It’s been a bit of a heavy week all told.
A funeral, a few work issues, a friend’s partner’s suicide, more vet visits
All varying in their direct effect on me ,
I’m not complaining, there’s never one thing
Boffin Cameron has tested positive for covid so can’t dog sit next week….
That’s only a minor brickbat, but it’s my nephew’s wedding
I will sort something out.
Last night I sat down in front of the tv to watch The Repair Shop
It’s a real indulgence and remains the best emotional romp on tv at the moment.
Now for those that don’t know The Repair Shop is a show that has the demographic of blogging individuals ( genteel folk of a certain age) they are asked to bring in a usually damaged personal item which holds a great deal of sentimentality and importance to them. A group of talented restorers are then challenged to see if they can return the item to its former glory and the results usually get everyone involved sobbing gently into their jumper sleeves.
Marcia at the reveal
Last night we had fifty something Marcia who brought in her broken childhood doll Diana.
Marcia had been placed into care with her brother because her mother , one of the Windrush generation and a single mom could not look after them single handedly. Diana was the only thing Marcia had of her own and the significance of the cheap plastic doll was all to evident when the repaired toy was returned to a quietly dignified and emotional Marcia
I bawled buckets
We all have items at home that hold varying degrees of sentimentality and importance to us
What would you say is your most treasured item?
Mine?
I was thinking about this this morning
My gargoyle , who is presently camouflaged amid the houseplants
So many treasured items, but the one I've had the longest is my teddy. I remember going to the shop with my parents when I was about 4 or 5. I immediately fell in love with him and despite them trying to persuade me to have a Sooty (probably a bit cheaper), it had to be Teddy. He was a lovely petrel blue and had a growl. Sadly, he's now a very faded, threadbare, patched and darned blue and his growl seized up years ago, when my Mum washed him. But he still has the cocoa stain around his mouth where I used to share my bedtime drink with him. To anyone else, he's only fit for the bin, but to me, he's priceless! xx
ReplyDeleteI have a little tiny teddy that was placed in my crib by my grandmother (Mum's Mum). He is only about 3 inches in height at most and the fur has worn thin. still has all his limbs is missing his little glass eyes but his joints are fully moveable. The resonance behind this little Teddy is he has been with me all my life. My grandmother died of cancer when I was 17 months old so I never really knew her although I have always had a sense of her presence. My mum looked after her at our home for the last six weeks of her life, so that little Teddy represents quite a lot of unexpressed emotion. I was the youngest grandchild living when she passed. It is also one of the few things remaining that she bought for me. I too like the Repair shop as it not only repairs priceless items but helps people let go of unexpressed emotions. Cathartic for the soul tooxx
ReplyDeleteProbably my grans tea service. I nver use but will when new kitchen is in. Not dishwasher proof
ReplyDeleteWhat was even more poignant was that Marcia's mother had come over here for a job as carer to a diplomat's children, and wasn't allowed to look after her own children as well, so had to give them up (she didn't know she was pregnant when she came here). How sad is that? Fortunately, Marcia and her brother were well cared for in the children's home and were able to have visits from their mother. We love Repair Shop, it's sweet and gentle.
ReplyDeleteI have a charm bracelet that was a gift from the father that abandoned our family. I kept it despite my anger. It made it all the more precious when we reconciled decades later. Now, when I take it out, it makes me smile and remember a flawed, gentle man.
ReplyDeleteMy most sentimental childhood item is one I don't have anymore and would give anything to have back -- a small wooden "ride-em" horse that my father made for me the Christmas I was four.
ReplyDeleteI will have to check and see if I can get new episodes of Repair Shop on my Netflix. I love that show too!
ReplyDeleteMy treasure is my Beary. He is in a sorry state but I have had him all my life and he always slept with me until he got too fragile.
At the moment, it's my grandfather's wedding ring; he lost it shortly after he was married in 1928, in a field he was working in in the village where he was born and grew up. The wedding ring was replaced, but in 2015 it was found in that field by a metal detectorist, who was detecting with the minister of the village. By a convolution of synchronicities, it found its way back to me. The detectorist was Derek MacLennnan, who was the finder of the Galloway hoard. The ring has a lot of story attached to it. Love your gargoyle :)
ReplyDeleteI still have my two Teddy bears from when I was a baby. The larger one is dirty pink, a bit bald in places, and has only one eye. The smaller brown one has a rubber nose/mouth that I teethed on. They were my first friends and all of us are now 70. Yikes!
ReplyDeleteWe love Repair Shop but haven't found any new seasons, just the same first 3 seasons we've seen a few times. Will look on Netflix.
Hugs!
Looking at your gargoyle, it occurs to me that this seems like a good idea for your next photo parade ... the valued item you'd like to see repaired.
ReplyDeleteWe LOVE The Repair Shop ….. it is such a gentle and inoffensive programme and the repairers are so clever …. It was a very emotional one last night …. Marcia, the guy with his Dads guitar and the man with the Mask of David. I have only one criticism …. They now play on the emotional side a bit too much but I still love it. We have a couple of things …. a stool made out of the timbers of The Resolute of which the same timbers made the Resolute desk in The White House ….. a clock that I bought when first married, from Harvey Nichols antiques department …. it was made from old clocks but doesn’t work now so I need Steve from the Repair Shop to have a look at it ! I also have a suitcase like the man yesterday that was my Dads which he also carried with him during his time in the war ….. it has all the labels on it where he travelled but could do with Suzies expertise ! XXXX
ReplyDeleteMy most treasured item? I’m stumped. But I know I would seriously miss a silly little plaster statue my sister gave me before I went away to university. A too-cute flower child standing on a platform on which reads: “In those quiet moments when you’re alone with yourself, think of me now and then.’
