BABY BEDROOM DECORATIONS

A History of the World in 100 Objects

From the renowned director of the British Museum, a kaleidoscopic history of humanity told through things we have made.
When did people first start to wear jewelry or play music? When were cows domesticated and why do we feed their milk to our children? Where were the first cities and what made them succeed? Who invented math-or came up with money?
The history of humanity is a history of invention and innovation, as we have continually created new items to use, to admire, or to leave our mark on the world. In this original and thought-provoking book, Neil MacGregor, director of the British Museum, has selected one hundred man-made artifacts, each of which gives us an intimate glimpse of an unexpected turning point in human civilization. A History of the World in 100 Objects stretches back two million years and covers the globe. From the very first hand axe to the ubiquitous credit card, each item has a story to tell; together they relate the larger history of mankind-revealing who we are by looking at what we have made.
Handsomely designed, with more than 150 color photographs throughout the text, A History of the World in 100 Objects is a gorgeous reading book and makes a great gift for anyone interested in history.

## This is the very first picture ever taken of my father , my uncle and my aunt , who are all three being portrayed here as still very , very young children .
Knowing that my aunt Sien was born on february 20 , 1919 and that both Wim and Cor , the babies on this picture , were born on august 18 , 1920 , I presume that this photo was taken in the early months of 1921 .

Cor and Wim were twinbrothers , but as was already visible from the day they were born and as was also very visible on this picture , they were definitely part of a non-identical pair of twinbrothers .

The birth of these twinbrothers , several months before this picture must have been taken , was a very special one , to say the least .........

Pieternella , their mother , became rather fat during the pregnancy , in fact she became fatter and fatter , and heavier and heavier , until she wasn't able any more to see her proper feet .........and still , not for a moment she must have considered the possibility of being pregnant of a pair of twins ..... and things like echoscopy had to be invented yet !

At that remarkable and special day of the delivery , august 18th 1920 , when mother Pieternella had already given birth to the first baby (Wim) , it had to be the midwife who made the astonishing and fully unexpected discovery of another child who was almost trying to find his way to the light of life .....and who was to be born one hour after the first baby .......
August 18th 1920 always remained a very special , memorable and somewhat unbelievable day within my family !


# Though being born and raised in Middelharnis on the Dutch island of Goeree-Overflakkee , the only one of the three children who would permanently stay on the island , was Cor , the middle one of the children on the picture - well , 'permanently' ?? : there was a short and very unwilling interruption during the second world war , when Cor was sent as a prisoner of war to the land of the German occupiers of course .

Cor's twinbrother however would live and work most of his life in or in the heighbourhood of Rotterdam and the city of The Hague , and like his twinbrother , Wim was also sent to Germany as a prisoner of was in 1944 , and did also come back , emaciated and certainly not in the very best shape , but fortunately unbroken and eager to restart every-day's life , the way it was before war had broken out .

Finally Sien : she left the island already in the year 1946 and had lived all the rest of her life , until her decease in 2003 , in the city of The Hague .

Especially the bond between Sien and her brother Wim has always remained very close . Since the late fifties , since the moment that they both lived in The Hague , they never ever lived further away from one another than just one or two blocks .

The three children on the picture , their two brothers and one sister and both of their parents nowadays only live on in all of our deeply cherished memories .......

medical research money would be spent on birth control methods for men..

baby-sitting,doing dishes and making beds would be considered "macho"..

men would be forced to purchase overpriced clothes every season..

minnie mouse would get equal billing with mickey..

the ideal weight standard would increase by 40 pounds for women..overweight men would be encouraged to wear girdles..

men would come with papers showing their true identity,marital and employment status,if they live with their mother,and whether they have had their shots..

shopping would be considered an aerobic activity..

men who designed women's shoes would be forced to wear them..

men would not be allowed to eat gas-producing foods within two hours of bedtime..

men would be secretaries for female bosses,working twice as hard for no credit..

little girls would read "snow white and the seven hunks".. (lol!)

men would bring drinks,chips and dip to women watching soap operas..

men would be judged entirely by their looks,women by their accomplishments..

men would sit around and wonder what WE are thinking..

men would pay as much attention to their women as their cars..

all toilet seats would be nailed down..

men would work on relationships as much as they work on their careers..

TV news segments on sports would never run longer than one minute..

men would have their wedding rings permanently attached so they can't pretend to be single..

men should learn phrases like:
i'm sorry..
i love you..
you're beautiful..
of course you don't look fat in that outfit..
go to sleep-i'll take care of the baby..

From beer to Coca-Cola, the six drinks that have helped shape human history
Throughout human history, certain drinks have done much more than just quench thirst. As Tom Standage relates with authority and charm, six of them have had a surprisingly pervasive influence on the course of history, becoming the defining drink during a pivotal historical period.

A History of the World in 6 Glasses tells the story of humanity from the Stone Age to the 21st century through the lens of beer, wine, spirits, coffee, tea, and cola. Beer was first made in the Fertile Crescent and by 3000 B.C.E. was so important to Mesopotamia and Egypt that it was used to pay wages. In ancient Greece wine became the main export of her vast seaborne trade, helping spread Greek culture abroad. Spirits such as brandy and rum fueled the Age of Exploration, fortifying seamen on long voyages and oiling the pernicious slave trade. Although coffee originated in the Arab world, it stoked revolutionary thought in Europe during the Age of Reason, when coffeehouses became centers of intellectual exchange. And hundreds of years after the Chinese began drinking tea, it became especially popular in Britain, with far-reaching effects on British foreign policy. Finally, though carbonated drinks were invented in 18th-century Europe they became a 20th-century phenomenon, and Coca-Cola in particular is the leading symbol of globalization.

For Tom Standage, each drink is a kind of technology, a catalyst for advancing culture by which he demonstrates the intricate interplay of different civilizations. You may never look at your favorite drink the same way again.