Adoption, Screamin Lez and The Mindbenders and our Latest Collection

Good Morning

from

Arundel Eccentrics Antiques

It's been generally a rather grey, rainy Arundel.

Very much like the rest of the south of England.

but today.....
the sun is shining and Arundel looks like a beautiful film set again.

Adoption Day

An interesting week.....

Firstly and mostly importantly..

6th January isn't only the day we take our Christmas decorations down.

Its Adoption Day in our small family.

It was the day, very many years ago,
the adoption of my son,
was made official.

The day we went to court.

Actually, the day, little Jay stood up and said to
the judge he wanted to stay with his new Mummy.

After months of uncertainty, the judge decreed this little boy,
who I had grown to love so much, was officially mine.

Still brings tears to my eyes to think about it.

It's important to me and its important to Jay, a few thousand miles away,
Even now he goes out on the day to celebrate it.

His lovely wife would have been taking him out to lunch, or dinner , to mark the day.
He lives in California, where, after many years of hard work,
  he is a highly successful and well respected, menswear designer.

I wrote this on my blog a couple of years ago,
 and said I desperately hoped Jay wouldn't mind.

 I told him if he was unhappy about it, I would remove it.

Only to find, instead of asking me to delete it,
he had actually cut and pasted it and put it on his
 and Krista's "wedsite" and that far from being annoyed he,
and his close friends, were touched to read it.

Jay and Krista were married in September 2012
 at the most stylish wedding I think I have ever attended.


Here is our story....................

HAPPY ADOPTION DAY

6TH JANUARY

I always wanted children and in the 

traditional sense it was a baby.

Over the years my ex husband and I 

went through all the normal stuff to achieve that, 

but it just never happened.

We decided we would look at adoption as an option 

and went to an adoption society in London,

 for an information evening.

The social worker told the small group, 

3 case histories 

and Jay's was one of them.

such style even then

By chance...or maybe not...after the talk, 

when everyone was chatting and drinking coffee, 

we were looking at Jay's photo 

and I made a comment such as

" Oh look how beautiful he is"....

The social worker was behind us.

" Would you like to find out more about that little boy?"

The rest, as they say is history.

The social worker assigned to our case hadn't 

met Jay herself at that point, 

and on her return from seeing him for the first time, 

stopped at a phone box...

yes.. we did use them, then,

to excitedly inform me

"You are perfect for each other, 

your temperaments match each other completely."

Something happened..to this day I don't know what it was,

 whereby, although we had met Jay a few times 

he had never been to the house and 

stayed.

I felt they were trying to move 

him from his foster placement quickly, 

for some reason known only to them 

and on one of my visits the social worker

 asked if I would take Jay home

 the next time I came to see him. 

This was only a few days later.

I drove over in my yellow citroen 2cv, 

which was to later become such a huge part of our lives.

We were to go out and about in it all over the place.

I bought this lamp when I stopped off on the way to bring Jay home all those years ago..It became his night light.
In later years it sat in our window in our house in  Tarrant Street and when it was on friends knew we were around and meant they could drop by for a glass of wine!

 When I arrived Jay

 had pulled all his pictures off the wall 

and was packed and ready.

Taking my hand he said

" Come on Mum, lets go"

He was 4 years old at the time.

It all happened it a whirl and when I arrived home I was almost in shock.

This little girl adored Jay.
She was  also adopted and lived near us and our families became firm friends.
Her parents put us on to the adoption society we met Jay through.

Micky Mouse was the one item Jay still had from his birth mother.
He still has it, to this day, and Micky now resides in California

I was working at a play school at the time and thought I would be brilliant.

But brilliant doesn't happen overnight and  I am now a firm believer 

that postnatal depression isn't entirely a physical thing.

Also, you expect, I expected,  to feel a huge surge of love immediately.

It doesn't always just happen, like a bolt from the blue.

It grows and like all relationships, you get out what you put in.

Suddenly, here I was with a little person 24 hours a day.

It was quite a shock to the system.

I was emotional all the time, 

feeling I wasn't making a good enough job of things.

I didn't really know what he ate, his likes and dislikes.

I struggled to feed him...I had never really cooked convenience food,

 was deeply entrenched in cooking whole foods  

and found that he was used to stuff coming out of tins and boxes.

I remember in desperation asking him

" Well, what DO you like?"

and in a quiet little voice he replied,

" I like cheesecake"

Thanks be , I thought and proceeded

 to make the whole thing,

 as usual, from scratch.

