Storytelling Three: Pick Your Precious

Welcome to the final Storytelling Sunday! I can't tell you how much it has come to mean to me over the past three years, how many of your stories are still floating around in my head, how happy it has made me to watch connections being made around the world, all because of the stories. Storytelling Sunday may be coming to an end, but we'll always have the stories, right? So, shall we? One last time?

The Click of a Wedding Ring

I've thought many times, over the past couple of months, of the story I would tell for the end of the year. I had almost decided on the one about Nicky, the doll my Mum dressed for me the year I was nine. She has a real anorak, cut down from one of my own, and a Sunday best blue wool coat and beret, fashioned to look like the one I wore myself at the time. She has trousers.skirts, a kilt and a cardigan that sports the brooch I got in my cracker and gave her almost at once. Or, I had mulled over the story of the dolls house my new husband gave me the first Christmas we were married. He'd saved up and carried it home without me knowing a thing about it and it's still my best Christmas surprise ever. But, in the end, I found something unexpected to bring together our three years of Sundays. It's a little story that can be told in a few sentences and with one photo, and it's definitely precious. It goes like this:

The (Not So) Small One has been suffering school exams these past two weeks; and when that happens, she tends to turn up home at unexpected hours. Physics she'll say brightly, as she crashes through the door at lunchtime. Finished. And so, we decided to use the afternoon for some baking. She begged, I gave in, and we pulled out everything we needed for a first batch of Christmas mince pies.

I'll roll out the pastry and you spoon on the mince she decided, and she made a start. Then she stopped.
No, she said. It's no good. You'll have to roll. That way, she said, that way I'll be able to hear...the click of your wedding ring on the rolling pin. It's one of the best sounds in the world, the click of your ring on the rolling pin.

And I knew she was right. It is. I remember the click of my Mum's ring against the cool white of her wedding gift rolling pin as she made pastry for our Christmas; and a more comforting rhythm I still can't imagine. Sometimes Christmas is in the very smallest of sounds.

And sometimes the story is in the very smallest of scenes. Sometimes we see a circle we didn't even know we had joined, a band we have brought together. So, for one last time..think about writing a post and joining our circle.You have all week to dream up something you'd like to share - as it's the last time, maybe even one of your favourites from a past Sunday? - and a full seven days to pick a few storytellers and say hello.  If you have been following along from the sidelines, now's your chance to come on over: we'd love to have you with us. Let's make this a Christmas Storytelling session supreme.

I'm going to finish up today by sending out my very many thanks to everyone who has been part of Storytelling Sunday over the past three years. It's been such a pleasure to  watch the stories appear and to travel the globe, dropping in for a yarn. There would have been no stories without you and I'm hoping everyone who has taken part feels proud of every one of their posts. And the best bit? Now we'll all have them to remember whenever we want to. Exactly the way it should be.

And Storytelling Sunday itself? I'm sure it won't disappear completely. In fact I'm thinking a few flash appearances now and then might be a boost for the Blog Cos You Want To Club. You know what that means? keep those notebooks handy: you never know when you might feel the need to write....

Storytelling Sunday: Next Week (for the last time)

You know what they say?

Old storytellers never die: they disappear into their own story.

I don't think anyone round here is ready to disappear just yet - please, don't! - even if next weekend's Storytelling Sunday will be our last. Three years we've been storytelling in a Sunday - three years!

It started round about this time of the year in 2010, when I told you a bit of a yarn about my childhood Christmas Club, how I liked to gather the family together and do "Christmas stuff". Every Sunday after, right up to the Big Day itself I invited you to post a Christmas story of your own. Then A blog friend at the time, Kate, (if you are still out there,please get in touch so we can thank you again!) suggested I should turn the whole thing into a Sunday event. And the storytelling began in earnest.

That first year, as we gathered pace, I told you about the day Ted Fred got left behind; oh, and the day the caravan died, and you responded with amazing tales of your own. In the second year I thought we should try to get the photographers to join us with "The Words, The Pictures", and the idea that you might only need a sentence or two if you had a great photo. Of course, most of my stories ended up becoming a little longer than that (remember the one about lentils?); but we did bring lots more of you on board: you and your beautiful photos, your moving words. This year? Well this year we've been celebrating our treasures with "Pick Your Precious"; and I think for lots of us the delight has been in discovering how many of the same kinds of things we love.

And so we come to the end. We have one last Sunday to fill in 2013. Sunday 1st December will be the final Storytelling Sunday and I'd love you to be there. You don't have to bring anything precious (though there are suggestions  in What To Scrapbook The Storytelling Sunday Edition if you are looking for an idea). Bring any story you like! Oh, except maybe one about endings. I'm not good with endings. Let's think about beginnings. Who knows where next year will take us?

Storytelling Sunday Three: Pick Your Precious

Storytelling Sunday Three? There is no excuse for not joining in with this one! Everyone can do it. Pick Your Precious is about celebrating the little things you love: those souvenirs, bits and pieces, things from your past you can't bear to throw out. You know, the special little something you have tucked away in a drawer or up on a shelf? Or the thing you love most in a room? Or the object you would save if you knew you had to leave the country? Your favourite things.

Ready to begin?

The Ballet Dancer

As we creep ever closer to the end of the storytelling year, it's good to look back on the - records, maybe we could call them? we've been making all year: records of things we have loved over many years, things others have loved and passed on to us so that we can hold them as precious too. Last month Jo posted about a little glass bottle she had found in a charity shop; and that was something new she thought she would like to hold on to. I liked that idea. Many of the things I have chosen have come from way back in my past: today I have a photo of something new

She's a little ballerina Christmas tree decoration we brought back from our trip to the ballet in St. Petersburg this summer.

We had um-med and ah-hed over that trip. It cost more than we wanted to spend, it lasted long into the night when we had to get up early the next morning, there was a dress code to decipher: the girls were keen and the boys, in the end, had to admit that it was a once in a lifetime opportunity. So we signed up for an excursion to see Swan Lake, on a warm Summer's evening, at an old theatre, in Russia.

It was a tourist version, the online reviews said, fast ballet on a not-so-fancy stage. But as the coach spred us through the streets I had spent years dreaming of seeing, the tour guide reassured us: We do happy endings in St.Petersburg, she said. The story would end well.

And it did. It was magical. Our story of that night will probably keep for another time. Today I'm Picking my Precious; and she is our ballet dancer, dressed in the deep blue of the night's costumes, and ready for our Christmas tree for the first time this December. Happy Endings? I'm hoping her story has just begun.

