This week feels like it's gone on forever! The main things at work were full council on Tuesday which ended up being a very long, drawn out meeting. With a request for another meeting right at the end of it. Thursday was visioning (i.e. forward planning) for Children and Young People committee. I still feel really nervous every time I chair it; I'm not sure why, really. Just my nervous disposition, I suppose.

Yesterday Marianna stayed the night at Anthony's mum and dad's, so I mostly just slept. There was a time when a free weekend meant sightseeing, or a night out, or whatever, but now it's just a chance to sleep as much as possible! I did get up eventually and finish off a post on the Broad Haven Triangle mystery I've been working at on and off since last October though.

We also watched that new Netflix film, Murder Mystery. The reviews haven't been great but I really enjoyed it. I mean, sure, it's not a cerebral masterpiece, but it's great as a piece of easy entertainment. I'm halfway through The Alienist - Daniel Brühl never ages, I swear - and Gentleman Jack too. It's so good, and Suranne Jones is awesome as usual.

The blog has been ticking over. For Miniature Monday I posted a guide to the Trailer Trash Dolls, and on Thursday I put together a list of 100 places offering free carpet samples delivered direct to your door.

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*I moved all my UFO and otherworldly stuff to weirdwales.co.uk - you can find the updated version of this post there.*

Over the years I have heard this story dozens of times, and that's a conservative estimate. Any time UFOs came up as a topic of conversation my mum would tell me about her own otherworldly sighting back in the 1970s. To tell the truth I was always kind of dismissive. Aliens? Yeah, right. And just how good would the memory of a kid on holiday be, anyway? It was far more likely to have been a nightmare that only became more vivid with the retelling.

Later, in my twenties, I first heard of the Broad Haven Mystery. The Dyfed Enigma. Welsh Triangle. Whatever you want to call it, the bare bones of the incident involved over twenty children and school staff witnessing a strange craft and being at Broad Haven Primary School in Pembrokeshire, West Wales. Picked up by BBC Newsround, a news and current affairs programme aimed at children, the story quickly went international.


Throughout 1977 people in Broad Haven and the surrounding area were plagued with sightings of UFOs, strange lights, and weird looking men who inspired feelings of intense terror.

I knew my mum had been on a caravan holiday in the general area when she had her sighting, from memory I assumed somewhere in Haverfordwest, and started to wonder if it had been inspired by the media attention given to the activity in Broad Haven. I even mentioned it in passing when working on research for an April 2016 blog post - 10 Weird Welsh UFO Encounters - though most of our discussion then centred on the Berwyn Mountain Incident.

Anyway, always in need of stuff to blog about, and getting into the Halloween spirit by whiling away a few hours on the Fortean Times messageboards, I suggested back in October that I write up my mum's sighting in as much detail as she could remember. As soon as we sat down to talk about it I was surprised to hear her bring up Broad Haven straight off the bat, telling me that during the 40th Anniversary coverage in 2017 she had seen the children's original drawings of their sighting on the BBC and realised, in her own words, 'that's what I saw!'


Furthermore, the location of the caravan site they were staying at was much closer than I had assumed. In fact, as best as my mum's memory can tell, it was actually at Broad Haven Holiday Park. Less than a mile from the village primary school, the park is a popular static caravan site, today boasting around 175 caravans. Although not quite as neatly laid out back in the 1970s, the general look hasn't much changed, and aerial photographs on the park's website from the time suggest the number of caravans was roughly similar too.

It was in this unlikely setting that my mum had her very own close encounter of the third kind...

FIVE FILMS OF THE 1880s

Five films even older than me...

#5. Cockatoo - stop-motion photography by Eadweard Muybridge (1887)

#4. Pferd und Reiter Springen über ein Hindernis [Horse and Rider Jump Over a Barrier] - Ottomar Anschütz (1888)

#3. Hyde Park Corner - William Friese-Greene (1889)

#2. Monkey Shines No. 1 - William Heise and William K. L. Dickson (1889)

#1. Roundhay Garden Scene - Louis Le Prince (1888)

Le Prince shot the world's first known film, Man Walking Around a Corner, in 1887. Read more about the man, his inventions - and his mysterious disappearance! - in a post I prepared earlier.




