#52 Ancestors in 52 Weeks 2024 - Week 8 - Heirlooms

 

I have quite a few keepsakes in my possession that I have acquired over the years and some would say that I have far too many.  I am not a hoarder but I do love my ornaments and things that mean something to me.  These things are not antiques or worth a lot of money but they are all part of who I am and where I have come from.

My Christmas decorations have a special place in my heart and they bring me joy every year to see them displayed.  One of the most treasured things on my Christmas tree is some very old and tattered and threadbare gold and pink tinsel.  My Dad brought this home one year when one of the clubs he delivered small goods to was updating their decorations and was throwing it out.  It has stood the test of time and adorned our Christmas trees of my childhood, travelled with my Mum in her possessions after Dad died and then became part of our family decorations.  I leave it on our Christmas tree now each year when packing up, to preserve it a little bit longer as I think the putting on and taking off each year is a bit too much for it and would add to its threadbare(tinsel bare?) state.  So now it is carefully covered with the whole tree each year. 

Another favourite tree decoration for me are the set of wooden Christmas teddy bear hanging ornaments that I painted in one of my Folk Art classes.  These are all named on the back and this year I asked the Grandies to pick their two favourite while decorating our tree and their initials were also written on the back.  So somewhere down the track CR, AJ, IF, PH, LP, EJ and CM will know which ones they may claim!  I also have quite a few hand painted Christmas ornaments and plaques that I loved painting and which give me much pleasure.  I have a fairly large collection of Santas.  Each year they adorn a coffee table and as yet I haven’t been able to stop my addiction with collecting them, but I do try to limit the purchase to one a year. 

I also have lots of glassware in our china cabinet that was my Mums.  Some of the things are also mine that I have acquired over the years.  I have a twelve piece dinner set that I got for my 21^st from a group of friends.  This over the years was brought out for special occasions but it hasn't seen much use lately as I don't have the ability to get it out and put it away.

Then I have my books.  Fred said once on Facebook that he thought I should have been a librarian as I had more books than a library, he is a bit prone to exaggeration!  But in saying that I do have some favourites that I would love someone else to eventually treasure as much as I.  I have a collection of Georgette Heyer that has brought me many hours of enjoyment. Also I have a collection of paperback Agatha Christies mysteries that were my Mums.  She would scour the Op shops for copies that she didn't have and I haven't had the inclination to get rid of them.  Then there is my collection of Anne of Green Gables.  So I have noted many times with my family to think before they relegate things to the Op shops. 

I am currently working on my heirlooms.  My quilts!  Sewing patchwork quilts brings me joy.  Also seeing Grandies snuggled up together under one, two or three of my quilts while watching TV is something I treasure!  They still manage to find them even on a stinking hot day!  So I am happily creating my supply of snuggle quilts for heirloom treasures.

I need to go through my china cabinet and mark things that have been passed down to me.  Most of these things I don’t know the origin of, as my Mum and Dad just had them when they were around and of course it was never mentioned where or how they came to have them.  I also have a very delicate diamond ring which was given to me for my seventeenth birthday and from memory was told it belonged to a Great Aunt.  Who was this Great Aunt?  I have no idea and I don’t remember ever being told and why I didn’t ask I will never fathom!  

So in writing this it has spurred me into thinking that I need to get around to documenting what things are and how they came to be for future generations.  I just hope they are given the same pride of place that I have given them.

#52 Ancestors in 52 Weeks 2024 - Week - 6 - Earning a Living

 

John Robert Brandt was born on 22 October 1876 in the goldfields near Gulgong. He was the fourth son born to Alfred and Louisa Brandt.  Another two sons and a daughter were born after John.

John lost his father in 1883 when he fell to his death down a well.  His mother remarried August Engstrom in 1886 and another daughter was added to the family in 1887.  Then August died in 1888, leaving his wife of two years with eight children.  Louisa was the licensee of the Sugarloaf Inn, near Gunnedah NSW, which she had run with her first husband and continued after his death with her second husband, although the license was only in her name.

As a young boy of thirteen and the fourth oldest my great uncle John Robert Brandt must have had yearnings to get out into the world and help his widowed mother.  No doubt he was home schooled and ready to take on more responsibility. I assume like most teenagers he was keen to prove his worth and earn a living.  He probably nagged his mother to let him get a job.  He would have had dreams and plans, but I assume initially it was only his desire to help his family.

From a report found in the local newspaper of the day I have learnt that John’s employment came to a tragic end.^⁠1  Also I feel for his mother who had buried two husbands and now was faced with her son’s death all in the space of seven years. In the same clipping from this paper it was reported on the amount of rain the area had received. Most probably the ground where he was working in his employer’s yard was very slippery from all the rain and may have contributed to his accident.  It sounds like he was in great pain for four days in hospital before his death.  Did his mother sit by his side in her own pain during this time? Whatever his dreams for future employment they were cut short too soon.