If you have a story, we'd love to hear it! I'm hoping for a Happy Ending of another kind round here as Storytelling Sunday finishes up its three year (three years!) run at the end of December. Let's send it off in grand style, with your pick of your Precious this month and then we'll have a grand Christmas finale next. That's two chances left to spin your story, tell us your tale...what are you waiting for?


Write your post, introduce it as a Storytelling Sunday story and then come back and link us up. You won't regret it! Everyone meets someone new on Storytelling day. You have a full week to add your story, and the rest of the month to come back and read your choice of the others. No big rush! Have a think, take your time. And then? Sit back and enjoy the rest.

Storytelling Sunday Three: Pick Your Precious

Storytelling Sunday Three? There is no excuse for not joining in with this one! Everyone can do it. Pick Your Precious is about celebrating the little things you love: those souvenirs, bits and pieces, things from your past you can't bear to throw out. You know, the special little something you have tucked away in a drawer or up on a shelf? Or the thing you love most in a room? Or the object you would save if you knew you had to leave the country? Your favourite things.

Ready to begin?

The Mystery Chest

October? Can you believe it? Round here that means slippery leaves on the ground and bare trees, darker nights, extra layers. Maybe it's not quite like that where you are, though. I've always loved that scene in E.T. where they all go Trick Or Treating, and it's light outside. We don't do that here; so that scene is a good reminder to me of the different ways we all see the same things, the different filters we use. As we move through the year, I've been realising how our own personal filters change too. Do you think, I mean, that you would pick the same objects to show off now as you would if I had asked you to list the lot in January? Or would you have picked the same objects, but chosen to emphasize different bits of the story?

if you had asked me in January what Precious I might pick for round Halloween month I definitely would have had an idea...

...our chest of mystery. Everyone here likes to believe that it once belonged to Harry Potter; and that would be because it has his initials H.P. placed on the lid. But it's clear he has no more use for it since it has washed up with us. Truthfully, I wouldn't be trying to grab it if I had to flee from here in a hurry: it's cast iron - I think - and I can't lift it. (Though I guess that means it might survive fire, flood or plague and I could come back for it? ). But I know you want to find out what's inside...

Well, earlier in the year I'd been planning to tell you about its quirkier contents for Halloween...Great Grandpa's false teeth, anyone? Or how about the owner-less glass eye? the locks of baby hair or the Victorian mourning envelopes? there are letters and certificates going back a century or more. The Fair family owned a grocer's shop through the years of the Great Depression; and I could show you the shop ledgers. Tucked inside you'd find letters from customers who were struggling to meet their accounts. It could break your heart, even from this distance. All of these things have their own stories.

But when I started to sift through it all this week, the thing which really spoke to me was a little blue notebook, full of numbers still recognisable as being in my Father-in-Law's hand: "Money Spent Each Term at T.C.D." His college accounts from his years in Dublin at the end of the 1940's. How much he spent on "digs", on a new saddle bag, on train fares and "outside meals": a strange world of gowns and Punch Magazine. You know why this has fascinated me right now, of course. I'll be emailing his namesake, modern day student grandson who has spent the last couple of months wondering how his student loan will stretch and I'll be telling him how lucky he is that he doesn't have to buy his own coal. I think that will give him a smile. And then I'll be tucking that notebook back into the chest, in the hope that another generation will use it as a reminder of what came before. I hope someone else comes across it at exactly the right time. Just as I did. 

Maybe you have a story for us today?

Write your post, introduce it as a Storytelling Sunday story and then come back and link us up. You won't regret it! Everyone meets someone new on Storytelling day You have a full week to add your story, and the rest of the month to come back and read your choice of the others. No big rush! Have a think, take your time. And then? Sit back and enjoy the rest.

Storytelling Sunday Three: Pick Your Precious

Storytelling Sunday Three? There is no excuse for not joining in with this one! Everyone can do it. Pick Your Precious is about celebrating the little things you love: those souvenirs, bits and pieces, things from your past you can't bear to throw out. You know, the special little something you have tucked away in a drawer or up on a shelf? Or the thing you love most in a room? Or the object you would save if you knew you had to leave the country? Your favourite things.

Ready to begin?

The Monkey's Bathrobe

Sooo..my story for this month. Now, let's see..

Well, for the past week we've been thinking about packing. We've been making lists and getting the suitcases down from the loft and counting pairs of socks, all for that boy of ours who is heading off for student life. And I hope that turns into a long and happy story he'll maybe tell you himself one day. There's another story in there, too, I think, about another Fresher, many years ago now, who had no idea then about what her Mum must have been feeling as her daughter loaded her bags into the little brown Nova and drove away. But that's not the story for today, either. My story for September - a quick one now I've got started - is about what that daughter found when she began to unpack at the end of her journey.

Oh, yes. I've picked my Precious and here it is:

a small blue bathrobe: sewn from towelling and monogrammed with the letter "M". That would be M for Munty, my illiterate but faithful monkey mascot. He would have been about three or four by then - a teenage present - and we were an inventive, storytelling family, always, so he had already had a rich and varied life by the time he packed his smoking jacket (which he worked as daywear) to keep me company in Halls. I was very glad to see his head appear when I opened my suitcase, but when I turned to the little "Don't Open This til you Get there" box, I was laughing out loud. For inside, wrapped in tissue paper and nestled beside the new mugs and the big jar of coffee, was a new outfit for Munty: made by my sister to exactly match the robe I had sewn for myself to take with me when I left home. she had gathered up the scraps and put it together and I'd known nothing about it.

Now, you know how it is: we could have got a bit sad and wondering-what-everyone-was-doing-at-home-ish at this point. But we were too pleased with the present. So Munty whipped off his Smoking Jacket and tried it on and I hung my robe on its peg and we sat back and waited to see who we might meet in our new student life.

New student life? Isn't that where we came in? I guess that means it's back to the packing here. I'll have to see what I can get into that suitcase when his back is turned. ..

Maybe you have a story for us today?

Write your post, introduce it as a Storytelling Sunday story and then come back and link us up. You won't regret it! Everyone meets someone new on Storytelling day You have a full week to add your story, and the rest of the month to come back and read your choice of the others. No big rush! Have a think, take your time. And then? Sit back and enjoy the rest.

Storytelling Sunday Three: Pick Your Precious

Storytelling Sunday Three? There is no excuse for not joining in with this one! Everyone can do it. Pick Your Precious is about celebrating the little things you love: those souvenirs, bits and pieces, things from your past you can't bear to throw out. You know, the special little something you have tucked away in a drawer or up on a shelf? Or the thing you love most in a room? Or the object you would save if you knew you had to leave the country? Your favourite things.

Ready to begin?

The Cardboard Sign

Today we are celebrating! Precious? That would be our Silver Wedding Anniversary. Twenty five years? We have been married for more of our loves than ever we were single. Two children, three houses, quite a lot more stuff than we started out with...