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The weather has been mostly miserable this week - so miserable Marianna's sports day was cancelled on Wednesday. She was not happy! Hopefully they'll be able to have it some time soon. I had Maendy school governors on Tuesday. It was the AGM and I got elected Chair this time. I've been vice-chair for a couple of years now so it should be interesting. (There's always a need for new governors. If you're interested in becoming one, read more about it HERE.)

Work was fairly quiet this week - mostly Labour party stuff, and I had licensing panel on Thursday morning. I hadn't been on licensing committee for a few years now, so it felt a little strange doing a panel again.

On the blog I've written about Clueless dolls, FAD dolls, Apne Dolls, and Middle School Moguls. For my Friday Five I wrote about my Top 5 Scary Movies, and also posted a list of 100 places to get free artificial grass samples.

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FIVE SCARIEST MOVIES

#5. The Tommyknockers. It gave me lots of childhood nightmares.

#4. The Exorcist.

#3. Ring.

#2. The Ring. Yeah, it freaked me out so much both versions are on the list!

#1. Threads. No contest.




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It's Fathers' Day. :) Marianna's been swimming with Rhys and Hannah today, then we went to give my dad his present. Anthony had his early because we blogged about it for our Fathers Day Gift Guide - it would have been kind of difficult to keep it quiet after that!

This week has been mostly focused on work stuff. There was the LCF (local campaign forum) AGM on Monday, along with Labour group, and I had a licensing committee meeting Thursday and a scrutiny meeting of the Torfaen public service board on Wednesday. (The links go to the council webcasts.)

Marianna's been practising for her sports day all week, then they had a teacher training day on Friday so she has been demonstrating her running everywhere. So much so she now wants to be 'Flash Marianna'. Or, so she said on Tuesday, Darth Vader's girlfriend: the very originally titled 'Darth Girl'. I'm not quite sure what the obsession with Darth Vader says, but it's probably not the best sign...

On the blog this week I've written about Kuu Kuu Harajuku dolls, my Top Ten Obi-Wan Kenobi Memes, and created a masterlist for the 30 Day Blog Challenges I've completed. I also put together a mega list of 200 places you can get free fabric samples (inc. free delivery). They're great for helping with decorating decisions, but are also perfect for crafts, especially in miniature. I think I've picked up enough to upholster five doll houses now...

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The big news this week is that I got a new (well, refurbished) laptop! A couple of weeks ago the 'S' key on my old one finally gave out completely, joining such problems as the non-working '2', headphone jack, cracked power socket, smeared screen, etc, etc. After much deliberating I finally went with an Acer Spin 5 - you can fold it over and use it as a tablet too which is pretty cool. I got it from Argos Outlet for £279.99.

Other than that the week was kind of depressing. My parents had to have Bracken put down; she had a vertebrae shatter and there was nothing the vets could do for her to control the pain. Marianna and Bracken have been pretty much inseparable their whole lives so she keeps asking if she's ever going to see her again. :(


Yesterday was much more cheery; it was the Cwmbran Big Event, so we spent the day down at the Boating Lake enjoying everything going on.

This week I blogged about Shibajuku Girls dolls, online stores with free UK delivery and no minimum spend, and my 2019 Father's Day Gift Guide.

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FIVE DRINKS YOU COULDN'T LIVE WITHOUT

#5. Tea.

#4. Squash. Robinsons is my favourite at the moment.

#3. Milk.

#2. Milkshake. (strawberry, of course)

#1. Water. Duh.




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It's been a fairly quiet week, though Marianna has done her best to be as loud a possible to make up for it, wanting to be entertained 24/7.

Here's Anthony and Marianna's craft for the day:



On the blog I've posted a guide to La Dee Da Dolls, a Mini Mart review of Sandie's Little Gems, and most annoyingly catchy songs for Friday Five. I'm also running a giveaway for recobags - check it out HERE.

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