St Patrick?

[fbhjr]

So I’m ¼ Irish (Southern), 1/8 Irish (Northern), ¼ English (Saxon), ¼ English (Norman), 1/8 English (get off my property you bloody census taker).
My father (Northern Irish) used to wear orange to annoy my mother’s mother (southern Irish) at dinner each St. Patrick’s day.
My grandmother, mother and aunt would all wear as much green as possible.
So, in memory of them all, I’ve decided to wear blue today…
They would all agree to eat the corned beef. But, I did that Friday. (My grandmother wouldn't be happy about that either...)

Comments

[64tbird.livejournal.com]

I'm 2nd gen Irish American. Grandmother came from Crough Patrick (Western Ireland...as west as you can possibly get.) to NYC when she was 14 years old. (1914) She lied about damn near everything in her childhood from her siblings to her religion. She wasn't pleased with it.

Add to that my Pagan leanings, and...

I wear black.
With a button that says, "Pinch me and I'll punch you."

(Erin has no bra?)

Oh yeah - and it's the damn Scots that eat that awfuly haggis concoction from hell.

[fbhjr.livejournal.com]

Western Ireland was my favorite part.
We drove through one section where for about 6 hours we only saw 3 other people. A postal truck, a grocery truck and a Guinness truck. Looked like they had all they needed.

My grandmother was the 4th of 8 kids. She was the first one of them born in the US. When they got here, they erased the family name and took the one given to them by immigration. So, although I know and have been to the tourist trap they came from, I don't know the name of the family when they were there.
Of course, despite how strongly Irish Catholic she was, she married and English protestant. As did her daughter my mother...
Go figure.

[64tbird.livejournal.com]

Grandmother was deadset on telling everyone she was protestant, so I was raised Episcopalian. When we went back to see a cousin and visit a grave and her house...the cousin laughed her head off. Of COURSE June was Catholic. Everyone is Catholic!

We saw her house on the top of the mountain...it was so windy that the trees grew sideways. The house had two rooms and a kitchen - tiny. June was one of fourteen kids in that house.

When she was a child there, the choices were; Inherit the farm, or own a pub. Only a son could get the farm. And there were only so many pubs a town like Westport could support in 1914. So she was shipped off to the New World, to family who had already established themselves here.

[fbhjr.livejournal.com]

I've always wondered if my grandmother was so vocal about being a staunch Catholic because her family was from Killorglin, home of the puck fair (http://www.puckfair.ie/ )
I've never been to it. But, I know she went back at least once in the 70's to see the goat crowned king...

[eryndil.livejournal.com]

I stayed in Killorglin in September - beautiful countryside.

BTW, how do you know that you are 1/4 Saxon and 1/4 Norman?

Oh, and sorry for suddenly appearing on here - that's links for you!

[fbhjr.livejournal.com]

I didn't like Killorglin much. Too touristy.
There were parts I liked much better. Mostly in the NW.

My mother, my uncle (mother's side) and one of my cousins (father's side) are very into family history. I've got fairly good family trees from them that show it. The cousin on the father's side is Mormon and they are big in it in general, and they've shared what they found.
My mother's family (the Edson family) is fairly well documented way back to one of those big King Ed's. My father's mother's family (Boughton family) is also fairly well documented.
The Hunt's not so much, but still a couple of centuries. The Manning's not at all. (They're the ones from Killorglin.)

No problems with you popping by. But, I don't know which link you mean...

[eryndil.livejournal.com]

I'm envious - I've been tracing my family tree for years and haven't got further back than 1700 (except one line). The mormon records are very useful though.

I've been following the icon explanations. Cute teddy, BTW.

[fbhjr.livejournal.com]

The teddy also had a story:
http://fbhjr.livejournal.com/34065.html#cutid1

[fbhjr.livejournal.com]

Westport was one of the places we went through on that drive without seeing anyone (but the 3) on the road. It was actually the town where we almost got stuck because I stopped to try and get a picture of the sheep eating seaweed.
I didn't get the picture. But, I did manage to get the car out of the sand.
It looked like a nice place, but we only stopped for about 5 minutes.

[evrgreen.livejournal.com]

Well, Happy St. Patrick's day to 3/8 of you, anyhow !!!!
Erin go brea !

I have no Irish blood in me at all, from what my genealogy can tell me - I'm almost purely 50/25/25 French/Saxon/Scottish.. No wonder I am often so conflicted.
I'm not drinking a green beer tonight, and have run out of Guiness over a week ago - so unfortunately my backup backup beer, Michelob Ultra (which at least is low carb) will have to do for today ;-)

Gary is a scotch drinker, and I tried to shame him into at least switching to Irish whiskey today - he compromised by putting Bailey's Irish creme in his morning coffee.. It usually provides him with some particularly snappy astrological prognostications !