...and something which says August instantly, every time I catch a glimpse of it peeping out from underneath a stack of keep-it-flat magazines. It's a simple piece of cardboard. Look closely and you'll see it's the inner packaging from a shirt: the bit you are left with after you peel off the cellophane and take out the pins. Just married it says. And on that August day, as we waved our wedding guests good bye, we discovered it tied to the back of our car. Is that a tradition in your part of the world? It is here. Most honeymooners find their car a riot of toilet paper, balloons, signs and shaving foam. We drove off, tin cans tied to the exhaust, rattling our way towards a dinner of Pot Noodle in our new little house, before our trip to England. We untied the sign as soon as we could, of course, and we set it on the shelf and I've been carrying it from house to house ever since.

It was made by our friend Tony and I'm thinking that he got up that morning and put on a new shirt, all the better to perform his duties as our Bets Man. maybe he peeled off that cellophane and picked out the pins and wondered what the day would bring. 

You do a lot of that, getting ready for a wedding. Unpacking, unwrapping, unpicking. All those gifts: carefully chosen and cushioned in tissue paper, set out on display, used until they fall apart. Clothes, for the big day and beyond: bits of froth in fancy bags mixing with favourites brought out of a suitcase carried from one home to another. Lots of layers, lots of packaging you need to lose before it all means anything. 

i remember the flowers arriving that morning, lifting them out of their cardboard box and wondering how they could possibly be for me. I remember stepping into the vestry to sign the register and the man who had just married us threw his arms round me, my new Father in Law, and everyone laughed because he didn't usually hug all the brides and I thought how lucky I was. And I remember the confetti tumbling to the floor, out of my own new clothes later on in the day. More unwrapping.

You won't be surprised to hear, because you know me well enough by now, that I brushed up that confetti and saved it, picked out the dust and stuck it in our wedding album. I have all the cards we were sent, too, and we're still using the gifts, beautiful things we were given and I'm still holding onto a piece of old cardboard. I think I know why. I think it's because we're twenty five years down that road of peeling back the layers, deciding what we want to keep, and if what we keep is the basic, every day stuff for most of the time, then so be it. Sometimes you don't get to Pick what's Precious.

And, with that in mind, I'll put my piece of cardboard back on the shelf. We have a small party to go to I talked to Little E on the phone about it. He said Auntie Sian, we got cake - chocolate!- and heart shaped balloo- and then there was the sound of a hand being clamped firmly over the mouth of a small boy and the line went dead..

Have a great Sunday, whatever you are up to, but don't forget to Pick Your Precious. I'm ready and waiting. 

Write your post, introduce it as a Storytelling Sunday story and then come back and link us up. You won't regret it! Everyone meets someone new on Storytelling day You have a full week to add your story, and the rest of the month to come back and read your choice of the others. No big rush! Have a think, take your time. And then? Sit back and enjoy the rest.

Storytelling Sunday Three: Pick Your Precious

Storytelling Sunday Three? There is no excuse for not joining in with this one! Everyone can do it. Pick Your Precious is about celebrating the little things you love: those souvenirs, bits and pieces, things from your past you can't bear to throw out. You know, the special little something you have tucked away in a drawer or up on a shelf? Or the thing you love most in a room? Or the object you would save if you knew you had to leave the country? Your favourite things.

Ready to begin?

The Postcard Album

..and we're into July! Mmm..that usually means a trip here. The schools finish at the end of June and we like to skip town as soon as we can; so I'm thinking about travel this month. And souvenirs of journeys taken and reminders of friends who returned. 

I've used a postcard before as a Precious, but I guess that's the way it is with the things we love: we keep wanting to go back: a sure sign of a treasure, something to revisit. Because the card I showed you in February doesn't rest on its own. I pulled it from what, at the age of nine, I grandly called my album (album? my first? Little did I know how many more there were to be in my future). A simple scrapbook (scrapbook? a good word even at that age), bought with my pocket money to house a precious collection.

I loved postcards then, as I love them now. They were cheap and easy to find because of course, lots of us sent them, way back then. A good papery interest. I', paging through right now, impressed with the photo corners. They're still holding on there: a retro romp through that seventies sunshine. because the sun really did shine in the seventies and Auntie Rose went to Exmoor and wrote to say she was sending on my birthday present and cousin Anne went to Ayr and "bought a pair of baggy jeans for £4.50!!" and Caroline stayed in a caravan in Portrush and Hilary made it all the way to Spain ans swam every day. It's all there.

I cherish the cards I was sent, but I also get a smile from the cards I sent: saved by the family so that I could stick them into my book when I got back. From a school trip to London. Look!

1976 and that's how I wrote (spelling doesn't matter in postcards, right?); that's how I signed myself. SG. The girl who loved paper then as she loves it now.

Paper: where would we be without it? Emails, texts, facebook updates: they aren't safely tucked away in a book I can pull out whenever I want. The colours, the feel, the spirit..I need that. Paper is precious. But i think you know that already..

And that's my story for this month. I've kept it short in the hope that it will encourage anyone who doesn't like long to join us! Every month I think - there isn't really anything I can offer all you great storytellers. You get it, you know what you are doing, I have no advice. And then, often, I spot someone saying - I'd like to join in, but I haven't. Yet. And I think to myself - what can I say to persuade you? Is there something else I could have said? Try it! Short is perfect. A few sentences work just fine. Pick the first thing you trip over when you go into the attic, or the last thing you took back out of the charity box (or is that just me?). Start with a who, a what, a why; and if more comes - yes. If it doesn't, maybe that means you have told the whole story. But tell it! Because we're all here to listen.

Write your post, introduce it as a Storytelling Sunday story and then come back and link us up. You have a full week to add your story. No big rush! have a think, take your time. And then? Sit back and enjoy the rest.

Storytelling Sunday Three: Pick Your Precious

Storytelling Sunday Three? There is no excuse for not joining in with this one! Everyone can do it. Pick Your Precious is about celebrating the little things you love: those souvenirs, bits and pieces, things from your past you can't bear to throw out. You know, the special little something you have tucked away in a drawer or up on a shelf? Or the thing you love most in a room? Or the object you would save if you knew you had to leave the country? Your favourite things.

Ready to begin?

The Copper Bracelet

Now here's something that'll make you laugh. When I went to hunt out my Precious this month I couldn't find it. i know what you are going to say: So much for Precious. Maybe you'd be right. After I'd balanced on a kitchen chair to look on the shelves and done that thing - you know the one, where you look under the bed, realise you're covered in dust, consider bringing out the vacuum cleaner and then reconsider very quickly - and scratched my head, I realised what my missing Precious was telling me. What I think we are all becoming more aware of as the year goes on: the story can be more fun to hold on to than the thing itself.

