grandad kit

Thank you for reading my blog. If you have difficulty seeing your grandchildren, or have any views about my situation, I would welcome your messages by e-mail through this blog site. If you wish, just use a first name or a nickname and your identity will be protected, like mine – “Grandad Kit.”

Dear “Tom”

Mending a damaged heart

I am your other grandfather, the one you have never met. You are three years old, and although I have never met you, I love you dearly and always will. You are my flesh and blood, and always will be. We will meet one day, I am sure.

Today I went to see a friend of mine who has been very, very ill. He had smethign wrong with his heart, and he was so ill he nearly died. What happened was, he was taken into hospital and these very clever doctors took a vein out of his leg (a vein is a tube inside you body that carries blood all round the body) and used that piece of vein to mend his heart. I think the vein in his leg with a bit missing will grow again, but I'm not sure about that.

The important thing is that my friend is gradually feeling better and in a few months time will be completely better. But at the moment he is so weak, that he can't properly dress himself or take a shower. His wide has to help him! (And that's quite hard, because he is a big, big man and very heavy). In other words, my frine is like a very very big baby!

LOve from

Grandad Kit and Nana Ann

Thank you for reading my blog. If you have difficulty seeing your grandchildren, or have any views about my situation, I would welcome your messages by e-mail through this blog site. If you wish, just use a first name or a nickname and your identity will be protected, like mine – “Grandad Kit.”

Dear “Tom”

A grand house

I am your other grandfather, the one you have never met. You are three years old, and although I have never met you, I love you dearly and always will. You are my flesh and blood, and always will be. We will meet one day, I am sure.

Today Grandad went to visit a very rich man who lives in a big, old house, a very grand house. To get into the house you have to drive up to the gate, which opens automatically, so you can drive straight through. Of course the gate opens only if you are expected, not everybody can get in. The house is a very fine house, looking over the gardens and the countryside. Every room has a different view. I had a cup of coffee in the kitchen with the housekeeper, a very nice lady who looks after the house. The kitchen is big and warm with a big wooden table and wooden chairs.

The reason I was there was to make a film with this man. I didn't do the actual filming - that was done by two other peope who came with their film camera and sound recording equipment. It was onyl a very short film, but making a film is very interesting. When the first film didn't come out quite right, we sinmply did it again. After the third time, it was just right.

On my way to the house I called at the home of a friend of mine who lives in the nearby village. She wasn't at home, but as I was driving up the road I saw her - she had been going for a walk. So I was able to get to talk to her. I haven't sen her for a long time, so it was nice to meet and have a chat. She asked about Nana Ann and I said we would both come and see her and her husbnad very soon.

Tonight I was supposed to go to another boxing match, but again I was too busy to go. But a friend of mine wnet with his father. No doubt they'll tell me all about it when we next meet up.

Love from

Grandad Kit and Nana Ann

Thank you for reading my blog. If you have difficulty seeing your grandchildren, or have any views about my situation, I would welcome your messages by e-mail through this blog site. If you wish, just use a first name or a nickname and your identity will be protected, like mine – “Grandad Kit.”

Dear “Tom”

Curtain Shop

I am your other grandfather, the one you have never met. You are three years old, and although I have never met you, I love you dearly and always will. You are my flesh and blood, and always will be. We will meet one day, I am sure.

You know I'm writing a book about a house, a new house and a vcery unusual one that's being built near us. Well, all the people who have had something to do with building the house, the people who make the furniture, the kitchen, the bathrooms, the swimming pool and so on, as well as the builders themselves and the architects who drew up the plans, well, they are all going to be in the book with words and pictures to show what they have done.

So the man who is providing the curtains for the house - and there are going to be some very nice and very unusual curtains - he is going to be in the book as well. So today I went to see him. Not only did he show me round his shop with all its curtains and fabrics for making dresses and so on, he also showed me upstairs where he has a treasure trove of all kinds of cloth - silk, cotton and so on (I can't remember all the kinds of cloths, Nana Ann will do, she used to be a seamstress mamking dresses on so ). It's all very intresting, and you'll be able to read about it in the book.

If ever you can coem up and see us here in the North, I'll show you the house. And I'm sure I'll be able to take you inside and show you this fantastic house. It will have a swimming pool underneath!