Jay didn't like it and barely touched it.

" I thought you said you liked cheescake?"

" Yes, but out of a packet!"

We used to visit friends in France most years. 

I remember so vividly, my friend Val 

making the most spectacular

mousse au chocolat.

All from scratch of course.

She spent hours on it.

"MMMMm"

said Jay

" Lovely Instant Whip Aunty Val"

Ha Ha

Val and Jay often chuckle over that

We got through all the early hurdles

 and somewhere along the line,  

actually very soon after,

 I realised I loved this little boy, 

more than I had loved anyone in my life.

And that's the point I wanted to make....I never in a million years thought you could have such strength of feeling for a child that you had not produced yourself.

Prior to that, I had spent years weeping and wailing and feeling such intense jealousy

 for all my friends who seemed to be having babies with ease.

Jay and I went from strength to strength.

Our relationship so strong that when he was at college 

he came home one day and proclaimed,

" My mates at college are so jealous of our relationship"

"Why Jay?"

" Because it's so strong and they don't have that with their own mothers"

" How do they know?"

" Ma, they just see us together"

Over the years, I have been so proud of my Jay's achievements.

From an early age he took a huge interest in clothes,

loved his skateboard, loved to travel.

After working for a menswear fashion degree,

at the local Northbrook College,and graduating with flying colours,

( incidentally, the first college in Europe to offer this degree)

 he just went from strength to strength.

Determined to end up in NYC..against all odds he got there.

Not the first time, when he borrowed money to get out there for interviews.

On his return, he said they felt he was good,

but needed more experience.

"So Jay, what are you going to do next?"

" Get more experience , of course"

and he did...through sheer hard work, gritty determination,

and talent, he got a job in New York with Ecko Unltd.

He not only gained experience, 

he also gained the

gorgeous Krista, 

his wife .

Look at him now, a successful menswear designer in California.

When he first went there he was designing for

...a skateboard company..funny hey?

After all the years he hurtled round on his own board.

Jay and Krista after he proposed to her in Arundel

birth brothers re-united

the first time they had all got together

Nass and I miss him terribly.

Oh! I forgot to tell you, I gained even more out of this than a wonderful child.

When by ex husband and I divorced about 20 years ago,

I became entrenched in the school PTA to keep me busy.

We organised a massive Summer Ball and hence I 

was spending more and more time at Jay's school.

So, my bonus was.....

going out with the gorgeous PE teacher 

who I subsequently married and who became

 a loving stepfather adoring Jay as much as I do.

Adoption Day?

Its the day you go to court to make it all official.

Jay wrote a note to the judge to sway the man to let him stay with us.

I still have that note and to this day and it still makes me weep.

Adoption Day 

has been celebrated every year since.

As important to us, as a birthday

If you are considering adoption..really, really, go and find out about it.

Be patient, its a lot of interviews and social workers poking into all areas of your life.

But...a million times over..its worth it

gorgeous boy.. now a gorgeous young man

So

Happy Adoption Day

to our wonderful son

and Congratulations

on the imminent birth of your own child

in February.  

The wedding of the year

Jay designed his wedding suit...every attention to detail was looked at...even the cuff links were vintage UK sixpences

Here's the link to the video.

you WILL need a box of Kleenex

Ha Ha

Our Wedding of the Year

.

Rock n Roll at Arundel Cricket Club

Last  Saturday we had a great night out.

Our friend Danny, AKA Screamin Lez,
of 

none other than,

Screamin Lez and The Mindbenders

were playing.

Arundel Cricket Club
was rocking.
Mostly with Arundel people so it was like one big party.

They have a huge following locally.

Latest Collection

We have our antiques warehouse really full at the moment.

Here is a look at some of our collection.

We sell mostly to the US antique trade.

We would also like to get into  props.

Anyone have any advice on that?

There can't be too MANY people painting

 tartan or decoupaging fish all over pieces.

can there? 

If you see something you like just email us for trade details.

I'm afraid I'm having trouble keeping up with the website changes.

Too busy doing the painting and decoupage at the moment.

Creative Writing Group

 We had our latest meeting this week. It's always great fun and really inspiring.

We hear from The Guvnor... as our mentor is affectionately known....

 that some of our work is going to be on a 

Books for the Blind CD.

Exciting stuff

have a great day


www.arundeleccentrics.com