ReplyDeleteI really have too many to mention.. I have collected alot in my 54 years... Everything from an old perfume bottle i picked up new in Paris some 35 years ago.. the perfume is gone but the smell is still there... to a wooden table my husband made with a hundred tiny holes in it to hold all my colored pencils that i love to draw with... to a curio cabinet full of little treasures i've collected over the years... A house full of memories...
ReplyDeleteThis was a good morning challenge for me. I've been looking around my house trying to spot the items that hold the most sentimental value. I finally settled on two favourite childhood books, (Miss Suzie and Miss Twiggly's Tree.) Each of the stories has a theme surrounding the need most of us have for a place to call home. I love houses. I enjoy my own house tremendously but even so, I waste a fair bit of time perusing houses on real estate apps. Perhaps that's why I was so intrigued with the Welsh word, "hiraeth", you introduced not long ago.
ReplyDeleteMy dolls house that my Dad made for me when I was about 5. When we moved house a couple of years ago we took it out of the loft and I cried and cried as it represented all the love my Dad put into it.
ReplyDeleteDue to circumstances that would be familiar to many, not much in the way of material possession got through my childhood. I'm most attached to memories of books that I read that helped teach me about the world I was otherwise missing. So now I search out those old children's books. The collection comforts me.
ReplyDeleteI borrowed your idea for a blog post of my own about my favourite item, a flint knife, hope you don´t mind...
ReplyDeleteMy forest green 1954 Silver Cross Doll's pram. Original mattress. Not in terrible shape, but if I lived in the UK I would love to have The Repair Shop fully restore it. I actually used it as a bassinet when my (now adult) children were wee babies.
ReplyDeleteFramed photos,beloved dog ashes and a small inexpensive ornament of an elderly gentleman sitting with his adoring dog alongside x
ReplyDeleteA photo book my husband made for me the first year we had Turbo...full of puppy pictures and happy memories.
ReplyDeleteI love that idea but can't think of any item I treasure that much. Photos perhaps? My cat for sure!
ReplyDeleteI love the Repair Shop. I don't think we are getting new episodes on Netflix here in the US. It's not just the emotional reaction of the owners that gets to me, it's the skill of the crew and their relationships with each other that is so charming. Plus, that dishy Will is so easy on the eyes, isn't he? (Never mind, I'm old and a lesbian but I can still appreciate a pretty puppy. Lol)
ReplyDeleteWell I treasure my father's collection of poetry books and I treasure my mother's thimble - but I can't think of anything else. I am not particularly sentimental. I watch The Repair Shop because I so admire the workmanship but I don't care for the sentimentality in the programme.
ReplyDeletemy collection of wooden angel figures and an antique picture of an angel x
ReplyDeleteFrom childhood. I have what is left of a doll named LaLa. I washed her and she fell apart. I have her in a box in my closet marked, "My name is LaLa."
ReplyDeleteWe get The Repair Shop here and I love it! I have a couple of pieces of jewelry from my Grandmother that are very important to me. But I think most treasured is a tiny rocking chair (about 5 inches high) that my Great-Grandfather carved for my Mother when she was a child. It meant a lot to my Mother because she always had it displayed somewhere and it has come to mean a lot to me. I hope to pass it down to my Granddaughter.
ReplyDeleteMy son committed suicide it kills me constantly. My daughter has a lamb named meme. Me a bear called bubba..
ReplyDeleteI am so sorry Suzanne .
DeleteMy maternal grandparent's (working) wind up mantle clock, or the opals given to me by my paternal grandmother, or the wedding ring my father gave to my step mother.
ReplyDeleteChoosing just one item is impossible for me. Hopefully next week will be less challenging. That said, things tend to happen in multiples just as you have experienced.
ReplyDeleteI treasure an autograph book full of poems written by grand parents, and aunt and uncles given to me as we stepped on the boat to emigrate I was only nine and little did I know that I would not see many of them again, in those days people did not travel like we do today and even a phone call cost a fortune.
ReplyDeleteA small, wallet size black and white photo, bent, abraded, from decades of being carried in my father's wallet, it was the last airplane he owned in the mid 1960's, he carried it the photo for 50 years pulling it out to show to anyone he could. It is the only thing I removed from his wallet after he died.
ReplyDeletePossibly my soldier doll 'Alphonse'. I shall be reunited with him very soon.
ReplyDeleteFerris Frog, who is very small and green and has been many places with me but liked Italy best. Lately he has had to just hang out with the other stuffed animals.
ReplyDeleteMy two most treasured possessions are my teddy bear Valerie, who was a 1st birthday present (which now makes her 60 years old). She was in reasonable condition until my son decided at age two to carry her everywhere with him and she spent a good four years being well-loved all over again.
ReplyDeleteAnd also a little Swiss musical chalet which was one of the few items my Nana really treasured and as her first grandchild I was the only one allowed to handle it. Now it is faded and tattered but still something I treasure greatly.
I would love to take either item to the Repair shop and it would be good to have another day out to the Weald and Downland Living Museum where it is filmed in the old barn. I'm guessing that hosting the tv show has paid for the new roof on the barn because it didn't look that good a couple of years ago.
My Granny's locket with a photo of my mothers older sister.
ReplyDeleteI didn't know my Granny as she had passed away before I was born, so my Aunt was my surrogate Granny.
A beautiful ring with the young Queen Victoria's head. A parting gift to my mother (then passed on to me) from Sarah Churchill, Sir. Winston's 'naughty daughter' who became an actress, when they left the WAAF after working together underground on the south coast during WWII. I wear it a lot and it's wearing thin!
ReplyDelete