Just a bit on the damp side

What a morning it's been! 

Wet! Wet! Wet!

 Paths under water

Garden steps broken, I trod on the corner as I went out to feed the birds earlier and hurtled forward but managed to stay upright.   It's not a flood of biblical proportions by any means but it has entered the house, well garage,  which is connected to the rest of the house.

I did have a dental appointment this morning but they rang last evening to cancel so I don't have to go out except to post a birthday card which I can do just round the corner on the next street, when and if it ever stops raining.   In the meantime to cheer up the day I've made a cake, a chocolate cake.  It's not the most attractive cake in the world but it smells wonderful - just hope it tastes as good.

Put the kettle on!  Care to join me for a slice?

St Chad's, Old and New

Below is the Lady Chapel the only part of the old church of St Chad which remains standing after it collapsed one night in 1788.  By the end of the 18th century the building was falling into disrepair and cracks had appeared in the tower,  the famous engineer Thomas Telford warned that the church would collapse and not long after it did.  

During the time of King Offa of the Mercians (757-96) there was a monastic college on this site whose church was dedicated to St Chad, the first Bishop of Mercia.  In 1148 it was replaced by a much larger church.  Below, open to the elements are the arches of the sedilia.  The remains stand on an incline at the top of Milk Street just off Wyle Cop in the centre of the town.

A site was chosen, on a hill in the loop of the River Severn as it runs through the town, for a new church dedicated to St Chad and the foundation stone was laid on St Chad's day, 2nd March 1790.  Stones from the old church were used in the foundations.

Charles Darwin famous naturalist and  author of 'On the Origin of the Species' was baptised at the church in 1809 and attended services there with his mother, Susanna, daughter of the famous potter Josiah Wedgwood. 

There were some fascinating grave stones in the church yard, I was amused by the name on the one above.

Some of them were very elaborate.

With their classical influences and designs.

Some were very plain, now who is buried here?  Oh?  never!

Ebenezer Scrooge? Bah, humbug!  Well, no not really!  The stone is a prop which was used during the filming of a TV adaptation of Charles Dickens's novel  'A Christmas Carol' in 1984.  Apparently George C Scott was Scrooge and David Warner was Bob Cratchit.   It is in fact a real stone of the correct period which had been so worn away that they were able to inscribe over it.  If you look closely you can see the vague outlines of some writing on the bottom of the stone.  I wonder whose stone it was?

Remembrance

Spotted yesterday a bit of street art on the wall of The Cromwell Hotel, which stands right on the joining of St Mary's Street and Dogpole, Shrewsbury, Shropshire.

(more from Shrewsbury in my next post)

Looking forward to....

 One of my favourite 'dip-into' books from our  bookshelves is Dorothy Hartley's 'Food in England'.  I bought this copy quite some time ago and am always fascinated by the snippets I pick up from it.  It is a social history of  English food through the ages; its uses, its preservation. preparation and presentation.

I know very little about Dorothy Hartley's life except that she was born in Skipton, Yorkshire, that for several years she lived in the vicarage at Rempstone in Nottinghamshire, where her father was the Rector, a village we pass through a couple of times a year on our way into Lincolnshire.   She spent most of her later life in the village of Froncysyllte near Llangollen in Wales, somewhere else we pass through quite often on our way to Porthmadog, where she died  in 1985 aged ninety two.

Consequently I'm very much looking forward to one of the programmes which is part of the 'Food, Glorious Food' season on BBC TV this week.  Historian Lucy Worsley is presenting a television programme about this renowned and well-respected author and illustrator called  'The Lost World of Dorothy Hartley' on Tuesday at 9p.m. on BBC4.  I just know I'm going to find it fascinating.

 I'm also looking forward to putting these pretty Christmas trees on our tree!

I was so lucky recently to come second in Suzy's giveaway at Rustic Vintage Country and when my lovely parcel  arrived as I opened it the smell of lavender was so wonderful.  Your handmade goodies are beautiful  Thank you Suzy.

Cat Thoughts

Ooh at last - a little bit of sun!  I'll think I'll just lay here where it's warm.

If they want to get out of the back door they will just have to step over me. 

It's very relaxing just laying here, when you get to 17 you need to take it easy and chasing that squirrel this morning just tired me out.  You have to keep those little creatures in their place though, let them know who is boss of the garden.

I think I'll risk being trodden on and stay here a while longer, then I'll have a roll around on this mat where they wipe their feet after they have been in the garden.  Then, for a bit of fun, I'll run upstairs and clean myself down on their bed!  They'll like having bits of garden and dust there I'm sure and be so pleased that I'm clean and tidy again.  Then after that well..... it may be time for another snooze.

Do you see what I see?

Yesterday was a grey day, a day for seeking out warmth in both clothes and food and most certainly a day for seeking out some cheering Autumnal colour.  

 

A walk around the lake at Trentham seemed like a good idea so, yesterday afternoon,  we ventured out for a brisk walk.  We could feel the slight chill in the air, a precursor of the colder weather predicted for the end of this week.

The leaves were blowing around in the gentle breeze scattering off the trees in short, sharp showers, whilst up above them buzzards were whirling around their kitten mewling cries echoing across the lake.

Gulls were swirling and swooping low over the water, grebes and cormorants dipping for food, tails up in the air then just a whirl on the surface to show where they had been.  Long tailed tits were flitting and tweeting in the bushes daring us to spot them and jays were flying from tree to tree looking for those elusive acorns, but something else was stirring.................