Love from

Grandad Kit and Nana Ann

Thank you for reading my blog. If you have difficulty seeing your grandchildren, or have any views about my situation, I would welcome your messages by e-mail through this blog site. If you wish, just use a first name or a nickname and your identity will be protected, like mine – “Grandad Kit.”

Dear “Tom”

The House of Lords

I am your other grandfather, the one you have never met. You are three years old, and although I have never met you, I love you dearly and always will. You are my flesh and blood, and always will be. We will meet one day, I am sure.

Today was a very exciting day, a great day. Grandad went down to London and (of course) met up with Nana Ann after work, as we alawys do, but best of all, this evening Nana Ann and Grandad went to the House of Lords to meet up with a lot of people who went to the same university as me, Durham University. Durham University is the third oldest university in England, after Oxford and Cambridge. This year Durham University is 175 years old, and there are all kinds of celebrations going on.

This was a sort of party, with drinks and eats. Not only did we go into the House of Lords, which is a grand place, we had the party on the terrace, overlooking the River Thames. When you see pictures of the Houses of Parliament, they are usually taken from the opposite side of the river - the Albert Embankment, where you can ealk along. So, looking across the river from the Albert Embankment, you can see all of the Houses of Parliament and the terraces at tghe bottom of the building where people can go and look out over the river.

As you look across the river, the House of Lords is on the left and the House of Commons is on the right. There are two houses, so that's why it's called the Houses of Parliament. The Lords sit in the House of Lords (of course!) and the MPs sit in the House of Commons. Grandad would have liked to have been an MP or a Lord, but it looks like it's too late now - but I could still try!

When we were looking out over the River Thames, we saw a young ducj swimming around. It m,ust have been lost, because it swam round and round and looked in at the bank in various places befores going up the river and out of sight. We hope it found its family.

Nana Ann workls in a building very close to the Houses of Parliament. At the party she saw a man who works in her office. They were very surprised to see each other. Nana Ann didn't know her friend used to go to Durham University, but they were pleased to see each other and we all had a very nice chat.

Then it as back on the train and goodbye to Nana Ann, unitl the next timne - which won't be very long.

Love from

Grandad Kit and Nana Ann

Thank you for reading my blog. If you have difficulty seeing your grandchildren, or have any views about my situation, I would welcome your messages by e-mail through this blog site. If you wish, just use a first name or a nickname and your identity will be protected, like mine – “Grandad Kit.”

Dear “Tom”

Wrong day

I am your other grandfather, the one you have never met. You are three years old, and although I have never met you, I love you dearly and always will. You are my flesh and blood, and always will be. We will meet one day, I am sure.

Today I went to the printers to meet with the printer and a man who is designing one of my books. He's called a designer (ha ha!). But the designer wasn't ther. He got the wrong day, and he had already been the previous day. Forntunately, no damage was done, as he and the printer had duscussed waht to do with my book. But it is very annoying when people don't get the right time for a meeting - although I've done that myself more than once. But I always write the time and place of meetings in my diary, which I look at every day to see "where I am today."

In the evening I met with a lot of people who want to be local councillors (like Grandad!). To be a councillor, or an MP for that matter, you have to put your name forward. Your name is printed on pieces of paper called ballot papers, along with all the other people who want to be councillors, MPs and so on. Then all the people have a vote - that is, they mark these ballot papers to show which person they want to be elected as their MP or councillor.

The person who gets the most votes - that is, the most popular person who gets the most people to vote for them - they get elected. It's like any other contest, a game of football or cricket, there are winners and losers. The winners are very happy, and the losers are very sad. But the winners know that in a few years time, they will have to be elected again if they are to continue as councillors or MPs, and the losers know they can have another go and might be successful next time. It's all very interesting.

When you go to school, you might be asked to elect one of your classmates as form captain or whatever. You might even be interested in being a captain yourself! Why not? I can see from your photographs that you are a serious little boy. I bet you think about things a lot. That's a good thing, we should always think about things and try to understand why some things happen and why toher things don't. But don't ever worry too much about things - always try to enjoy yourself which I am sure you do.

Love from

Grandad Kit and Nana Ann

Thank you for reading my blog. If you have difficulty seeing your grandchildren, or have any views about my situation, I would welcome your messages by e-mail through this blog site. If you wish, just use a first name or a nickname and your identity will be protected, like mine – “Grandad Kit.”