The thing, the Precious, this month? (because The Not So Small One found it, of course, she can find anything) I think it cost less than a pound, when I was, oh, about thirteen, maybe? It doesn't look like much now. It was a cheap little thing, even then. But - and this is the big bit - it had my name on it.

Some of you will understand what that means. If there aren't a lot of "you" around. When I was growing up there were no other "Sians" for miles around. Possibly not surprising, because it's a Welsh name and we didn't live in Wales; but a tricky situation when you are little and your second name is also so unusual you are the only one in the phone book. Nobody could say it (it's "Shan"), nobody could spell it, not even the teachers at school. I dreaded the first roll call of the school year. Doctors, dentists, opticians, hospitals? Every receptionist left me to the end of the queue: clever, on their part, because it meant they didn't have to announce me. I was the only one left. Wow, my Mum must have picked up a lot of useful stuff from all those magazines she read while we waited.

But all of that I could take. I got used to gritting my teeth and smiling sweetly through everyone else's mangled vowels. What I couldn't bear so easily was the lack of stuff. The little things we all like to gather round us as children: proof of ourselves, things named as our own. Souvenir keyring with my name on it? Nope. Mug from a service station shop? Not a chance. Personalised birthday card? Dream on, Sian. It seemed to matter in the 1970's world of novelty items. Funny, now. And so, that's why my little copper bracelet became so important. I spotted the "any name engraved" sign in a shop when I was on holiday at the seaside, and I begged , and I was allowed to order one. I picked it up the next day and the shiny copper sang out that I was Sian, and life was good. Best holiday souvenir ever. Even if it did turn my arm green.

Things are different now. I spend a lot less time in queues since I became Mrs Fair. But I've grown to like my name. It makes me think of those lovely words "I came into the world with nothing and I'll leave with nothing but love". We arrive with nothing and what's the first thing we are given? A name. The first thing anyone chooses just for us. That's worth holding onto. That's precious. I don't really need the bracelet - or even the copper stained green arm - to remind me.

And that's my story done for this month. If you have one of your own to share - and I very much hope that you do! - write your post, introducing it as a Storytelling Sunday story, and come over and link us up. It doesn't have to be about anything precious: we love all kinds of stories here and we promise to give it our full attention. Everyone welcome!

Storytelling Sunday Three: Pick Your Precious

Storytelling Sunday Three? There is no excuse for not joining in with this one - everyone can do it! Pick Your Precious is about celebrating the little things you love: those souvenirs, bits and pieces, things from your past you can't bear to throw out. You know, the special little something you have tucked away in a drawer or up on a shelf? Or the thing you  love most in a room? Or the object you would save if you knew you had to leave the country? Your favourite things.

Ready to begin?

The Girl Guide Shirt

It's Storytelling Sunday! The fifth month of the year and already we have enjoyed a captivating collection of precious items and the memories they help us to hold on to. When I started out in January I had a rough idea of the stories I wanted to tell, for the first few months at least; but what I'm enjoying now is the way your picks are helping me with my picks. maybe that's happening to you too?

Two things led me to my choice for this month: the departure of The (Not So) Small One for her very first Guide Camp; and the thought that, in the end, the remembering is more important than the thing itself.

See, I still have my Girl Guide shirt. It wouldn't be one of the first things I'd grab if I had to leave in a hurry: in fact it took me a while to find it; but it has more memories bundled up inside it than many of the others things here I might count as precious. It's genuine vintage now: "antique" said the girl who slipped on her blue rugby shirt and a fleece before she left. I wore it with a hand knit for warmth, and my school uniform navy skirt, and my yellow scarf.

I relished every minute of Girl Guides. we weren't, as a family, especially fond of the outdoors, so camping and hill walking and orienteering were new delights. at school I didn't like sport, but at Guides I didn't mind getting hit with a ball or pushed off a bench. Guides was different. I slogged my way steadily through a slew of badges, stitching each one to my shirt with pride. I can chart my progress through the size of the stitches: by the time I was ready to leave they were finally as small and neat as I wanted them to be.

Each badge tells its own story: 

Camping? "Shut up Sian, we want to go to sleep."

Camp cooking? "Sian, if you eat that raw sausage, your insides will die."

Laundress (laundress? surely not any more..) "Now remember girls, if you stick chewing gum to your skirt, you can pop it in the freezer and let it harden. then it will be easily removed."

Reader? Nailed that one.

At the end I was awarded the Queen's Guide badge - that was as high as you could go - and a group of us all squeezed into our shirts (which were getting just a little bit tight) for one more ceremony, a presentation of awards by the local Duchess.

And then it was time to leave. The Leader of the Swallow Patrol had to learn to fly. Endings and beginnings, hanging up uniforms and moving on: they've been on my mind this week as The Tall One fitted himself into his school blazer for the very last time. When he isn't looking, I think I'll take the blazer and hang it beside the Guide shirt, let it hold onto its stories too. Maybe there'll be a smoky smelling blue fleece come back from camp to join them. How about it?

My story is done. How's yours coming? Show us some pictures, tell us the story behind whatever you choose: it's all good. Write your post, with an introduction linking back to Storytelling Sunday (so your readers get the idea, the more the merrier!) and come link us up. I'm looking forward to reading about your treasures..

..More information can be found on the Storytelling Sunday page. And, don't forget, any story will be welcomed. It doesn't have to be precious in any way at all! Whatever you have in your head will be just fine: small or tall, we'll read them all. And if you are reading in a Reader, click through now to join in...

Storytelling Sunday Three: Pick Your Precious

Storytelling Sunday Three? There is no excuse for not joining in with this one - everyone can do it! Pick Your Precious is about celebrating the little things you love: those souvenirs, bits and pieces, things from your past you can't bear to throw out. You know, the special little something you have tucked away in a drawer or up on a shelf? Or the thing you  love most in a room? Or the object you would save if you knew you had to leave the country? Your favourite things.

Ready to begin?

The Typewriter

Pick my Precious? This month I could hardly lift it! makes me wonder how my nine year old self used to do it: staggering under its weight, searching out a spot for the potable office..

My Precious today is a typewriter. And I had to find it for you by touch. I let down the loft ladder in my Mum's hall and when I climbed to the top, I remembered that the light hadn't worked for years. So I felt my way along the boards, up over the dolls pram, past the picture frames until I found the case with the crack in it; and then I hauled it - gingerly - over the swathes of insulation and back down the ladder. I remembered the days before the built in ladder arrived; and how my dad would hoist himself up by his arms from a set of ordinary household steps. That always impressed; seemed so manly from a small schoolteacher who wore cardigans and lived in his greenhouse. But I'm getting off the subject.

