MQ7 - Sidmouth

It's a new dawn, it's a new day....

My Mum was coming with us on today's trip out.  She came to my house first (she doesn't drive) and we went on from here.  Just before she came, I had a quick scout round with 'my mother's eyes' - do you know what I mean?  She doesn't come here often - my Nan never came to our house much during our childhood, we always went (very frequently) to hers, so now we always go to my parents rather than the other way round.  I digress.  I picked up stuff and threw other stuff into cupboards, I cleared my  bed of debris, I put away dishes and I wondered whether to hide my dying basil and thyme plants on the windowsill because she was bound to say something about that.  She sees stuff.  She sees the tiniest of details which I care not a jot about, but somehow her noticing them makes me feel that I should notice them too.

This nerve-jangling start to the morning aside, it was nice to have her along.  Nice for Oliver to have a bit of extra company,  he loves her, and she is a very good Nan.  Although being a good Nan does not obviously preclude her from saying 'your plants aren't doing very well' when eyeing up my windowsill.  Sigh.

So we headed off to Sidmouth.  I thought that Topsham was full of oldies.  Sidmouth was something else.  It was like an oldies convention had descended on the town.  Everywhere I looked, there was a crinkly face to be seen.  Bless, but bloody hell - it was packed! 

The museum, thankfully, was not so busy.

They have a really good children's area with loads to do:

Oliver has never seen this toy before and was quite excited about it.  He wanted to immediately rush out and buy one, but I reminded him that as we live in a bungalow, the lack of stairs would make it a bit dull to play with...

I pressed him into a quiz (as an alternative to manually writing out a few sentences of his own).  My Mum did one too, under the guise of 'doing it for Oliver'.  Hmmm.  She looked quite into it from where I was standing.

You see this:

We had this footie game when I was growing up.   I remember it so well - my brother and I played it incessantly.  AND I had those yellow Rupert books.  My Mum thought it funny that I am now old enough to see my childhood toys in a museum.  That wiped the nostalgic smile from my face pretty sharpish I can tell you. 

A couple of things which captured my interest:

I didn't realise that there was a 'Crown of England' and that it is only worn for coronations. 

 

And this:

Wow, wow, wow.  Can you just imagine the feeling you would have coming across that in a ditch?  Can you imagine how it would feel to touch it, and picture the last time it was held by human hands?  This is what excites me so much about old things.  I once went to an exhibition at the Tate of Pre-Raphaelite art (which I LOVE), and felt quite breathless standing in front of paintings and knowing that the painters themselves would once have stood in front of these paintings - that their hands had touched them and their eyes had seen them as I was seeing them.  I love to go to National Trust places and walk into rooms in grand properties and imagine I was walking into them as if I actually lived there hundreds of years ago.  I like to reach out and touch the city wall whenever I pass by it in town and picture the hands which built it.  Touching history - that's what really excites me. 

Anyhoo.

We popped into a cafe for lunch (pensioners specials all round ha ha)

My Mum does not normally smile like this.

And then to the park for a breath of fresh air:

 

 

Do you like my scarf?  I love it - it's chunky and was perfect for the day.  I also got it from a charity shop about 10 minutes earlier and it cost me £2.  Oh happy day.

This was a good day, and this was a lovely museum.  Our preference is definitely for the smaller museums.  Have I said that before already?  Sorry to bore.