Irish Cookies

Well... not exactly Irish!

Cristina and I are spending the weeekend in Mullingar, Ireland at the "World Wide Widdis Family Reunion, 2008". There are a LOT of Widdis' here... a lot more than I knew existed... and only 3 from Australia - well and truely the minority. The other Widdis' were fairly evenly split between Canada, USA, UK, NZ and Ireland (although the UK, NZ and Irish Widdis were almost direct family).

Although we couldn't find the uniting bond between the four "clans" (CAN, USA, AUS, NZ/UK/IRE), we feel that we are only one generation from finding a common relative. I can proudly say that the Australian research (mine and Des Widdis') goes back the furthest - to the 1780's - whereas most of the others only go back to the early/mid 1850's. So if we could get them back one more generation, we might find some brothers & sisters. There is one possible connection between the Australian and USA Widdis clans... possibly John, a brother of Charles Athur (who came to Australia), is the same John that went to USA. Same year of birth. Worth exploring.

The weather was not so great, but very fitting to Ireland - wet and cold. Perfect weather for kicking around in old cemetaries trying to read 200 year old tombstones. No success there. In Ireland's climate, even tombstones that are only 100 years old are quite difficult to read - overgrown with lichen and moss, and the enscryptions worn away. Oh well, the quest goes on.