Moments in Time

Blogs which describe moments in my life, or the lives of my family.

Marriage, Hardship, Illness and Death

This is a picture of my paternal grandmother. She married my grandfather on 20 November 1912. She was 31, my grandfather was 36. By early twentieth century standards, and for a first marriage, they were older than the norm. My grandparents had at least five children between 1913 and 1919.

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Tsar’s Easter Kisses

Today is Orthodox Easter. Unlike the rest of the Christian churches who have been using the Gregorian calendar for over three centuries, the Orthodox Church still follows the old Julian calendar. They also calculate Easter to fall on the first Sunday after the first ecclesiastical full moon. This means that

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Easter – no bunnies, no chocolate

Easter Sunday is here and once again the holiday reminds me of food. Last year I wrote a post about some of the traditional Russian Orthodox sweet dishes eaten only at Easter; the Kulich and the Paskha. For several years I tried my hand at making both of these. Mostly

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Russian naval officers on the Standart

My grandfather was a lieutenant in the Russian navy. He served on the Imperial Yacht, the Standart, which had been built by the order of the Russian Emperor Alexander III. This photo shows a group of Russian naval officers, together with Tsar Nicholas II and his family. It is taken

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Connections to Place

Does your family have a connection with a geographical place? I had to think about this for a recent writing activity which I had to produce for my study. Both my maternal and paternal sides of the family have connections with geographical places. But one example immediately sprang to mind.

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Found Objects – Postcards from Russia, OTMA

Among other interesting objects left by my parents, I inherited many Russian postcards. I assume they belonged to my maternal grandparents, Paul and Olga Woronoff. There are a couple of hundred of them and I know almost nothing about them. There are postcards depicting Tsar Nicholas I, his wife the

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