Hello Godwin Clan

He he! my first ever blog....

Hello everyone!

I can't wait to meet you all, but I am snuggled up in mum's tum at the moment.

Mum wanted to know if I was a boy or girl, but I curled up in a ball & wouldn't let her see...

I love to play games....

Happy christmas everyone!

Hope everyone has as lovely Christmas, if you are passing Marlborough Rd, in Eynsham Christmas morning please feel free to drop in and begin the day with a mince pie and mulled wine!

With all our Love

Christmas Spirit!

Its a very busy time for me at the moment with everyone buying Christmas presents! On a trip to the bank today in nipped into Borders and bought these lovely Santa russian dolls. Now anthony and I are pretty useless when if comes to Christmas decorations but I thought this was a nice start for this year!

Anna

Thinking of Grampy

one year on and still missing him.

Dave making use of the NHS.

Hello from Dave in gloucester hospital.Gardening could do this to you!Fortunately he did not damage his

bricklaying ,or he would have been upset. Hopefully he will have his repairs done this weekend.

Happy Birthday Grampy

Thought you would like to see this picture I took last year on his birthday xx

Congratulations

Wendy's daughter Melanie has just had twin daughters 29th october,
Jane Grace 5lb 5oz
Hannah Faith 4lb 12oz.
Both have black hair and blue eyes,all are doing well.

Happy Halloween

Some of the Godwin Great grandchildren at halloween

Baby Owl came to visit & delivered a Wonderful suprise!

It was a gorgeous evening in spain and I was getting ready to go out for the evening. I had been missing mum, because it had seemed like ages since I had seen her with John & I in spain and Mum in Australia, which brough a tear to my eye.

I continued to get ready and heard an unusual bird noise, which I put down to the parrotts and love birds that had been on the palm trees in the garden, which brought a little smirk to my face. However this little noise was rather pesistant and I looked out the window to see a baby owl on the branch by my window she stared straight at me and chattered away. I felt a lovely warm feeling just like nan would make me feel, I called John in to meet the baby owl and she sung away to us both of us. I turned to John and said 'nan can always cheer me up'

A little while later when we were back from holiday we had a wonderful suprise ' we had been blessed with a baby robbins' as some of you know it was unlikely John and I would have children.. so we were very surprised!

Baby robbins is due on 1st May, which means the little baby owl delivered him. I was very sad that I could not share this with nan, but would love to think that nan ' the little baby owl ' gave us this special little gift and indeed she was the first one to know!

Happy 2nd Birthday Benjamin

Having a good day with Thomas the Tank Engine

Poor fishy!

Have you ever seen anyone clean the bones of a fish like this except for perhaps a cat! Dad always gets value for money.....

Back from Chicago.....

Hi everyone!

Anthony and I had a great time in Chicago, we should have got some top tips from Todd but didnt get round to it. Still I think we explored the city pretty well. If you fancy having a look at some pics from the fair I did click HERE

Anna

HAPPY BIRTHDAY

Happy birthday Dawn hope you have a good day lovely picture of Kizzy and Mummy

love Always Craig Amber & Benjamin

The Paparazzi in Dubrovnik.

Headstone

Nanny's and Grampy's headstone is now in place. The roses are from their garden. Beth.

Happy Birthday Mum (& Alex)

Tee Hee!!!

Happy Birthday Alex & Aunty Penny

Hope you both have a great day.

Love Bec & John

Silly pics!

Sorry, just thought I would share this with you all. We spend quite a lot of time putting things on the cat head which he tolerate very well.......
Here he is sporting a little sombrero.

Anna

Out with the old and in with the new !!!!!!

After seven years outstanding service Denise and I have had to "let it go" as they say, that is our trusty old Mondeo !!! I must admit that it still feels like brand new as far as I am concerned and as Merv would say "A second class ride is better than a first class walk" although he did refuse to get in it on the odd occasion !!!!



Also pictured are some new kittens that popped out of a cat we are looking after for the cats protection league. If anybody would like their children to see but not have a kitten you are more than welcome to come and have a stroke and leave us to clear up the mess !!!



By the way the car has been replaced but is too shy to have its picture taken at the moment.


Bye for now.......Diddle

Greenhouse

Hi everyone
Thought you might like to see the this latest edition to my greenhouse. Mother and sibling doing well. Thanks Don.................Merv.

FLOOD!!!