Dear “Tom”

Poor baby pigeon

I am your other grandfather, the one you have never met. You are three years old, and although I have never met you, I love you dearly and always will. You are my flesh and blood, and always will be. We will meet one day, I am sure.

I can't remeber if I told you before, but a pigeon has been nesting in the tree outside our front door. This has happened only once before. The mother pigeon built a great big nest of twigs in the tree, she sat on the nest for a good while and eventually a baby pigeon was born. The mother fed the pigeon and it got so fat that it tipped over the nest out of three tree and the nest fell to the ground. Fortunately, by that time the baby pigeon was big enough to fly away and look after itself. But that happened only once before.

For several years there was another pigeon nesting on the end of our terrace. This was a smaller type of pigeon, a collar dove, a beautiful greay bird with a black collar at the back of her neck. I only ever saw the one bird, so where the daddy collar dove was, I don't know. One year our neighbour pulled the next down, but the bird built it up again and carried on using it every year. I neversaw any baby pigeons come from this nest, but I did find broken egss on the pavement below. Nana Ann thinks other birds like crows would come and try and steal the eggs, but drop them on the pavement.

Well, this time I found a complete egg, with just a little break, lying on our front path. There was a baby pigeon inside, but all cold and dead. Now whether it was already dead in the nest and the mother pushed it out, or whether it fell out andgot killed, I don't know. The mother pigeon stayed in the nest for a few days more, but then flew away. So I've only ever seen one baby pigeon from those two nests, all those years. And the collar doves are now nesting in another house - not the same bird as before, but probably one of its children or grandchildren.

This is a sad story, but things are sad sometimes. But there are still lots of pigeoons flying around, so they must be nesting successfully somewhere!

Love from

Grandad Kit and Nana Ann

Thank you for reading my blog. If you have difficulty seeing your grandchildren, or have any views about my situation, I would welcome your messages by e-mail through this blog site. If you wish, just use a first name or a nickname and your identity will be protected, like mine – “Grandad Kit.”

Dear “Tom”

Help with my computer

I am your other grandfather, the one you have never met. You are three years old, and although I have never met you, I love you dearly and always will. You are my flesh and blood, and always will be. We will meet one day, I am sure.

Grandad isn't very good with computers. I can do all tghe ordinary things with it, write letters, send e-mails, look on the internet and so forth, but when it comes to anything unusual or difficult, I have to ask my friend Keith to come and help me. I don't like taking up his time with soemthing I should be able to do myself, but Keith says he doesn't mind. Besides, we have other things to talk about besides computers (mainly books!).

Nana Ann ws very understanding about me having my camera stolen in Rome. She didn't tell me off like she nromally does when somthing like that happens. But when I go anywhere, she always tells me to "watch your pockets." She's right, of course, but if you're always worrying about soemthing bad happeneing, then you don't enjoy life. And I do try and enjoy life as mcuh as possible. After all, it's the only one we've got. So I suppose having soemthing stolen every so often isn't too bacd.

Love from

Grandad Kit and Nana Ann

Thank you for reading my blog. If you have difficulty seeing your grandchildren, or have any views about my situation, I would welcome your messages by e-mail through this blog site. If you wish, just use a first name or a nickname and your identity will be protected, like mine – “Grandad Kit.”

Dear “Tom”

Building a garage

I am your other grandfather, the one you have never met. You are three years old, and although I have never met you, I love you dearly and always will. You are my flesh and blood, and always will be. We will meet one day, I am sure.

The men are getting on with building the two houses behind us. They have started on the walls of one house, building them up to about four or five feet high so far. I notice that, inbetween the two courses of bricks (you should know that a brick wall for a house is usually actually two walls, each one brick wide, with a gap inbetween) they are putting very thick insulation material. That will keep the heat in and will mean that the heating bills are less, when the house is finished and people are living in in.

I went to see a friend of mine who wants to buold a gar4age at the bottom of his garden. The reason he wants this is that he lives ina v ery narrow street and had nowhere to park his car - he has to park it soem distance away. That is very inconvenient. It means he has to carry things a long way from the car to the house, and he can't keep an eye on his car at night when it might be stolen or broken into.

