The generation game!
Thursday, 5 January 2012
IT'S not often you find five generations of the same family celebrating Christmas together, but one Antrim family made the most of the festive season with that unusual gathering.
The virtually unique event was made possible by the birth of generation number five - beautiful baby girl Aimee on Wednesday, December 14.
Sixty year-old Ann Gould (Aimee's great-grandmother) told the Antrim Guardian of her 'delight' at welcoming another little bundle of joy into the family at the most wonderful time of the year.
Explaining the family tree, she said: "Well it starts with my mother, great-great-grandmother Grace Matthews (80), me, then my daughter, Grace Gould who's 42, and her daughter Jodie-Lee Gould (20), who is the mother of little Aimee.
"It really only dawned on me when I was talking to my mother the other day that this was five generations of our family, and five girls at that!
“It's just so unusual and we're so pleased that we were all able to celebrate something as special as Christmas with the whole family around us."
The family is well-known in the town, with Mrs Matthews and her husband moving here 36 years ago and the rest of her family following suit.
Ann worked in Holywell for a time and she and her husband William have five children, of whom Grace is the oldest. Grace has four daughters and both she and her partner Neil were delighted to become grandparents when Jodie-Lee gave birth last month.
Ann continued: "Christmas was so exciting. My other granddaughter works in Lanzarote and she flew home to see Jodie-Lee and the baby.
“We were all delighted that she got to see her before she went back.
“Christmas was a bit different this year, normally I would have 16 or more of them round at the house but we've moved to a bungalow because of my arthritis and we went to my son's house on Christmas day.
“It's just been such a wonderful Christmas present to have another little baby and although my mother isn't in the best of health she was just so delighted.
“It was far and away the best Christmas gift any of us could have asked for."
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