Happy Birthday Mum

Its hard to believe you would of been 69 today mum and even harder to believe you have been gone nearly 15 years. Most of the people in my life now wouldnt of known you that includes 5 of my kids and 6 of my nieces and nephews. Your grandchildren how much they have missed out on although im not altogether convinced you would of liked having 15 grandchildren seeing as you never wanted to be a nan lol

For those of you who never met her here is my thoughts on my mum

She was a tiny little woman only 4 foot 11 and a half (we were never allowed to forget the half lol) she weighed about 6 stone although towards the end of her life because of steroids she weighed double that,i remember her joking she finally had boobs lol. She spent 4 long years bravely battling first breast cancer,then bone cancer and finally brain tumours,through out all of this she never complained, she carried on working right up until about 8 months before she died once the brain tumour gave her a huge stroke. She went into hospital then,not able to talk, walk or eat but battled back the doctors and nurses were amazed by her.... but they didnt know my mum she had never had an easy life had tried to leave this life a few times, once she had meningitus and had to have a bore hole in her head. If she had a day off of work through illness you knew she was really really ill. The last few months were great although we knew we would lose her me and Deb finally got to know her ...

There was never any point doing anything around the house as she always went behind us redoing it so me and Debs took full advantage bless her, she always had the kettle on for a cup of tea and her favourite treat was pie, mash and liquor or jellied eels.Growing up we went to working mens clubs most saturdays and my mum liked her drink lol i cant remember how many hedges or bins she fell in only to shout Gal Gal Help Gal (my maiden name was galvin and she always called my dad gal) nor will i forget her singing songs from the past like show me the way to go home, any old iron and maybe its because im a londoner. Deb and I knew to stay well out of the way when she was drunk as she just loved cheeks and pinching them telling us how much she loved us.

Well mum we loved you infact we still do and we both miss you very very much

This one is for you mum, hope you are having a cup of tea and a fag with dad xx