As promised here is a picture that Craig took of Mum and Dad's garden "the Meadow" the water was over their bridge so Dad couldn't get to his Allotment to Water his plants!!

love to all

Amber xx

floods on the Meadow

hey its me again I went down to the meadow this afternoon and saw this, in fact it is higher than that now, this picture was on the bbc oxford web site!!!

hope you are all keeping dry

love to all Amber x

buttercups on the Medow

I took this picture from the bridge when the Buttercups were out and remembered of walking through them with Nanny and getting Yellow shoes

Shreddies - Knitting with Nanas

I was feeling a bit miserable yesterday because I was thinking that I have no Grandparents. This really cheered me up though!
Anna
Hey are you impressed that I've posted a video!!!

Fraser Baptism

I've finally cracked it, hello to you all, I've just had a look through all the messages, i'll pass on the news to the sisters as they've not worked it out yet!
Fraser is getting Baptised in Eynham at St Leonards on the 22nd July at 10.45 would the cousins like to come, if so could you e-mail me emma.muir@talk21.comby Sunday 15th so i can let the church know for numbers, thanks Emma. PS 'keep on blogging!'

Oliver?

Does anyone remember that horrid dog that lived in one of the houses down the rookery? I think its name was Oliver. Well Amber you should remember cos we were chased by it once on our way back from the meadow. I remember I was very cross because as we started running from him you grabbed the back of my jumper and stopped me from running as fast as I wanted to to get away from him! We used to peep down the Rookery to see if he was down there. He had evil eyes!
Anna

Well, I seem to have discovered a solution to global warming. Forget bio fuels and electric cars, the answer is...homemade ginger beer!!
To be honest, it was only the first batch, but it was enough to blow your socks off. It tasted like homemade schnapps or something - pretty foul anyway. Nevertheless, I persevered and you'll be pleased to know that the second and third batches are delicious, although I'm at a point where I think I'm going to have to keep two plants going simultaneously because the 8 pints per fortnight just aren't enough!

Mitchell and Webb

Is anyone else a big fan of Mitchell and Webb? Just in case you haven't stumbled across it yet there' a new series of 'That Mitchell and Webb Sound' on Radio 4 (which is where it all began). If anyone wants a link to the listen again feature here it is: That Mitchell and Webb Sound Tee hee! Dawn x

Look I have made myself a contributer!

Hi again!
If you look to the right there is now a list of contributers AB with is me Anna and GodwinHQ which is all of us at the moment. And when I do a post (like this one) you can see its me that posted (AB)

Anna

Become a contributer..........you can sign in as yourself!!!

Hi All,

Dawn mentioned a while ago being able to sign in as yourself to post on the blog. I can sort this out. You will then be listed on the blog as a contributer. All I need to do is send you an invite to your email address. You will have to set up a Google account but this is very easy, infact the link will take you through the steps. Its just like setting up a hotmail account or other such things. If you want me to do that let me know (via email as I will need your email address) or if you are happy to carry on signing in as godwinhq then that is fine too! Please someone do it cos I want to see how it works!!!

Anna

OK, it’s not Port Meadow but we have our own floods here. This was taken last year near Cheltenham on the way to work.

Firstly, sorry for not taking more time to look at this blog before. I could come up with lots of highly plausible excuses about time and commitments and the dog eating my homework blah, blah, blah but no one who knows me would believe me so I won't waste your time.

However, what I have noticed is that as a clan we seem to have diversified (or infiltrated) into a wide variety of professions, hobbies, interests and locations. I've got to admit that I do less than I could to stay in touch with everyone (it's a sad reflection that it took a funeral for me to catch up with my cousins and extended family).

So in the absence of actually meeting someone face to face (heaven forbid in this digital age), if anyone has a website, email address, profiles or blogs that they want to share then perhaps we need to get a directory of them going.

Is there any way with this blog (I haven’t investigated yet) that we can create a sort of address book with our various contact details on, preferably one that is private to us? Perhaps something we could add into the extended info on the profile?

Matt

 

Some of the next generation of the clan.
Jack, Ben, Robin, James and William, Jesame, Ella May and Kizzie

James seems to be doing his best to unscrew his brother's head.

I've been teaching mum (Beth) to use Picasa to organise her photos and even a technophobe like her is quite excited by it. It has a neat function whereby you can load pictures directly from your albums onto this blog so once mum gets the hang of it, expect to be inundated with photos. For anyone else who's getting to grips with digital photography I can heartily recommend Picasa (just Google it for a free download) and no, I'm not being sponsored by them.