Or maybe I'm not. The typewriter was his; and when he let me borrow it, I felt his trust. He knew I would be careful. It had travelled with him from a teaching job in Africa (the label says "Union Trading Company: Ghana and Nigeria"); and, when I was little he was still using it in his work. When I wasn't. My work was  essential too. I had a family Gazette to write. I've already told its story here: it was full of homework poetry and self-important diary notes. Sian went to the Library on Wednesday, and borrowed three books. Or On Friday Sian received a letter from Mr. S. Wright.

Mr S.Wright: that was Grandpa, and you've heard about him before too. Within a couple of years both men were gone and the typewriter was put away. But by then I was happily filling exercise books with answers to essay questions. Every weekend: English or History, History or English. I had plenty of words for both.

Which brings us back to today, I guess. We brought the typewriter home. I dusted it and, after a bit of googling, ordered a new ribbon for the executive sum of £4.50. It's at least fifty years old and it works almost perfectly. Maybe you've noticed its work appearing on my pages? I'm even thinking of bringing back the Gazette. Little E took lunch with his cousins on Friday. Oh, but wait - maybe the blog has got there before me...

My story is done. How's yours coming? Show us some pictures, tell us the story behind whatever you choose: it's all good. Write your post, with an introduction linking back to Storytelling Sunday (so your readers get the idea, the more the merrier!) and come link us up. I'm looking forward to reading about your treasures..

..More information can be found on the Storytelling Sunday page. And, don't forget, any story will be welcomed. It doesn't have to be precious in any way at all! Whatever you have in your head will be just fine: small or tall, we'll read them all. And if you are reading in a Reader, click through now to join in...

Storytelling Sunday Three: Pick Your Precious

Storytelling Sunday Three? There is no excuse for not joining in with this one - everyone can do it! Pick Your Precious is about celebrating the little things you love: those souvenirs, bits and pieces, things from your past you can't bear to throw out. You know, the special little something you have tucked away in a drawer or up on a shelf? Or the thing you  love most in a room? Or the object you would save if you knew you had to leave the country? Your favourite things.

Ready to begin

James the Falorie Man

The beginning of March: it always appears as a surprise! St. Patrick's day right in the middle, too; that gave me an idea. I decided to look for a precious that was Irish: something that would help me give a special wave to my storytelling friends who are on scrapping retreats across the sea from me this weekend. I know there are a few! Wait, did I say something? I meant someone. He has been in our family for, oh maybe close to fifty years now, he's certainly precious to us - and when I lifted him from his box this week, I had no idea of the path he would set me on. Meet James the Falorie Man

What do you mean, you've never met a Falorie Man before? No, he's not a Leprechaun: he's from the North of Ireland, for a start, he features in an old street song and his name isn't actually Irish at all. There is some thought that it comes from the English "forlorn", which round here can also mean "mysterious". But enough of the learnin'..

..there aren't too many of them around; and James may well be the only one with his very own story, written by my Grandpa for my aunt when she was a little girl. So, here was my plan: I would go to my Mum's, fetch James, give him a bath and take his picture - and then pull out the manuscript and give you the best bits. I thought of telling you how James lived in a lush, little green glen which can still be found round here if you know where to look, and how he loved to take his boots off and paddle in the stream, all the while talking to his friend Sally the Seagull. How those boots fell into the water and got swallowed by a fish, and how Sally rescued them  and how, to thank her, James prepared a feast: the very first ever meal of fish and chips, cut from good Irish potatoes and eaten to the strains of flutes and fiddles and joyous celebration.

But I couldn't find it. I couldn't put my hand on the copy I was sure I had, on that best blue Basildon Bond paper my Grandpa used for his writing. It wasn't in any of my special-things-places...and I knew that that meant only one thing. Something I hadn't been planning on. The tape.

Because when Grandpa passed on his story to me, well over thirty years ago now, he also gave me a cassette tape. A recording he had made of his reading of the tale; and I hadn't listened to it in all that time: not since he died, probably. I hadn't been planning on listening to it now; but I wanted the details and I thought I could do it; and, so, on a bright, sunny afternoon this week, I slide the tape into its slot and pressed play. The only machine able to do it sits beside my scrapbooking table, and maybe that was what made it right, because Grandpa would most definitely approved of scrapbooking. 

I heard him retell the story he called The First Supper; and then those teenagers of mine appeared and they heard him too; and, as they listened to the voice of a man born before Titanic sailed, they realise, maybe for the first time, how rooted they are in this fine city of shipyards and red brick. That was good. They lifted James from his new seat on the shelf and pulled up his socks and straightened his coat, and reached back, way into the last century and before. For Falorie Men have been around a long time and more besides, and ours isn't planning on leaving any time soon.

Maybe you'll here from him again. If I work out a way of letting you listen, I'll do it. If I finish up transcribing the story, you'll be the first to know. But, for today, that's all there is. My story is done.

How's yours coming? Show us some pictures, tell us the story behind whatever you choose: it's all good. Write your post, with an introduction linking back to Storytelling Sunday (so your readers get the idea, the more the merrier!) and come link us up. I'm looking forward to reading about your treasures..

..More information can be found on the Storytelling Sunday page. And, don't forget, any story will be welcomed. It doesn't have to be precious in any way at all! Whatever you have in your head will be just fine: small or tall, we'll read them all. And if you are reading in a Reader, click through now to join in...

Storytelling Sunday Three: Pick Your Precious

Storytelling Sunday Three? There is no excuse for not joining in with this one - everyone can do it! Pick Your Precious is about celebrating the little things you love: those souvenirs, bits and pieces, things from your past you can't bear to throw out. You know, the special little something you have tucked away in a drawer or up on a shelf? Or the thing you  love most in a room? Or the object you would save if you knew you had to leave the country? Your favourite things.

Ready to begin?

A Postcard In Primary Two

It's February. The month of love. And for that reason, as I was picking my precious, i was thinking about things given to me with love. There are a few pieces of jewellery, fancy handbags, even - but these are the kind of things I would leave behind if I had exit in a hurry. I'd take the man who gave them to me instead. So, in the end I've settled for a simple postcard.

It's not perfectly precious, I'll admit it; but I've held on to it for forty years now, so I guess that means I'm attached. If I disappeared tomorrow, someone would look at it and laugh and wonder what it meant. And, if he or she knew me well enough, they'd know, of course, that there would have to be a story. So here it is.

When I was six my Dad got a new job. A good one, an exciting one; but it did mean moving to a new town. And a new house and a new school. The school thing was hard. I'd only started the year before, and I'd made my friends and shown them that I could read; and suddenly I was being asked to do it all over again..

