Regency History's Christmas newsletter

Rachel's year

2015 has been an eventful year. I have been to see exhibitions at Buckingham Palace, the Queen’s Gallery, the National Portrait Gallery, the Wallace Collection and Windsor Castle. In September, I took part in the Jane Austen Festival Grand Regency Promenade in Bath for the second year and enjoyed reading a chapter of Emma as part of the 200^th anniversary celebrations. I have visited numerous historic sites including Osterley Park, Athelhampton House, Stratfield Saye, Ham House, St Paul’s Cathedral, A la Ronde, Stourhead, Hardy’s monument, Gretna Green and Samuel Johnson’s House Museum. Some of these have made it onto the blog; others are still waiting!

On a personal note, one of my daughters got married and another obtained her Master of Laws degree. And I achieved a dearly held ambition of getting my novel into print. I am delighted that A Perfect Match is receiving some very positive reviews and look forward to writing the sequel!

I wish you and your family a peaceful Christmas and a happy New Year.

Rachel

My year in pictures

This collage takes you through some of the highlights of my year:
January – A replica of a genuine Almack’s voucher that I researched and reproduced. If you missed this, click here to read more about the Almack’s voucher on my blog.
February – Visiting the Waterloo at Windsor exhibition at Windsor Castle. The exhibition runs until 6 January 2016. Until 5 January, Windsor is also decorated for a Regency Christmas. Find out more here. See my post about Windsor here and about the Waterloo exhibition here.
March – The Wallace Collection held an exhibition about Joshua Reynolds. It was a lovely chance to see lots of his wonderful portraits. You can read about the exhibition here, but it is now closed. However, some of the portraits do belong to the Wallace Collection and there are lots of other gems in this little known London museum, so well worth a visit.
April – A chance to visit London again for my daughter’s graduation ceremony. I was rather pleased with this silhouette of George IV and Nelson’s column that I captured. Unusually, the photograph is mine, not my husband’s!
May – Big month for me with the publication of A Perfect Match. Find out more about my Georgian historical romance here. Available on Amazon: £8.99 for the paperback and the new reduced price of £1.99 for the Kindle version in the UK; $11.99 for the paperback and $2.99 for the Kindle book on Amazon.com.
June – Lots of visits in June. This picture is of the beautiful gardens at Athelhampton House where I joined the Historic Houses Association which gives free entry to a lot of private houses including Stratfield Saye, Goodwood House and Beaulieu.
July – Tisha and Pete’s wedding. Here they are being covered in the heart-shaped confetti we made from old copies of Pride and Prejudice and other works of Jane Austen.
August – A la Ronde near Exmouth, the home of the Parminter cousins. Read more about it on my blog.
September – A very Austen month with the Jane Austen Festival in Bath. Read more here and see even more pictures on the Regency History Flickr account here.
October – A visit to the blacksmith’s shop in Gretna Green. If you missed this one, you can read about why lovers eloped to Gretna Green here.
November – Another trip to the Queen’s Gallery in London for High Spirits – an exhibition about the comic art of Thomas Rowlandson.
December – Happy Christmas!