship of being a solo grandparent is a struggle at times. And the sorrow; the deep sorrow of doing it on my own. When I’m out and about, I may hear a child calling out for their granddad, or I’ll hear grannies and nannies saying, “Go and ask granddad”, and I hear these innocent words with such pain. Because we have no granddad and it is a reminder that he isn’t here.
The most painful thing for me is that my grandchildren will have no memory at all of their granddad, because they never met him. They will have no stories to tell others about how their granddad taught them to play cards, or build a boat, or make a paper hat or, how granddad fell asleep with his mouth open while eating ice-cream.
Another one of my hurts is that Alan never saw his children (our children) become parents themselves. It is an amazing thing when your own child has a baby. Look at how everyone rejoices when newlyweds say: “We’re pregnant!” Seeing my sons become fathers and my daughters become mothers has been one of the greatest pleasures in my life.
I know that grief is a living thing. It never dies. Nor should it, because we need it to help us live our lives fully. Without it, we would not greet the joy and love of life as we do. And my family, with all its little ones, certainly fills my life with joy and love. Abundantly.
June Crompton
Playlist: The year I became a teen dancing queen
Dancing Queen by Abba
“You can dance, you can jive, having the time of your life. See that girl, watch that scene, digging the dancing queen …”
My eldest brother, Tim, who was six years older than me, had a record player in his bedroom in the attic and, when he was out, I had special permission to use it.
Whenever I hear that helter-skelter of notes from Dancing Queen sliding down the keyboard, it takes me back to the sultry summer of 1976, putting my single on the turntable in Tim’s bedroom, moving the black arm across and hearing the hiss and bump of the needle as it made contact with the vinyl.
During that summer, as a heatwave coincided with disco dancing fever, I and many of my friends became teenagers; slipping over the border from 12 into 13. Lots of us threw parties in local halls or at someone’s house to celebrate our admission to teenage territory. Boys and alcohol were strictly forbidden, but it was the dancing I loved. And as soon as the first notes of Dancing Queen rang out, we would assemble in a line in our high-waisted trousers and cap-sleeved T-shirts and execute the moves to Dancing Queen – moves I had been practising in Tim’s bedroom all week.
All too soon, the evenings came to an end and our mums would materialise out of the kitchens or be waiting for us outside in their cars. Sometimes, Tim was tasked to come and pick me up in my parents’ Renault 12 and, whenever he did, he always teased me about being the dancing queen and sang snatches from the song all the way home. Secretly, I quite liked it.
Liz Gwinnell
We love to eat: Mum’s seriously scrumptious sponge
Ingredients
170g self-raising flour
170g caster sugar
240g butter
3 eggs
Vanilla essence
115g icing sugar
Milk
200g bar of chocolate
Marshmallows, Maltesers, sprinkles, etc
In a bowl, mix together the self-raising flour and caster sugar and 170g butter. Beat in the eggs and a teaspoon of vanilla essence. Stir until you have a smooth mixture. Spoon the mix equally in to two 7in cake tins. Bake at 150C/gas mark 2 for 20 minutes. Leave to cool.
For the buttercream filling, add 70g butter to the icing sugar and a few drops of vanilla essence to flavour. Beat together until smooth and creamy. Add a small amount of milk if necessary to loosen the mixture. Spread the filling on the inside of one of the cooled cake halves. Place the other cake half on top, insides together.
For the topping, break a third of a 200g bar of chocolate into a glass bowl. Place the bowl on top of a saucepan of water and gently heat until the chocolate has melted. Spread the chocolate over the top of the cake. While the chocolate is still soft, decorate with marshmallows, Maltesers, hundreds and thousands, chocolate stars – anything you like.
I loved it when Mum said she was going to make a sponge – especially licking out the bowl. She would sit me on the worktop and I would run my fingers round the bowl and slurp the gooey mixture. When I was about eight, I started to help Mum. Money was tight, so sometimes there would be only a little buttercream in the middle and a dusting of sugar on top.
Perhaps that’s why, when I had my daughter, we packed everything we could into the cake. Often buttercream would be oozing over the sides and the toppings became more elaborate, crammed with tasty treats. I feel we have done Mum proud but, we both agree that there is nothing quite like Mum’s sponge.
Esther Newton
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