I have not been able to find any information as to what he was actually employed as or how long he had been employed.  Surely at the age of thirteen it couldn’t have been for long.  I hope that he was happy in whatever he was doing and not just treated as a drudge as a lot of children were treated in these times.

From the Australian Town and Country Journal (Sydney, NSW 

ACCIDENT, -  A lad named John Brandt, about 14 years of age, met with a painful accident on Sunday last.  It appears that he was doing something in the back yard of his employer, when he somehow fell on to a pointed piece of wood.  The splinter tore his jaw and some part of the cheek. He was afterward removed to the hospital, suffering great agony, and died on the following Thursday.

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¹ Gunnedah. (1890, March 1). Australian Town and Country Journal (Sydney, NSW : 1870 - 1919), p. 15. Retrieved February 4, 2024, from http://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article71108542

#52 Ancestors in 52 Weeks 2024 - Week 5 - Influencer

 

I have been struggling all week for something to write about for this prompt.  Who in my Family Tree could I write about? 

Nothing jumped out at me, no one sprang to mind.  But then I changed my thinking once again as I have done in the past and realised that maybe I am looking in the wrong places.  To my family I may possibly be an Influencer or at least I have had many influencers in my life that made me the person I am.

So I have decided to write a little post on who and why certain people have influenced me.  Yes there are the usual family members, parents, siblings, children etc.  But for the purpose of this exercise I am also going to touch on people outside of my family who have shared their talents with me.  

I had a good friend and mentor who always said that you really should share your talents, otherwise what was the point of having them.

So over the years I have dabbled in many hobbies and art forms.  My family and friends will attest to this as they have also been gift recipients of my work for many years.

It would be remiss in me not to include my first Influencer - my Mum.  It was through her example and teaching that I became a sewer.   Following her lead but not her ability I became an adequate clothes sewer.  I outfitted my four children when they were young and also made many home furnishings and camping gear.  My husband would get an idea for something and ask if I could do it and if he was prepared to design the object he had in mind I would take on the challenge to sew it. My trusty sewing machine never let me down despite the challenges I threw at it….tent canvas, tent zippers, tarpaulins, bags for camping gear etc.

Then around the age of forty I was looking for a new hobby and was keen to dabble in folk art.  My Mum encouraged me by shouting me an introductory course and away I went.  I signed up with a very talented teacher for weekly lessons in a class of about sixteen.  These lessons continued from Beginner, Intermediate, Advanced and then just onto long term members.  My teacher Carolyn was and still is a very talented artist.  But more to the point she had the ability to impart her skills with grace and encouragement.  It was her influence that also saw me progress from Folk Art to Pastel Painting, although she never actually taught me Pastels as she moved away to another state, but she became a life long friend from our time together in classes and I cherish her influence in my life.

But my sewing skills although a bit inactive once my children had all left home, came to the for again when grandchildren came along.  It was lovely to sew for little people again especially at Christmas time!  Every year my grandchildren with encouragement from their parents indulged me with wearing Christmas outfits sewn with love.  This was a relative easy task as I had six granddaughters and one grandson.  The dresses were easily produced but the outfit for the grandson was a bit more of a challenge.  Luckily I was able to access super hero fabric and appliquéd these figures on handmade t-shirts and put a Santa hat on a different one each year!  It is here that I can also see the influence of my Mum as she loved Christmas.

In the last four years though I have hankered for a more creative outlet with my sewing.  Here is where I introduce my next Influencers Monica and Alaura Poole, a mother and daughter team who started an online QAYG(Quilt As You Go) Patchwork Youtube channel and classes.  I dove into the wonderful creativity of quilting, along with many others.  It was through these ladies that I also ventured into the creative process of thread painting which has given me much joy.  I fell in love with this art form and now I have gone onto my own designs which fall into the category of “Textile Art - Fabric and Thread Painting”.  I now have the confidence to design and create pieces of art, although there is room for a lot of improvement. 

So now with guidance from these online courses and teachers, I now consider that I have gone from a “Sewer” to a “Sewist”!  I have sewn for over 56 years but now I am finding this new art form takes me on a journey with my sewing machine, that challenges and excites me. I have dabbled in many painting mediums over the years but this world of thread sketching and thread painting with unlimited resources of colour, design, texture and imagination is exhilarating. There is no paint, paper or pencils involved! Just Me and my hands let loose with free motion sketchy stitching, fabric and threads on my trusty sewing machine. But I do still pick up the brushes or pastels occasionally. 

As to my mentor who suggested that a talent not shared was a talent wasted. It has just occurred to me that he was an Influencer as I have over the last nineteen years donated a framed painted piece of art or lately a framed Thread painting for auction to the annual Wally Bamford Memorial Benefit Concert.  This concert raises funds for research by the The Centenary Institute, into the disease SADS, in memory of my daughter-in-love’s brother who died at the age of 26 in 2004.