But when I got there I discovered there was somebody else in a new uniform, with a different accent and parents from out of town. You notice these things in a class of ten. ..

So Ian and I quickly became fast friends. We played houses every lunchtime and he went out to work while I stayed home and tidied. He had a hand knitted school sweater, I remember, and nice brown hair, and one day he came in and said that his dad had been transferred and they'd have to move. Which was not what a girl wants to hear when she sees babies and a cosy little cottage in their future.

They did move, too, quite soon after and it was a wrench. My love life was in tatters and I had to play with the girls instead. One afternoon, a couple of months later, I was settling down to an hour of comprehension cards when the teacher came back from the Staffroom with a handful of post. She pulled a brightly coloured (very brightly coloured. and coloured very brightly too) postcard from the pile and she handed it..to me. It was from Ian! And it was all a bit surreal. A postcard sent to school? Nobody ever got post in school. From abroad? From my boyfriend friend who happened to be a boy? With all the words spelled out in different colours. Wow. 

It still makes me smile to think about it now and that postcard continues to sit in my collection of special letters. I only heard from him the once. But that was enough. He cared. He sent me a precious postcard. And I kept it.

And that's my story for February. Now, how about yours? Show us some pictures, tell us the story behind whatever you choose: it's all good. Write your post, with an introduction linking back to Storytelling Sunday (so your readers get the idea, the more the merrier!) and come link us up. I'm looking forward to reading about your treasures..

..More information can be found on the Storytelling Sunday page. And, don't forget, any story will be welcomed. It doesn't have to be precious in any way at all! Whatever you have in your head will be just fine: small or tall, we'll read them all. And if you are reading in a Reader, click through now to join in...

Storytelling Sunday Three: Pick Your Precious

.It's the first Sunday of 2013 and that means it's time for January's edition of Storytelling Sunday. This year we are celebrating our small stuff. Pick Your Precious asks you to choose something you love from around your house and tell us the story. Anything at all! At the end of the year you'll have a permanent record of some of your favourite things.

and so to my first precious of the year:

The Sewing Box

This one sits safely tucked away on a shelf in my wardrobe. It has travelled with me from house to house since I was five years old; and I last used it about two weeks ago.

Round about the time I started school, my Mum gave me a sewing kit. She made it herself from an old box covered in one of her dresses and filled with everything I might need. I remember pulling out the knitting needles first of all, and my Grandma volunteering to teach me. There was fabric, too: a piece of 1960's pastel paisley I thought was too nice to touch; and, over the years, bits and pieces came and went as I made use of my box. I sewed a piece of bright red cotton into a top to go dancing in when I was seventeen, and then my box was almost empty, so I filled it with my teenage collection of plastic: you know, a 1980's thing? By then my sewing kit was too big for my childhood box: it became - I guess you could call it- a time capsule of tat: my teenage treasures.

So, just before Christmas, The (Not So) Small One arrived home from town:- eyes sparkling, arms full of parcels - after a shopping trip with a friend. She had got everything she needed, she said, but she had run out of money right at the end, with the scarf shop in sight. You know the one? With the Indian scarves? and the jewellery? and the funny smell?

Oh. Yes. I knew the one. Because when I was fourteen I had come up to the city with a map, drawn by an adventurous friend who knew how to find this particular notorious emporium: down a dark alleyway, past the oldest pub in town, underneath a tattoo parlour..

It has moved now, I'm pleased to report, easier and safer to find,though  still with the same array of teenage delights.  So you didn't buy anything? I asked. No, she said sadly and turned to go and put her shopping away. Wait! I said, and I ran for my box. Inside, I knew, was a silver snake bangle I had bought from that shop when I was exactly the age she is now. I gave it to her, of course, and she liked it. Some things don't really change. 

I went looking for it again in her room yesterday, to take a photo; but know what? It wasn't there. She'd gone out wearing it. I'm thinking maybe I'd better see what else that box has to offer. If only I'd kept that red dancing top..

And that's my first Pick. Now, let's hear about yours! Some of you are already talking about a mini-album for the year and I think that would be perfect.Show us some pictures, tell us the story behind whatever you choose: it's all good. Write your post, with an introduction linking back to Storytelling Sunday (so your readers get the idea, the more the merrier!) and come link us up. I'm looking forward to reading about your treasures..

..More information can be found on the Storytelling Sunday page. And, don't forget, any story will be welcomed. Whatever you have in your head will be just fine: small or tall, we'll read them all.

Pick Your Precious

A Very Happy New Year everyone! Everyone here is hoping that you all have a 2013 full of all the things you love best, and more besides. 

2012 was a tough one for many of us. I'm not sorry to leave it behind and I know I'm not the only one. It went out with a whimper here: I didn't end up doing many of the things I'd planned. But you know what? All the same we still had plenty of turkey and pudding and presents; we had Uncle Dave home to stay for a week; we got to spend some time with Little E and enjoy a delicious dinner made by his dad (the excellent Kenny-Who-Cooks); we visited Granny G; and Grannie F's unexpected admission to hospital (after a nasty fall) has meant she is closer to us than usual, so she has been much visited too. That's all good (apart from the hospital bit, obviously. .) and has left me looking forward ..

First up? Well, you know what it is this weekend, don't you? It's the first Sunday of the month! And, yes, Storytelling Sunday will be back! It's a real pleasure to be able to say - Storytelling Sunday returns thanks to popular demand. Sounds like you all do have another year of stories to tell after all. So I've thought about it, and thought about it; and I have come up with a twist for 2013...

Storytelling Sunday 3: Pick Your Precious

There is no excuse for not joining in with this one - everyone can do it! Pick Your Precious is about celebrating the little things you love: those souvenirs, bits and pieces, things from your past you can't bear to throw out. You know, the special little something you have tucked away in a drawer or up on a shelf? Or the thing you  love most in a room? Or the object you would save if you knew you had to leave the country? Your favourite things.

Start looking around, see what you love. Pick Your Precious is for short story tellers and for long. You can take the idea of simply a photo with a few words; or, if you are a can't-stop-yourself storyteller, you can expand as much as you like. The thing to keep in mind is that at the end of the year you'll have a permanent record of the little things you hold dear - and your family will know why you are holding onto them! Doesn't that sound like it might be worth it? No more "Do you really need that?"

You can make this as quick or as carefully documented as you like. You'd be surprised, once you get started, what big stories small objects have to tell. Storytelling Sunday 3? We're celebrating our small stuff!

Things to keep in mind:

- You can still delight us with ANY story you have in your head. Same as before if you can't find an object for the month.

- A photo definitely counts, so if you aren't inspired by a "thing", a photo will work too.

