Category Archives: Family

Aileen Fitzgerald-Sheehy

Really chuffed with how this turned out. I thought I was going to have to take it to a specialist lab to get scanned. However I discovered on http://www.rolandandcaroline.co.uk/slidescan.html that its not neccessary to have a special adapter in order to scan b&w negatives.

All you do is place the negative on the glass and place a clean sheet of white paper over the negative (apparently it won’t work for colour negs). This allows the scanning lamp to reflect light back through the negative. Have to say it worked brilliantly.

After scanning I straightened the image and using GIMP 2.4.4 I inverted it to make a positive (Color > Invert) then adjusted the contrast. As it is quiet old (1920s/30s) and hadn’t been in any protectibve wallet it had acquired some nasty looking scratches which I thankfully was able to clone out with GIMP even with my limited skills :)

Going to be a Dad again :)

I’m going to be a Dad again… yahoo!!! We found out on the 13th June although we’d guessed it a week previous as Marie had a bit of a stomach bug, the last bug she had like that we ended up calling Daragh :)

She went to get confirmation from the Doctor but he wouldn’t give a definitive answer even though the test showed she was pregnant. What happened was one of the lines was a lighter pink but it still means your pregnant but because we live in a “Sue Nation” the Doctor was afraid in case he got it wrong and just told her to come back the following week. Which left Marie confused as to whether or not she was pregnant. She finally put that bugbear to rest after trying two more pregnancy testers (different makes) all confirmed she was in the family way.

She seems to be handling this pregnancy much more easily than the last. So far she is seven weeks pregnant and has experience very little nausea. I’ve a feeling this one is going to be a girl as I’ve heard that some women find it easier to carry one over the other, time will tell.

Now grab a tambourine and sing along with me… to the tune of La Cucaracha.

I’m going to be a Daddy,
I’m going to be a Daddy,
Da da da – da da,
I’m going to be a Daddy,
I’m going to be a Daddy,
I’m going to be a Daddy,
Da da dada dada da
I’m going to be a Daddy,
I’m going to be a Daddy,
Da da dada dada da.
Olé.

Scanning Family Photos


My Grandmother aged around 17yrs.


My Grandfather in his “Irish Free-State Army” uniform circa 1940s.


An Irish Press photo of my mother on a Merry-Go-Round aged 6yrs. This photo was published in the newspaper in 1948 [BTW this is my current wallpaper on my laptop].

The scanning is going well and is throwing up some interesting finds. The photos above of my Granny and Gran’dad I’d never seen before until my Dad showed them to me.

My Gran’dad joined the Irish Army in the 1940s during “The Emergency” (our name for WWII). At that time Ireland wasn’t a Republic (we were independant but still part of the British Commonwealth) instead we called ourselves Saor-Stát or Free-State. In Northern Ireland the older generation still refer to people in the South as “Free-Staters”. My Gran’dad actually went AWOL from the Army due to the poor pay and the fact that he couldn’t support his family. He’d never set foot in the Republic again as he was afraid of being arrested.

When I get the chance I’ll write to the Department of Defense and see if I can get any info for the ole family tree… a wanted poster maybe :-)