An Empress....

Do you know who this little girl is? She is related to Queen Victoria. Her nickname was Alicky, and she grew up to wear this crown.

She is Alexandra, granddaughter of Queen Victoria. Her mother, Alice---Victoria's daughter, died when Alicky was very young and so Queen Victoria was really a mother image to the little girl, all of her life. Her one love---and only love---was Nicholas, son of the Tsar of Russia. Because of the differences in their religions, she kept turning Nicholas down when he proposed---and then she would cry in depression and desperation. Knowing that Nicholas would be Tsar of all the Russia's meant that if she married him she would be Tsarina, Empress---and she would have to embrace his religious beliefs wholeheartedly. Because of her own deep feelings about her own religion, she just couldn't reconcile the differences in her mind, and didn't want to marry him and become Empress with a lie in her heart. It took many years, and many family members to finally convince her that the doctrine that she believed in so wholeheartedly was not as different as Nicholas's. Eventually there was a happy ending...at least as far as their engagement and marriage was concerned. She wore this crown the day she was crowned with her beloved Nicky---the crown is the Russian Tsarina's crown. Well, the one she wore was this one or one extremely similar.

And Feodora? She was Queen Victoria's older half-sister, whom Victoria dearly loved.

I just sent off a couple of critiqued chapters to England. Its 11:33 here in the states, so what times is it there? 4:33AM? Soon the British will be getting up and my critique partner will open up her Monday email. I'll be sleeping.

Sweet little Alicky....she grew up to have 5 children. Her life was a life of highs and lows. She loved Nicky and her children dearly and being with them was a dream come true, but in other ways she was lonely, sad and frail. She was very misunderstood and her nerves were never good.