Who we are today is a culmination of who we were yesterday, who were our parents, who has influenced our lives and who we really want to be.

My maternal grandmother was, in my memory, one of the most loving people in my life. We called her Fuddy…I have no idea why and now there is no-one to ask. Her death was my first experience with intense grief ….I was thirteen at the time.

My mother was Barbara Harrington Hayhurst. She was a talented, loving person, giving herself wholly to care for her husband and four children. I have tried to emulate her in so many ways but it is difficult to meet her selfless standards.

My father was John Douglas Hayhurst, a brilliant man whose heart was broken when my mother died. At that time he retired from the civil service and went back to the North of England and pursued and obtained several degrees before his death in 1986. My parents were a loving couple though my father was not one for showing his feelings, though the picture to the left is so intimate!

My mother had a sister Jean, to whom she was very close (just like my sister and I)

One of the places we loved to visit as children was the farm owned by our great-uncle Tom Sandell and his son, Jim. Feeding lambs during Easter snow storms and riding on the combine harvester in late summer were times I remember best, as well as my great-aunt Fan’s wonderful trifle!