This is a picture of the wedding cake.
All cakes for special occasions in England like weddings, Christmas, Easter , Christenings and so on, are made of a mixture of flour, butter, eggs, sugar and a large amount of sultanas, raisins, currants, maybe peel and nuts and laced with a generous quantity of whisky or brandy.
They are cooked some time( like months) before the date of the event and so become very rich. Therefore you only usually eat an very small piece. Traditionally, the top tier of the wedding cake is kept as a cake for the Christening of the first child, because it can be kept for two or three years. They didn't want to keep it partly because it was coloured and because they sent pieces of cake to people who didn't come to the wedding, which again, is tradition.

Wedding photos

Well, I hope you liked these wedding photos.
perhaps they don't mean a lot to anybody but me, and my family, but I thought maybe you would like to see an English wedding as opposed to one in your own country - after all, I suppose that's what communicating is all about!
It also makes it easier for me to show lots of people.
Please, let me know what you think and if you want to know anything about them, please let me know.
Catherine

This is a picture of my family.
From the left, there is my mother's cousin, who travelled alone from the depths of Wales, my daughter, my Mum and me.
Then there is my sister-in-law, Barbara's brother, the bride and groom, Barbara, my brother, Theo, my nephew Robin and Barbara parents.
It's like playing "Happy Families"!

This shows my brother, sister-in-law and nephew at the hall where the reception was held.
It used to be a corset factory, and when the factory closed, the local council decided to turn it into a conference centre.
The original building had an enormous ballroom, which had been built for the firm's dances for its workers, and it has been maintained as a place which the public can hire out for occasions such as weddings.

This shows them raising the sticks that they use during their dances to form the arch, under which the couple pass.

I thought you would like this one.
It is a picture of the guard of honour for the married couple formed by Morris men. They are traditional English dancers, whose origins go back in time to the Moors.
My brother is one of the members of the team - he plays the melodion
The man at the front is called "The Fool" and you can see his unusual dress!
(He got changed afterwards to come to the reception - and so did the others!)!

The happy couple smiling for the (many) photographers!

My niece's wedding

Well, I promised you some photos of an English wedding and here they are. This is my niece and her husband outside the church - it's obvious really!

These are the babies of the family.
Oscar, the balck and white cat is two and tries to be the man about the house - but is afraid of his shadow!
Mimì, a female is one year old and is quite shy but determined.
She is Oscar's playmate but also his prey!

This is Tingy, a very elderly and temperamental Siamese cat.
Se is 17 years old and does not get on at all well with the other tow cats, especially Oscar. He weighs 6 kgs and she is very fragile!

This is Sasha, our dog. She is 13 years old|

This is Francesco and Anna, my son and daughter-in-law on their wedding day in July last year.
They lived for a time in Pescara, which is on the southern Adriatic coast, but a year ago they decided to move to Novara and are now renovating an old house in a village nearby.

This is my family - or most of it.
My brother, Theo, my daughter, Giulia ,Michael, the tallest one is Jennie's fiancè.
Jennie is pushing Granny, my Mum, then on the right there is my sister-in-law Barbara and my nephew, Robin
It was taken in England this summer.

This is a picture I like a lot. it was taken in Edinburgh in June when my niece got her degree in European studies with Italian and German - she as the only one on the course to get that combination.
The other person is my brother, Theo.
She is now doing a post-grad course and is getting married on 27th October.
I will add the photos!

OK This is a photo of me taken overlooking Lake Orta, which is not far from Novara.
I don't like having my photo taken, so I don't have many of me.
In the background you can see the lake and the Island of St. Giulio where there is a religious sanctuary. It is one of the picture postcard
places you see on the front of travel magazines!

Dear everybody,
I have decided that I too need to have a blogspot, so that I can show people who I am.
I am English but I have lived in Italy for 30 years. I have two children, Francesco who is 29 and got married to Anna last year, and Giulia, 24 who lives with me. My husband, who was Italian, died three years ago. We live in Novara, which is a small city between Milan and Turin at the foot of the Alps. It is not what you imagine an Italian town to be like - no sun no sea and so on but it is a very clean city and despite being cold in the winter and humid in the summer, it's not a bad place to live.
I teach English conversation in an Italian High school and my pupils are aged 14-19. It is a school for languages and business studies. They all study English and another EU language.
I now want to try and add some photos, but will send this first.
Catherine.