Family History

Today we got the rain. I was quite happy. It meant I could stay in on my day off, and do something I wanted to do, but feel I can’t when it is sunny outside.

I began with taking Henry to work, so no lie in for me. Then from there went to Lidl. I was there by 8.20 so no queue and very few people. It was my first time doing the weekly shop for at least 13 weeks, and probably more. As usual, I spent too much! I just find it hard to stick to the list. So Jon might have to go next week! But now he is working full time again, I really need to do it on my day off. I have got to learn to stick to the list!

Put the shopping away, and sat and read the paper. Then spent an hour or two before lunch deleting more downloads from my laptop and generally trying to find things!

Mollie and I had a late cheese on toast lunch. She did a bit of knitting, and then she went out and I took the dog for a long walk. I was home by 3pm ready to start on my family history sort... or to start at least.

A few years ago, in collaboration with some relatives on my dads side, who live in Canada who I traced many years ago as they were tracing the same Howard family line, we discovered a missing link. Today I wanted to research that link back further. The family come from Ireland ( I knew I had to have Irish in me somewhere) so, my Great great grandfather, known as John Howard, was actually John Coote. He was the eldest of 11 children, and his father was Sir Thomas Coote. I am fairly certain of this as I have done lots of different cross referencing with familysearch( the IGI international genealogical index held by the church of the Latter Day Saints) the best and most accurate records there are. Plus some others. It was difficult to tear myself away, to cook curry for dinner - but I did. It was nice. Now I am back with the Coote ancestors. As I type, I have tracked back to my 10 x great grandfather Sir Charles Coote, 1st Baronet. Born in 1581... and guess where?! Blo’norton, Norfolk. All his descendants were from Ireland so I have some more work to do to find out how he got there, and why. This is him! This is the most interesting part of family history. But finding someone of status, means there is loads of information about them, unlike the ordinary people like us.

I am so excited I’m leaving you now to get back to it!