Matt

Heading to the river

 

Heading out to the river with the pram, brings back a few memories.

Taken by Beth June 2007

Explosion?

OK OK which one of you Eynsham dwellers blew Newland Street up yesterday? I hear the lots of people had to be evacuated from their homes.....

Anna

Azorean Holiday....

hi all
we are back from our holiday in the azores and as you can see from our attire we went whale watching. our clothing consisted of a ankle length yellow waterproof mac and a life jacket. the trip was definately not for the faint hearted as the sea was rather rough! penny says very rough!! when we arrived at the whale destination the boat slowed down and we just drifted, it was at this point a large hole in the sea appeared in front of us. as we entered the hole a large wave decided to fill the boat. hence penny needs a new phone as her rucksack filled with water . the water then went in at the neck of her mac and out at her feet. but we did see whales so it was well worth it. sorry there are no pics of the whales as we had to use both hands to cling on to the boat. the rest of the holiday was very very nice.
penny and merv.

Happy birthday

Hi John Happy Birhday hope you had a good day
Craig Amber & Ben

Happy Bithrday John!

Love Anna & Anthony xxxx

HAPPY BIRTHDAY JOHN

Hope you have a lovely day.... he he! to all who don't know John hates his Birthday and will no doubt be a grumpy guts!

Here is a picture in happier times as John devours our house with a hammer....

Tree felling!

Hi Dawn!
Not quite a picture of the house but a picture of Anthony, our friend Phil and his son Josh felling one of the huge confers in the back garden. The tree was as tall as the house (three stories) and Phil climbed to the top and lopped off sections!!!

Anna

thank you Anna

Thank you for you advice today Anna, I really appreciate you being there... once again it made me realise how lucky we are to have each other. And whatever is thrown our way what Nan & Gramp have taught us is invaluable....

Nan's magic wisdom too make things better lives on in each of us and you were there with her genes to help me get through!


Thank you so much XXX

Love becca

New Home

Congratulations on your new home Anna & Anthony; may you have many years of lots of fun and happiness!

With all our love Becca & John

May Birthdays

Happy birthday Leon (18 years) Jesame (2 years) Paul, James, anyone else i forgot?
Amber xx

brown jug with hunting scene from 79

hi all
i always promised nan that i would try and find out a little bit about this jug. it bore the inscription w gessy, the bull inn, charing cross, launton. on friday penny and i went to launton near bicester and found the bull inn. a large thatched building.
i showed it to the landlord and he was very impressed and took numerous photos and then he showed me a list of landlords from when the inn first opened. low and behold the landlord from 1873 to 1879 was william gessy. the jug is dated 1875. cased closed. nan could never remember where it came from although it had been in her family for many years. secondly are there any twitchers in the family (birdwatchers) if so please visit www.eco-watch.com/livecams scroll down and click on blue tit cam.you will have to be quick because they are growing fast and will probably fledge within the next 8 to 10 days
merv.

We Have Lift-Off!

Hello Goblins!

Just to let you know that I have finally embarked on the great Ginger Beer quest and have started a plant! The fresh yeast was a bit weird, it came in a block like a bar of saop (like I remembered it) but the instructions said to stir till it became liquid. Well, after being a little sceptical and fighting the urge to call my mum (some things never change), suprise, surprise, it became liquid! I will be feeding it religiously for the next 10 days at which point I will be dividing my plant and will have a spare plant. If anyone wants to join the quest, let me know. I'll keep you posted and will let you know how things progress. First batch will be ready 3rd June, so perhaps I should find a way of dropping off a batch for the family picnic so that it can be sampled by a panel of experts?

Dawn

Mags...

Hi there,
If anyone is interested Custom Made has been featured in a couple of magazines this week. You can have a look on my other blog www.custommadeuk.blogspot.com

Anna

beccas memory garden

hi becs
would you like me to dig up some cowslip plants for the memory garden. you could keep them in a pot or plant them in a rough patch of ground until you are sure where
you want to put them . i am going down on sunday with your mum and could dig them up then . please let me or your mum know.
merv.

Hi all, finally found time to sit and read blogs. It is a great way to keep in touch and will definitely keep Nan and Gramp's memories alive.

Congratulations Lisa on your new arrival! Hope you are all keeping well and Elliot is relishing being the big brother.

I am going to mum's for half term in May and on my way back through to London wondered if anyone would like to meet for a picnic down the river, weather permitting? The boys have never been down to play by the river and we could either go to the spinney or near the bathing place. It would be lunch time on Sunday 3rd June.

