Bees in My Bonnet

 We visited again with Shannon this morning. The weather is cool and perfect and drinking tea seems to fit the mood.  We said goodbye and made our way to Donaghadee to poke around this small town on the coast and visit the local graveyard. I was looking for relatives from long ago - last names of Walker, Allen, Hamilton, and even McDowell. I'm not sure those I found are related... I'll need to do some more digging. I haven't done much homework on the tracing-your-lineage thing. Someone did most of this for the Crutchfield side a while ago. I don't have much mapped out from my mom's side - the Walker, Allen side.  I started to wonder about those in the distant past of my family when reading the book 'Translating Your Past ' by Michelle Van Loon. I highly recommend this book! It made me think - who were these people? What were their values? What is my heritage?  Wandering around the harbour and town and talking to locals, I get a sense of tradition, value, his...

 Jet lag.  Awake at midnight. So I started digging around on 'find a grave site' website to see if I can locate Grandpa Walker's cousin, Nina somewhere in Belfast. No luck, even if I am part Irish. Mom's cousin, Aunt Barbara, helped quite a bit with pics of documents etc. Finally got tired around 5 a.m. Slept 'til 10. Didn't want to sleep the day away, and it was sunny. Sam took me to Scrabo tower. Sun was bright and happy, like us. Maybe a rarity for me. Ireland suits my personality. I feel at home here. I wish I could grow a garden here. Rain most days feels needed. Like window washing for the soul. Verdant life abounds everywhere.  The tight roads and winding curves fry my nerves...I learn to trust. The locals drive here every day and they don't crash! Amazing! After the tower we came home and had leftover Indian food for lunch. We had gone out for that last night. Then we headed out to see Shannon, Sam's cousin's daughter. She was home with her t...

 Since the whirlwind that is our life has been fairly non-stop for the past 25 years, Sam decided it would be fun to go somewhere, just the two of us. He gave me a few options and I don't remember what the others were because I instantly, without a pause, said, "Ireland".  And after months of planning and getting a new passport, two days ago, we boarded the plane and landed in Dublin yesterday, drove two hours north to Belfast, walked to a local fish 'n chips place, and went to church this morning. I'll put a few pictures here and hand-write some notes to type up when at a computer next week.  It's quite the adventure already 😊