VE Day Celebrations in Lockdown

Well, after a few days preparing the day had arrived. I was up early to bake another loaf of bread and a Victoria sponge, then we were out to the garden to put up the gazebo and bunting.

As we aren’t going to the shops regularly, (we are mostly using the fabulous village store in Yattendon which provides most of what we need and as my sister in law is shielding we don’t come into contact with many people so we are protecting her as much as we can) we hadn’t had a chance to buy any durable bunting and decorations.

Not to worry, to the rescue came the .gov website and English Heritage. Both sites provided bunting and posters to print off as well as 1940’s menu ideas. So, we made our own bunting. The only draw back was that as it was on paper we had to wait to put it up in the morning so that it didn’t get damp overnight.

The gazebo turned out to be a massive 6x3m party one! Definitely not ideal for an afternoon on the front lawn! It would have taken us most of the day to erect it! Haha. We opted for a couple of garden umbrellas instead which worked perfectly well.

So, on went our 1940’s clothing (I thought we did pretty good considering most of our clothes are in store), we all donned our Tommy pins, stood our commemorative Tommy in pride of place on the picnic table and waited for 11am.

I would just like to say how impressed and proud I am of our 2 younger nephews (2) and (3) during the 2 minutes silence. They absolutely got it and apart from a couple of words from the 3 year old, were silent throughout. Wow! their mum said it’s the longest silence she has ever had from them when they were awake!

After The Last Post we tucked in to our afternoon tea – it was not yet midday! Heehee, who cares, we were enjoying ourselves. The little ones wanted to play so we got the bubbles out and entertained them for a while blowing bubbles big and small for them to chase and pop.

At 14.45 I put the BBC on my phone and we listened to Land of Hope and Glory from the band in Horseguards Parade and then over to Winston Churchill for his goosebumping 75 year old speech, even thinking about it now makes me emotional. We discussed the wars with our eldest nephew (nearly a teenager) and explained that lots of towns and villages were left without menfolk during both WW1 and WW2. If we are still up this way in November we said we would take him to the local remembrance service so that he can hear how his local village was affected during both wars.

We had lots of tea, interspersed with a Moscow Mule – I had read that it was very popular in the 40’s – and then toasted all our heros with a glass of prosecco at 3pm.

The little ones went for a bike ride with their Dad and older brother while Mum prepared their tea. I am cooking a joint of pork for us all later.

A little about the Tommy.

I saw this advertised on the web, not sure if it was on .gov but it mentioned the RBLI and a commemorative Tommy.

It’s a special edition VE Day 75th Anniversary production, manufactured by veterans at RBLI’s social enterprise, Britain’s Bravest Manufacturing Co. They are in limited production until 31st Dec 2020.

Ours has its own edition number. I was so pleased to get it along with 10 Tommy pins to give to our nearest and dearest as I thought that most people wouldn’t be aware that they are available. Due to Social Distancing we haven’t seen the normal sellers outside stores etc that we are used to.

The Tommy came in a lovely presentation box with certificate of Authenticity and a booklet about the guys who signed the certificate, their roles within the organisation as well as notes on their record of service.

It will be a great reminder of those who gave their lives for us and now also of those who we lost to Covid-19.

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