To our loving mum

Yvette's personal thoughts express our family's feelings very well

She was truly kind and loving. She always supported me, listened and cared about things important to me and the rest of the family. She had a lovely laugh that was infectious and kind. She adored all the natural world and would go above and beyond to help out any animal, bird or even insect that was in need.

She loved to help and support all children. Encouraging them to develop their love for the natural world, building wildlife ponds and wild areas.

She never sat still, always doing something. Her love for cooking, arts and crafts was unmatched. Her garden was also a great love of hers

We spent many happy hours visiting parks and gardens. We visited numerous garden centres which always had the obligatory coffee and cake before we headed home

She was the best mum in all the world, my best friend, mentor, teacher and guiding light. She made me laugh and smile up to her last few weeks. I miss her so so much. Love you mum.

Forever one of the greatest ladies in all the world.

Love Yvette

Even though Alzheimer's robbed her of many things she still kept a sense of humour and even fun.

Just a couple of weeks before the end, Maurice and I were doing things away from her bedroom and there was this clear strong whistle.

 "Was that you Patrick ?"

No - it was Mum - who had never managed to whistle before.- I went into her room and there was the broadest of smiles on her face followed by a couple of shrugs of her shoulders. - pleased with herself but just a little bit guilty.

Love Patrick

From the start she was like a lucky charm - on our first trip to a race course (Chepstow) I backed the first winner and Anne backed the last three !

I knew I as very lucky when my mother met Anne. Afterwards I was told by my mother, in no uncertain terms, to marry Anne as she was beautiful, a better cook and able to do many other things better than anyone in the Green family. Time has proved that to be very true.

Love Maurice

• Born: 21 December 1938
• Married: Oct 1960 to Maurice Green
• Children: May 1961 (Patrick) and Nov 25 1963 (Yvette)
• Retired: 1993 (deputy head at Prospect Vale)
• Died: 26 November 2023

Anne was born in Swansea to Ronald Croft and Marjory ,who already had two sons John and David, the year before the outbreak of the Second World War.

Her Father served the whole of the war driving a tank (aka Tommy Cooker) in North Africa (including El Alamein), Greece, Italy and finally Austria eventually ending in Berlin.

During the war her family's home was made uninhabitable by the heavy Luftwaffe bombing of Swansea docks and surrounding areas in Feb' 1941 and she was evacuated along with her mother and brothers to Pembroke for the rest of the war.

After the war the family returned to Swansea where her Father joined them. He earned a living as a long distance lorry driver, in the days before motorways, frequently driving between Swansea and Aberdeen. However he fairly quickly suffered chest problems that turned out to be lung cancer brought on by smoking and (possibly) driving a tank for the duration of the war. He finally died in 1953 (when she was 14) but not before another son was born - Duncan.

Her older brothers served in Malaya and Korea leaving Anne and her Mother to bring up Duncan. However she managed to work her way through school eventually qualifying to be a teacher with her speciality in Mathematics. Her first teaching post was in Swansea

In 1956-7 she met Maurice Green who was studying Engineering at Swansea University.

They particularly enjoyed dancing in the hall at Mumbles peer often using the Swansea train (tram) before it was scrapped

Photo of a young Anne

on Swansea's Three Cliffs beech

Anne and Maurice were married in St Benedict's Church, Swansea

Wedding Photo with family members

from the left: Mother in law Phoebe Green, brother in law Leonard Green, Maurice and Anne, brothers David and Duncan Croft, mother Marjorie Croft

When Maurice graduated they moved to Maurice's home of Sheffield - rather a contrast to the beaches of the Gower area of Swansea. There she enjoyed teaching, the people and walking in the Parks but not the weather. Her first child Patrick was born in May 1961.

In 1962 they moved to Wilmslow, Cheshire renting a house on Moor Lane

Their second child Yvette was born there, at home, in 1963

In late 1967 they bought their first and only family home in Cheadle Hulme. A new build by George Wimpey.

Initially this was a struggle financially, to the extent the house only had one coal fire and no central heating. Maurice's work often required trips abroad including Eastern Europe, America and even South Africa and the Far East leaving Anne to look after the children and home alone

Maurice's well travelled wallet photo

This was exacerbated by Maurice's ability to upset his bosses, often by calling a spade a spade and occasionally finding himself on the wrong end of a "restructuring".