.........did you see that?

there's another!

 Fairies! Yes, fairies around the lake.  All fairy life was here!

 There were flirty fairies

Friendly fairies

Languid fairies

Sinister ones too!

Come and find us, they cried!  

Did I tell you we found some Autumnal colours too?

You can find out more about the fairies - here  and here

Eden's Garden

I've just finished reading a wonderful book by Juliet Greenwood called 'Eden's Garden'.  I saw it first in the gift shop of Llynnon Mill when we spent a day on Anglesey on our last visit to Wales in September.  I remembered the details and wrote them down in my notebook so that when we returned home I could reserve the book from our local library.   I had read the blurb on the back and just knew it was a book I would enjoy.  Written in two eras the present and the late 19th century it is about two families from a small village in the Snowdonia region of Wales, one family from the big house 'Plas Eden' and the other family from its local village 'Pont-ar-Eden'.  It is about family commitments, duties and loyalties, gardens and garden design, art, sculpture and the search for ancestors.  It is about  people in both eras who are just meant to be together.  The stories of  both families intertwine right to the end as the present day characters seek out their ancestry and this journey of discovery takes them from Wales to London and a hidden garden in Cornwall.

I was even more intrigued when I read the author's  acknowledgements at the end of the book because the house and garden that had inspired her was so very close to an area we have been visiting, for many years now, staying at our neighbours' holiday home on a holiday park up in the woodlands in the village of Prenteg which is on the road between Tremadog and Beddgelert.  In the nearby village of Garreg,  approaching from Prenteg you pass over the Welsh Highland Railway near the RSPB Osprey viewing site, are the wonderful gardens of Plas Brodanw.   The gardens have always been open on an ad-hoc basis to locals and those in the know with an honesty box at the gatehouse but this year they had opened on a more permanent basis with brown signs on the road and a lovely new tea shop.  The house was the home of architect Sir Clough Williams-Ellis who is responsible, among many other things, for the village of Portmeirion which is not far away, just through the next village of Penrhyndeudraeth, on the Porthmadog road.  Below are   a few of the many photos I took of the gardens on our visit earlier this year. 

The modern wooden sculptures you can see were part of an Art Trail that was taking place across the district.

It was a magical place, with little hidden areas and spectacular views and the coffee and toffee fudge scones we had for afternoon tea were quite delightful too!

Tamworth Castle

Part two of our outing last Saturday was a visit to Tamworth Castle.  After our lunch at Middleton Lakes (see my last post)  it was nearly 2.30pm. and we weren't at all sure if the castle would be open but we decided to park up and walk through the pleasure grounds towards the castle.  Hurrah - it was open until 3.45p.m. so we had just over an hour to look around.  In we went not sure what to expect.  We weren't disappointed!

There is quite a bit of renovation and building work being carried out at the moment so some of the outside areas and the Norman displays were inaccessible.  We made our way through the huge doors into the reception area.  The first part of the building to see is the Medieval great hall.

It was very impressive but somehow the impact of it was lost as it was split into two by ropes as you go round the castle one way and come out on the opposite side of the ropes back into the great hall. 

Upstairs next to the Tudor dining room.  

The withdrawing chamber on the far side had been set out as a kitchen area.

Then we went up onto the next floor where there were Museum displays about the history of Tamworth from pre-historic times to the present day. It was nice to see that there were some pieces from the Staffordshire Hoard on display with some replicas of objects to show how the pieces would have been used as decoration.  There is a wonderful exhibition on a much larger scale here in the Potteries Museum in the city centre at the moment and another similar one at Birmingham Museum which we saw earlier this year. 

From this history displays we were able to go outside onto one of the walkways overlooking the chimneys of some of the roof structures.

Then it was up onto the roof of the tower where there were some wonderful views of the town 

and a view of the walkway we had just walked over.

The castle was lived in as a family home for several centuries and much internal alteration has taken place to reflect the tastes of the time.  A lot of these were done by Lord Humphrey Ferrers whose family owned the castle right through from the 15th to the 17th century.  The bedroom above is a reflection of those times.  This family left the castle in 1642 at the outbreak of the Civil War  and it was garrisoned by a Royalist force where continual 'harrying' raids were carried out against the nearby Parliamentarian town of Lichfield. In 1643 the castle was under siege and was eventually captured by Parliamentarian forces and held by them for the rest of the war.

The Townshend family lived at the hall from 1714 until 1837 and the next rooms reflect these rather elegant times.  It was difficult to take distance photos of the rooms as the sun was streaming through the windows so I've just honed in on a couple of things that caught my eye.  I loved the blue of the glasses above against the pretty blue and white wallpaper.

As well as the detail in the bonnet above.  There is an area near this display where you can try on various hats and wigs and a huge mirror to admire yourself in.

Above and below are Victorian rooms, above the nursery and below the rather grand panelled room which was used by the Cook family who were tenants of the Townshend family until they sold the castle in 1897 to the Tamworth Borough council for the sum of £3,000.  A museum was opened there two years later.

We were surprised at how much there was to see inside the castle.  The door you can see at the far end of the room leads down a staircase and back into the hall where we first entered.

At the end of the tour is a good little gift shop and an area with tables and chairs where you can have coffee/tea and biscuits. Not the table below, of course, set for afternoon tea with its central samovar.

An hour passed so quickly and it was soon time to leave and wander back to the car park through the pleasure gardens and by the river.