But before he can build a garage at trhe bottom of his garden, he nees to have a raod in. At the moment, there is only a footpath and it is not possible to bring a car in. So we have to try and arrange for a road to be built. It's not just for him, it's alos for all his neighbours who also have the same problem with nowhere to park their cars nearby. They want to build garages too. So if all the people club together, they could afford to build a little road to get theur cars into their new garages.

But if one person refuses to pay, what then? The road can't be built. The otger people are not preapred to pay for the one peson who won't pay, as well as for their own share, so nothing gets done. Sad, isn't it? But we are trying to find a solution.

Love from

Grandad Kit and Nana Ann

Thank you for reading my blog. If you have difficulty seeing your grandchildren, or have any views about my situation, I would welcome your messages by e-mail through this blog site. If you wish, just use a first name or a nickname and your identity will be protected, like mine – “Grandad Kit.”

Dear “Tom”

My camera stolen

I am your other grandfather, the one you have never met. You are three years old, and although I have never met you, I love you dearly and always will. You are my flesh and blood, and always will be. We will meet one day, I am sure.

This is my second and last day in Rome, so I had another quick look round, taking lots more photos. I also sent you a postcard - I hope you get to see it. It's a picture of the Trevi fountain, a very famous fountain that was in a film many years ago showing a young lady who jumped in and splashed arounbd (which you're not supposed to do!). But she was a very pretty young lady and all the men liked watching her on the film!

Grandad also went to the Rome Museum - which was disappointing - and had a glass of wine in one of the squares in the city. Then it was time to go home, and I went on the Metro and the train to get to the airport - takin g a taxi si far too expensive. When I got on the train I realised that my camera, which had been in my coat pocket, was no longer there! Then I rememberered that, when I was in the Metro (the same as the Underground in London that you go on) an Italian man asked me for directions. I thought at the timne that it was funny - after all, he was Italian and he should know which way to go more than me - but now I think that it was just a ruse to distract my attention while another person stole my camera out of my pocket. They must have seen me takign photographs.

I'm not too worried about the camera itself - it wasn't very expensive, and I can soon buy a new one - but all the pictures I took to show Nana Ann have gone and I'll never be able to get them back. I feel like going back to Romne, just for one day, and taking all those photos again. But it just wouldn't be the same.

Loive from

Grandad Kit and Nana Ann

Thank you for reading my blog. If you have difficulty seeing your grandchildren, or have any views about my situation, I would welcome your messages by e-mail through this blog site. If you wish, just use a first name or a nickname and your identity will be protected, like mine – “Grandad Kit.”

Dear “Tom”

Rome

I am your other grandfather, the one you have never met. You are three years old, and although I have never met you, I love you dearly and always will. You are my flesh and blood, and always will be. We will meet one day, I am sure.

Today Grandad flew to Rome, the capital city of Italy. It's the first time I've ever been to Rome, and I was very excited. Rome is famous because, many years ago, it was the centre of the Roman Empire. The Romans started off as a small tribe in a small town, but they were very, very good soldiers and they gradullay conquered many countries in Europe, the Middle East and Africa, including England and Wales. They didn't conquer Scotland, and that's why the Romans built Hadrian's Wall from one side of the country to the other, rougjhy from Newcastle in the East to Carlisle in the West.

The Romans stayed in England and Wales - they didn't take over Ireland - for 400 years, and they left their mark. Any town with "Chester" on the end started as a Roman Town, including Chester itself near where I was born. And the Romans built many roads which we still use today. The Romans always built their roads in a streaight line from point to point - just like Hadrian's Wall (which I'll take you to see one day) - and in fact we live on one such road, a Roman Road!

The other thing the Romans did was to bring their language - Latin - to many countries. Lots of our words we use today have their origins in Latin. Grandad actually learned Latin wheh I was at school, even though nobody speaks Latin nowdays (apart from the Pope and some Catholic priests). Eeven the Romans - the people who live in Rome - don't spaek Latin. They speak Italian.

There are lots of fine old buildings in Rome. Because I have been busy with meetings, there was not much time to look around the City. Fortunately, we have been meeting near St Peter's Square next to the Vatican where the Pope lives. There were hundreds and hundreds of people queueing up to go inside and look round, so I had to stay outside, but it was still a fine sight to see.

Nana Ann, who has been to Rome herself several times in the past, told me to take a lot of photographs so I can show her where I've been.

Love from

Grandad Kit and Nana Ann