Entries for the Royal Show

are already coming in. 
At least they are coming in to me. I usually take some people's  entries with me on the first day of my stewarding duties and then again on the day that the knitting and crochet entries need to be there.
I was given some yesterday. It was more important than usual because there is a train stoppage between  9am and 1pm on Tuesday. This will make it difficult for some people to get to the showgrounds. If they don't drive it would mean buses - not always convenient, especially with awkward loads. (The trains are much more forgiving of all that.) 
I need to be there by 8am so it won't be quite such a problem for me - or it should not be.
At least they have had advance notice of all this. Entries must  be in before 11am.Judging starts then.
And this  year we have another issue. Queen Victoria is celebrating her 200th birthday. HRH has insisted on celebrating for the entire year so we have special classes in the  Handicrafts and Cookery sections. 
Yesterday one of the things given to me was for  one of the special classes. I haven't looked at it. If they are wrapped up I never do look - tempting though it is. I wait until we put items out on the tables ready for the judges to come along an look. 
But, I could hear it. It is a sound that took me back to my early childhood. My paternal grandmother had one of those. It made the same tinkling sound.
You won't guess - why should you - but it is a milk jug cover. The person who has made it has sourced some real glass beads to hold the edge down.
Grandma's was crocheted from white cotton in a simple star pattern. The beads were made from blue Caithness glass. It had belonged to her mother-in-law - my paternal great-grandmother.
I think they must have had a good relationship because I know my grandmother treasured it. 
    "It always reminds me of her. She was a good woman."
As a very small child I would be allowed to gently put the cover on the jug. I think back now to the enormous risk my grandmother was taking because my paws might all too easily have knocked the little milk jug over. But it was one of those little pleasures of being with Grandma. She trusted me to do it.
I thought of this as I pedalled home with this little jug and the jug cover and the other things I had been given.
Someone is trusting me to get those things there safely. I must not let them down or Queen Victoria will not be amused.   

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