I have inherited a book which I gave to Nan years ago for her to write memories, poems or thoughts in. It has been wonderful to read the things Nan felt were important to her and I thought I would share a quote that Nan has signed as "Peggy", so I think she may have written it herself as everything else in the book has the source written beneath it.

"Don't walk in front of me, I may not follow.
Don't walk behind me, I cannot see you.
Walk beside me and be my friend."

Hope to see a few of you in June,

Ros

79 godstow road garden

hi all
dont forget if any of the family would like plants from nans garden please help yourselves

Nanny’ s Memories.

Have you ever wondered where Nanny got her sense of humour?


A sooty story.

A story I remember very well from my childhood. We had a very dear uncle who went to live in London.After winning a scholarship to Culham college he had become a teacher in London where he met and married very lady-like Aunty Dolly.
When they came on a visit, we children called her Queen Mary, o.ften looking very queen-like in her flowing georgette dresses. On one visit we were having a very lavish afternoon tea.(Aunt Dolly in daffodil georgette ) It was a very cold Easter. Mother had urged Father to make a huge fire in the open fireplace. It was soon blazing beautifully when suddenly there was a tremendous roar – the chimney was on fire! Mother looked accusingly at Father who had only swept the chimney a couple of days before, but he had a little trouble with the brush. It would not come down so Father being Father had left it up there.How did he know it would catch fire at such an unfortunate time ?
Down came the brush, soot and and all, showering the beautifully laid table, Auntie Dolly, and yellow georgette with a fine layer of soot. Father , by this time, was helpless in the kitchen, shoulders shaking. He always saw the funny side of everything.
Poor Auntie Dolly. I don’t remember what happened about her lovely dress, but they quickly left for London in the morning. My brother went up the very wide old chimney with water and some cloths and put out the fire. An old wooden beam had nearly caught on fire. Mother did not let Father sweep any more chimneys!

posted by Beth

Button Brooches

Hi everyone,
Here are a couple of the brooches I made from the buttons Nan gave to me. Sorry the picture isnt very good! If anyone would like one let me know. Just email your address and I will send you one.

Anna

new baby

to lisa and cecil and elliot
congratulations on your new arrival
penny and mervyn

Happy New Baby!

We're so thrilled for you all. Hugs and kisses to Lisa, Cecil, Elliot and little Alexa. Can't wait to see pictures! With love from Dawn, Todd and the girls x

Congraulations to Lisa,cecil And Elliot
well done to the 15th great grand child and in to the godwin clan
lots of love Craig,Amber & Ben

Congratulations Lisa, Cecil & Elliott!

Congratulations to you all on birth of baby Alexa, what a gorgeous name! we wish you all the happiness in the world

Love always Becca & John XXXXX

Buttons!

Hi!
I wanted to show everyone the bag of buttons Nan gave me a little while ago! I'm busy sorting them as we speak and I'm going to make some lovely things wih them. I will keep you posted!
Anna

Hello Everyone,
here's the original GINGER BEER recipe as given to me by Nan.

TO START PLANT>
2oz fresh yeast,
2level tablespoons sugar
2 level tablespoons ginger
1/2 pint water

1 Blend yeast and sugar until liquid
2 Add ginger and water and stir well
pour into covered jar.


EACH DAY


stir in 1 level teaspoon sugar
1 level teaspoon ginger



AFTER TEN DAYS

Dissolve 18 oz of sugar in 1 1/2pints water.
Bring to boil then cool slightly.Add juice of two lemons

Strain ginger beer plant through fine muslin and add liquid to syrup and lemon juice and 6 more pints of water.
Stir well and bottle at once in strong screw top bottles.
Store in cool place,ready in two weeks.



TO KEEP PLANT GOING.

Halve the left over sediment and place in two jars,add 1/2 pint of water, 2level teaspoons of sugar and ginger.Stir and cover and feed as each day.One plant may be discarded or passed on to someone else.



GOOD LUCK , LOVE JILL

HAPPY EASTER

Hi all, hope you have a lovely Easter! I will be o.k because the Easter Bunny 'alias' Mum has just delivered chocolate... some of it for John, but we all know he won't get a look in.

Love to all
Gready Gutts!