- It's easier to tell a story round an object than to pluck something from thin air so if you haven't joined in before you might like to give this a try.

- If you are having trouble coming up with a choice, ask someone close to you. You might be surprised at what they suggest you think of as precious!

Starting to see the possibilities? I hope so because I'd love to see you back here on Sunday for Round One. Let's see where this takes us!

Storytelling Sunday Two: The Words The Pictures

Welcome to the last Storytelling Sunday of 2012. We've taken it right through the year again, can you believe it? So far we have recorded 473 stories from January to November. Isn't that storytelling to be proud of? Some of you have filed a story for every one of those months, others have enjoyed dropping in when inspiration has struck. I like that: no pressure, just a good yarn when you have one.

Coming Home I said I'd think about for the December edition. And when I decided on that as a Christmas theme, I actually had an entirely different story in mind. But, as some of you know, it's been quiet around here for the last couple of weeks; and, as that husband of mine has made his trips to the Pharmacy and kept us all going, I remembered the first time he looked after me. The first time he brought me home.

Coming Home

We were students. We'd been students for the grand total of six weeks - which means that we'd been a couple for the equally excellent sum of five weeks and a day. Things in the Halls of Residence were fine and dandy. Student life was good. And then I phoned home.

"We know you were planning on coming home for the weekend," they said. "Don't. We've got chicken pox. Stay away from the plague house."

"Oh. Okay," I said. "Um..get well soon.." and I put the phone down.

That ought to have been the end of the story, of course. But, you know, I started thinking..it was half way through my first term, I'd been looking forward to telling them all how I was doing, everyone else was clearing out and I'd be on my own all weekend. Plus, they were sick, they needed my help...

I went home. And you can tell where this is going, can't you? I got back to Halls on Sunday night. By Wednesday i wasn't feeling too good. On Thursday I didn't want to get out of bed; and by Friday it was obvious to all my new student friends: I had chicken pox.

What were we going to do? I couldn't stay in Halls. My boyfriend did the only thing he could think of: he phoned his Dad. And that dear, good man took charge. He had only met me once, for about ten minutes; but he already understood that his son and I meant a lot to each other, and he didn't hesitate. He didn't know me, I didn't know him; but he got straight into his car and drove through the night from his home town to the university and then on to my town, with a sick, feeling-very-sorry-for-herself girl in the back of his car. He delivered me safely to my own recovering family and then he turned round and drove all the way back.

I still think it's one of the kindest things anyone has ever done for me. My new boyfriend and his Dad brought me home; and I loved them for it. I got back to Halls after a week, just in time for the Christmas parties and life went on. But that night made a big impression on me and, today, when our two ask for a story about their Grandpa, I'll quite often tell them this one. I reminded that boyfriend about our first Christmas just yesterday. 

"I should have known then," he said, like he always does. "Sometimes you need a bit of looking after. But you always bounce back. Just in time for Christmas party season, too."

Not that year, but the next. Packing up for Christmas, I'm taking a break, looking out the window of my room in  Halls. I see I'm wearing a sweater I knitted myself and  my favourite pair of black ski pants (ski pants?! It was the 80's)

And that's my story for today. Are you going to help us bring the grand total for the year to 500? Oh, let's do it! Write your Storytelling Sunday post, come on over and add your link, drop by on some of the other storytellers..let's make December the best one of the year.

Storytelling Sunday Two: The Words The Pictures

Welcome to Storytelling Sunday! It's the first Sunday of the month and that means it's time for our merry band of storytellers to gather round and offer us a tale or two or three..

Everyone is welcome. We like our stories any way we can find them: short, long, small or tall, we'll read them all! And if you would like to join us, all you have to do is create a Storytelling Sunday post, letting your readers know what it's all about then come back over here and link us up. Newcomers are always made to feel at home - everyone meets someone new when they join Storytelling Sunday! So don't hold back, come and join us: you'll find an audience just waiting and ready...

..and I think that's my cue to begin

A Helping Hand

It was a dark and stormy night and Uncle Sam was working late at the shop. He was studying to be a pharmacist, in the days when chemists seemed a little like conjurers with their own remedies at hand; and he was putting in a few hours at what was rumoured to be the oldest shop around. Certainly it looked as if it had been there the day Dickens came to town; and everyone knew that was where, as a little boy, CS Lewis had been dosed with cough medicine. They knew because their Grandmas had been there and watched him splutter. So, you have a picture in your head by now? Bow windows, little leaded panes of glass, a polished wooden counter and a hand painted sign hanging from a curly cast iron bracket.

That sign was creaking in the wind the night Uncle Sam sat on his wooden stool, high up in the attic, practising what he had begun to learn: making pills himself the old, original way. It was round this time of year: November, foggy, pitch black outside, blustery, and the lights flickered as the pile of tablets grew.

Photo from our trip to Blists Hill Victorian Town 2010

It was getting late. He rubbed his eyes, leaned back to stretch his back and as he did, he heard a noise. Someone was coming up the stairs. He hadn't been expecting a visitor - staying late was the student's job - but into the room came an elderly gentleman; maybe his boss's age, maybe a bit older, and he nodded and walked over to see what Uncle Sam was doing. he threw back his head and laughed and he shook the pills out of their moulds and he started again. He showed Uncle Sam a few tricks, never saying much, but what he did seemed to work, and the little piles of medicines grew as the wind howled and the lights dipped. And then, out of the corner of his eye, Uncle Sam caught a shimmering, rippling movement; and, when he turned, he realised that the man had gone. Simply, quietly, without saying a word. It was strange. It was. But students (especially, perhaps, pharmacy students?) sometimes like to accept strange; and, after all, the work was now done. Uncle Sam shrugged his shoulders, slipped on his coat and went home.

He asked around. No one knew who the man was, though it was agreed that his work was exemplary. And that was what led someone to suggest the story of the original owner of the chemist shop. Long gone, now; he had died in a terrible accident, many years ago, on one dark November's night..

I didn't hear this story from Uncle Sam. I heard it from his sister, my Mum. She told it, she let it hang in the air and then she laughed and said "I'll have to be honest. Years later he told us that he had made it up." But then we got to talking and thinking and here's the thing - Uncle Sam is known as a good, honest man. He always has been. Would he have pulled a story like this out of thin air? Or was he testing it out? Did something really happen and he wasn't sure if he wanted to believe it himself? So he tested it out as a story to see what the world would say? Uncle Sam isn't telling, so I'll leave you to decide...

And when you've had a think, please do have a hop around and enjoy some more stories. The audience is an important part of Storytelling Sunday - it doesn't work if you aren't there to listen! So have a read, say hello, we're all ready for you.