So some jobs were based away from home including Newport (Salop) Newport (Wales)

Overall though she loved the house, the people and the area with its lack of hills

When Yvette was old enough Anne returned to teaching at the local recently built Hursthead primary school.

Initially as a "supply" teacher and then full time. The school was initially very crowded to the extent that one year she had 49 pupils in her class, the legal limit at the time. Eventually a second building was added that became the infant school whilst Anne stayed teaching in the Junior school.

Later Anne became deputy head at Prospect Value in Heald Green. At one point this included acting for a number of months as Head, replacing the teacher who was unable to continue.

Anne enjoyed teaching even though at Prospect Value, teaching had to pause for every plane landing or leaving the nearby busy Manchester Airport resuming as soon as the noise had abated.

Anne always enjoyed good food. Being a good cook she enjoyed experimenting with what at first were considered exotic food styles like Indian, Italian and Chinese.

Some of Maurice's jobs took him to foreign fields and he would return with descriptions of the food which Anne would try to recreate, at a time when a green pepper was an unusual ingredient.

At one stage the family used to frequent "The Persian Restaurant" in what later became Manchester's Curry Mile but at the time was just a very few premises mainly for the locals. Trips to Indian and Chinese supermarkets followed with many unusual ingredients being brought home to experiment with.

Not all of these experiments were successful - once she got some Chinese "Thousand Year" eggs but failed to fully peel them and made herself very ill to the extent just the mention of an egg made her queasy for the next year.

For a good while she cooked Mo's Chilli Jam to a recipe developed with Maurice

To cook a new batch she had to don a full face mask to reduce the fumes produced by cooking the chillies

This was sold in the local butchers and regularly on Food Markets like Ashton's until her ill health prevented her continuing

In the early 80s Maurice setup M'n'G designs with Patrick writing design software. Although Anne did not take part in the daily running of M'n'G designs she often contributed greatly especially in helping with exhibitions such as Interbuild in the NEC during the 90s. This included driving the van loaded with the stand between our offices and the NEC near Birmingham.

All through her life she was keen on both doing and teaching various crafts.

Whether this was teaching her school children or later in life fellow pensioners

Anne always loved dress making, sewing and knitting and visiting the back streets of Manchester (the old Northern Quarter)for all the fents and rolls of cloth etc.

Quilt making was also a favourite with many comforters made to support the Linus charity for sick children in hospital

Her personal craft hobbies included silk flowers and dolls houses especially the dolls and furniture for the houses.

Her own home is still full of 1/12 scale dolls houses that she made and populated, from a fisherman's house to a witches cottage

Anne was never a member since, for the vast majority of her life, it was a private members club exclusively for men. However she enjoyed catering for various events including a trip to York races and various barbeques with her friend Josie Quinn. There were also three trips to Ascot's Ladies' day racing that Anne relished.

In her youth she had loved riding Welsh Cobs (horses) on Clyne Common (the outskirts of Swansea). She became a very competent rider to the extent that much later when Yvette did some training the course declined to take Anne as there was nothing they could teach her.

Whilst in later years a favourite day out was to a Horse Race meeting, whether grand or simple, and for a while she was one of many members of a horse owning syndicate

When she first moved to the Glastonbury Avenue she along with her children kept a number of pets. These included numerous guinea pigs, rabbits and a good number of fancy and tumbler pigeons which she enjoyed watching soar over the houses. Later she switched back to dogs having had a dog as a child. The new ones being Cassie and then Ash. They all enjoyed walks around Parks especially Bramall Hall Park.

Photo: Ash, Anne and Maurice

 

Parcevall Hall, Wharfdale

Whilst a teacher there were many class pets, nominally looked after by the children but often needing "help"

She had over a decade after retiring enjoying holidays abroad including visiting China almost immediately after 9/11. However her health became an issue and she was eventually diagnosed with the terrible Alzheimer disease.

Although she fought on this robbed her of the ability to fully enjoy her remaining years eventually confining her to a hospital bed in her home. She lost any real ability to even talk but could still produce a great smile or chuckle when the circumstances justified them

We, her family, would like to thank the nurses, carers and doctors that helped us care for her in those final years

The bench itself

   

Memorial Bench, Carrs wood

View from the bench in early March 2024

 

View from Bench in March 2024