There is such a history to my son’s musical journey and the persistence of keeping the motivation to plough through the incredible adversaries of COVID particularly impacting the music industry. Dylan is the drummer in Soda Blonde and when you see the “Thank You” section on the inner sleeve of the vinyl, it says Amanda McCann, for the front room and the cream eggs. Hi brother Alex also gets a mention. Memories of small windows of opportunities for the guys to meet live in between lockdowns
What can one say about gardening? That sense that after a day’s work in the garden, no matter how large or small the job was, you can look at it, appreciate it and say, super now that is satisfying. Beats answering scores of emails. Being accompanied by bees, occasional butterflies, robins and blackbirds adds to the group effort. Nearly sounding like a Snow White Movie screenshot there!
Ah Catan Figures. So many wonderful memories playing Catan with my sons Alex and Dylan during COVID. I need easy games. Wool, Wood and Brick currency, were the key elements in CATAN and the round table discussion processes. These commodities (for those of you who play Catan), were amazingly strategic for Al and Dyl. Wonderful times! Al always led on setting up the game, navigating through the myriad of instructions and inevitably ensuring that we were all playing according to the rules, or as close as possible. When we progressed to the next level of CATAN experiences, this did prove more challenging for me, but I got to see how my two boys competed with each other, and how they each inevitably had to be gracious in defeat. For me I was exceptionally gracious in defeat, as I had no idea what it was like to win.
Music in my life has been integral from as young as I can remember to playing in the Irish Youth Orchestra (IYO) now known as the National Youth Orchestra of Ireland (NYOI), and then playing chamber music with a number of different musicians in the years after that. I was never going to be professional/ or be good enough to go professional, but what a wonderful “experiential” journey, a journey that fostered a real love of classical music. The Telemann Oboe concerto part shown, reminds me, depressingly so, of what standard I had reached playing the oboe. Things sound a little different now!!!! The oboe reeds (hand made) are the bridge between your breathing and the eventual sound that comes out of the oboe. They are absolutely crucial. The feather is shown to demonstrate the very delicate approach to removing any unwanted condensation in the small intricate inner tunnels of the oboe’s finest architecture.
Another memory. So, I am a scientist, and as I made my way through research and subsequently to academia, I moved from being in the laboratory, to nesting in an office, where I furiously wrote papers documenting the discoveries the group had made and then writing grant applications to try and get more money to conduct more experiments and write more papers. In my time in the lab, 50X TAE was a key buffer required for many experiments in the laboratory. Making it was like cooking. A clear recipe with the three key ingredients measured in grams. You can see these written on the side of the container. This container is actually dated from 1994 in my own handwriting. It would be lovely to know how many litres of this cocktail were used in my research career and contributed to those papers!!!
Amanda is a proud mum of two extraordinary sons, Alex (Al) and Dylan (Dyl), both of whom are in their early thirties. When they were much smaller she inter-railed around Europe with them, and since then they have taken some amazing holidays together over the years
Amanda is a proud mum of two extraordinary sons, Alex (Al) and Dylan (Dyl), both of whom are in their early thirties. When they were much smaller she inter-railed around Europe with them, and since then they have taken some amazing holidays together over the years
Ciara is from Limerick and is passionate about rugby and tennis. She is happiest when cheering on the Munster rugby team and listening to her favourite band Hermitage Green. She also loves musical theatre, and would one day like to be an extra in a movie.
Ciara is from Limerick and is passionate about rugby and tennis. She is happiest when cheering on the Munster rugby team and listening to her favourite band Hermitage Green. She also loves musical theatre, and would one day like to be an extra in a movie.