Adding a link? You have all week to do it - the linky list won't close until next Sunday. And if you make a layout to go with your story, I'll add it to the Storytelling Sunday Pinterest Board.

Storytelling Sunday Two: The Words The Pictures

Welcome to Storytelling Sunday! It's our first-Sunday-of-the-month gathering of storytellers, tale spinners, journalers and memory keepers. I'm ready to make a start if you are..

The Fastest Fancy Dress

On Friday I told you about our family's love of dressing up. Fancy Dress holds no fears for the Fairs! And we start 'em young..

So: start of October. The talk about costumes for the family Fancy Dress Party begins; and, in the middle of it all, the Parent Teacher Association send out their flyer about the Annual Fireworks and Fancy Dress Parade. It's The Small One's first year of school, and we can tell she's tempted. Last two, we didn't go, Loud and Bangy Things being at the top of The Tall One's Big List of Things to Avoid. So, we talked about it and considered it and in the end we decided not to go: we would stay at home, under the kitchen table in our hard hats.

And that was that. The day of the Fireworks display arrived and I spent the afternoon cutting out costumes for the family party (Pirates of the Caribbean, I think it was that year. One miniature Jack Sparrow, one even more miniature Elizabeth Swann) before serving up a big shepherds pie in time for tea. As we ate, I watched a very small Small One slump in her chair. She stirred her potato round her plate. She sighed loudly for added effect; and eventually we just had to ask her what was the matter..

"I want to go to the Fancy Dress," she said. "I want to go."

"But you don't have a ticket. Or a costume," we replied.

"I really want to go," said a very small Small One, in an even smaller voice, and she pushed her plate away and looked at her toes.

"I suppose I could take her," said her Dad. "But it starts in twenty minutes and it's a sell-out, no tickets left, i'd have to talk our way in..and then there's the little matter of her costume..."

It was true. The Pirate costume was still in pieces on the Dining Room table. 

We looked at each other. Thomas! we both said.

I told you we never throw anything out. "Thomas" was a four year old cardboard box fashioned into a steam engine to suit The Tall One's fancy, and it was sitting ready in the attic. We fetched it. It fitted. She got in the car, clutching an old cap for her head and with Thomas beside her, and they drove off into the night...

..and about half an hour later they were back. With First Prize! They had arrived with seconds to spare. The Fancy dress Parade was already parading and the judging was about to begin. The Small One had clambered onto the stage and joined in at the end of the row. Her dad had popped the cardboard box Thomas over her head and stuffed the train driver cap on her head. It had been enough. The judges had liked it. She accepted First Prize and, as the first fireworks flared in that dark October sky, The Small One was carried home to bed.

And that's almost the end of the story. Almost, but not quite. With a bit more preparation, she won the next year..and the year after that..and the year after that the PTA decided I'd better do the judging instead. But that sounds like the beginning of a different tale entirely..

..and that's my story for today. Like to join in with one of your own? We'd love to have you! Everyone welcome. Simply write your story, with an introduction to Storytelling Sunday and come on over. add your link and we'll come and enjoy...and don't forget - tell your story your best way: if that means photos, not words, then that will do very nicely indeed. We'll take our stories any way you care to offer them! If you make a layout to go with your story, i'll pin it to the Storytelling Sunday Pinterest Board: it's beginning to fill up very nicely with reminders of Sundays past. Now, let's  tell stories...

Storytelling Sunday Two: The Words The Pictures

First Sunday in the month? Then it has to be Storytelling Sunday! Let's dive right in;

L is for Life Lessons and Lentils

It's not often I take a picture especially for Storytelling Sunday. Usually I'm pulling one from the past. But for today I had nothing quite right. I needed lentils. 

Does anyone actually need lentils? they're saying round here. Well, I like them. Especially in soup. And (almost) every time I reach for the jar, I think about the first time I tried to cook them. The time I turned to lentils in my hour of need.

It was round this time of year. Let's call it late September. But dark, gloomy, classrooms with the lights on and nature tables loaded with Autumn. I was nine and I was hungry. Nothing new there: most nine year olds are hungry; but, after a summer of my Mum's cooking, the miserable old problem of school dinners was pressing on my mind.

Our school dinners were loathsome. School itself, I liked. The food? It still makes me shudder to think of it.No packed lunches allowed, no snacks from home: it was basically blackmail. They offered it up, we refused to eat it and everyone went hungry. Tapioca, semolina, wartime rations for 70's kids who dreamed of fish fingers and Angel Delight. Oh, yes. We were hungry.

And on that day, I cracked. I'd like to say that my plan came to me in a dream; but actually it arrived in a supermarket carrier bag full of dried pulses. We'd all been asked to bring stuff for a craft project. A stick on fantasy of peas and rice. Mmm..peas and rice..real food. I knew what I had to do.

It was easy. Mum did it all the time. She took the dried stuff. She boiled it up and an hour or two later we all had lunch. An hour or two? I still had time! we hadn't even done Science yet. I would take my raw ingredients, I decided, and prepare a delicious feast. My picture would be light on lentils, but my belly would be full. I needed to work fast. I needed to plan. But I was a Girl Guide, I knew what I was doing. I waited for breaktime, until the teacher had slipped out for a coffee (I knew there were biscuits in that staffroom and I was bitter, but I wasn't broken)..I carefully, quietly took an empty glass coffee jar from the store cupboard. I filled it with hot water from the tap, I poured in my lentils, screwed on the lid and set it gently in my locker. Now all I had to do was sit back and wait. At lunchtime my soup would be ready. I'd feast, I'd eat my fill and I might even have enough to go round. Sian's soup kitchen would be in business.

Well, you know what happened, of course. My coffee jar full of lukewarm water and dried lentils was still a coffee jar of lukewarm water and dried  lentils at lunchtime. Though by going home time it had changed - to a coffee jar full of cold water and dried lentils. I got into my mum's car and asked her if she had any toast and jam.

I was still happy I'd tried. It might have worked. I might have found fame as a world class lentil handler. These days I do a lot of slow cooking. I have cracked the Crock Pot. And my picture making has improved too. In fact I would go so far as to say - same situation today? you know what? I'd choose sticking over soup making. And that's what makes it, as they say,  a funny old life..

And that's my story for today. I can't wait to see who else has one to share.  If you have one  we'd love to hear from you! A photo and a few words (or maybe the few words without the photo?) or something a bit longer. I love them all! Create your  Storytelling Sunday post with an introduction (so your readers know what's going on) and a link back here and then come on over. The linky stays open all week, so if your story isn't ready for Sunday - no worries! And if you add a link - then, please, do say hello to some other storytellers. We can't tell stories on our own, we need an audience. So.. ready, steady, story..