Happy Easter to you all hope you have a lazy day eating lots of chocolates & watching rubbish on the telly or weeding your gardens in the wonderful sun, this is a picture of Auntie Beths garden
love Amber xx

Think a bout this

Hi all
They say its the early bird that catches the worm but its the second mouse that gets the cheese
Merv

As usual Nan laughing and Grampy sleeping

Hello everyone I finally sussed this out without asking Craig to help me!!!! hpoe all are keeping good Sorry uncle mervyn didnt forget your Birthday i didnt know how to do this till now so "HAPPY BIRTHDAY" Amber xx

Thanks everyone!

Thank you to everyone who has posted. Its pretty easy right? Please urge your parents to post. Aunty Sally and Dad/Uncle Mervyn have already, I'm really pleased about that, and please please remember to sign your name on a post or we wont know who its from!
Anna

birthday thanks

Hi all
Many thanks to everyone who sent me cards and birthday greetings on our blog also many thanks to anna and anthony for letting us spend some time with them in spain. i am sorry i moaned about getting in and out of the JIMNY. thanks to david and denise for taking me to see wilco johnson last night in stratford
keep on bloggin
merv

Happy Birthday Uncle Mervyn!

Hope you had a lovely Holiday and have a great Birthday....

Love becca & John X

p.s. perhaps everyone could pop their Birthdays on the comments on this post, as it would be great to for us to celebrate everyones Birthday on the blog......

Happy Birthday Uncle Mervyn!

Hope you have a lovely day!

Love from Dawn, Todd, Jesame & Kizzy x

What Mum meant to me.

There was a time felt no reason to live
I needed shelter from the storm I was in
And when it all got too heavy
You carried my weight
And I want to hold you
And I want you to stay
You are all that I need

For you, I give my soul to keep
You see me, love me
Just the way I am
For you I am a better woman
I say you are the reason
For everything I am
I'm so lost, so lost, without you

Under the stars
At the edge of the sea
There's no one around
No one like you for me
We'd talk for hours
As time drifts away
I could stay there for hours
And with you this way.

-Sally.
-James Morrison, track 13 of Album: Undiscovered.

You showed by example that you don't need material possesions to live a full and happy life and that we could be rich in other ways.

Dad and you made sure we had the important things by making ours a close and loving family.

However big or small our achievements were, or whatever mistakes we made you gave us praise, support and encouragement. Not only were you there for us but for anyone else who needed your help, not expecting anything in return.

Countless times you would say how proud you were of all your family never thinking that you made us what you are.

You taught us how to give love and respect to others regardless of their actions that we have passed down to our children and will be to their children.

In future generations they will still be saying Nanny Peggy did that or Nanny Peggy said this and telling stories of the wonderful life she lead.

You never reliesed your worth, how wise you were, or what an influence you had on us all.

I know there have already been times when we have some news that we think "I must tell Mum/Nan" I'm sure we will still be telling you.

Your unconditional love, forgiveness, selflessness, sense of fun and wicked sense of humour will be with us forever.

So many memories, you were and always will be so loved.

-Sally

Evening!

Anna here!

Cool, I love that people are posting! I can sort out profiles for everyone at some point but if we all sign our names that will do for now.....
I like the picture of Rubin on Davids motorbike!

Dad you are allowed to post too you know. Can everyone encourage the Mums and Dads too as the blog is also for them. They may need a bit of help I suppose although Dad/Uncle Mervyn is rather proficient in blog posting.

Anna

Morning!

It's so nice to see people are beginning to use the blog already! As we're all logged in as Godwinhq it's impossible to know who's writing what unless we sign off somehow. What's the best way to do this? Just put our name at the bottom of the post I s'pose?

Dawn

Well Done.

A big "Well done" to all those involved in setting up this blog. I think it will provide us all with a focal point now we will not be meeting at number 79. Nan was always impressed by the information available on the web and the levels of communication provided by the computers we all now have.
I must say though NOTHING will impress me more than Nan's ability to provide a full roast dinner and crumble should you happen to visit Nan and Gramp around lunchtime !!! This will require an amazing computer.

Nan in the garden at number 79

Hi

This is Bec in Spain last year, Now you all know that she is not sleeping.

Her nice asked me, "Uncle John why is Aunty Bec laying on the floor?"

Heres a picture for you!

Here's a good picture to start off with. This is Dad (Mervyn) with Gerry Denton. Those of you who live in Eynsham will know Gerry. They wrote a song about Eynsham toll bridge many years ago and this is their photshoot for the papers! I thought this would make you all laugh. If you click on the picture you can enlarge it.

Anna