Wednesday

Well it's supposed to be a sunny day today but I'm in two minds what to. On the one hand it'd be lovely to get out for a drive and to take some photos, but on the other hand I'm on a roll preparing the presentation for the family and don't want to lose the momentum. I can't really understand why, but the thought of doing a bit of both unsettles me ... very strange, so it'll have to be one or the other! Decisions, decisions!

I spent some time chatting to my sister yesterday, hoping she had some idea when a certain article appeared in the local newspaper but she wasn't able to help. I phoned the Records Office and spoke to a lovely helpful lady there who confirmed that the archived newspapers are available on fiche and access isn't restricted at present. Apparently where it says access to documents is restricted they mean that you now have to book your place one week in advance, everyone is restricted to one visit a week and you can only order 6 sets of material to use during that visit. Usually you can just pop in and can 'follow' your research through as many documents as is needed, but this new arrangement suits me just fine. I've booked my place for next week and have asked to view the archives of the local newspaper to see if I can find the article in question. I'm waiting for confirmation as I'll need access to the viewer and printer so it'll depend on whether it is already booked out for that day ... fingers crossed!

I have the entire family tree presentation mapped out. I'm using Powerpoint to create a slide show and so far have created a draft of every slide. I now have to make it look more interesting with a consistent style, add the transition instructions, and check some of the historical dates, and then I'll be ready to show the family. This is just the history of my maternal grandmother's line, which is the family we all grew up knowing as family, but if it goes well and assuming the others are interested I will be able to do the same for my maternal grandfather and paternal grandmother's lines. I've spoken to some of my family and so far everyone I've spoken to is interested to see the presentation. I still have others to invite and then it'll be the nightmare task of arranging a date and time that's acceptable to everyone. 

I discovered that the Drama channel on UKTV Play currently has all the episodes of series one of the original All Creatures Great And Small starring Christopher Timothy and Robert Hardy on catch-up, so plan to start binge watching that this evening (and may give up on the new series as I don't like how they have altered the character of Tristan!!). I'm a bit late to the game so there are only 11 days left to be able to view episode one if anyone else is interested.