Thank You

Many thanks to all who sent birthday wishes to me yesterday, it really made my day. I had a really 'wicked' birthday weekend I couldn't have asked for better. I laughed until I cried, ate until I thought I was going to burst and cried because I didn't want the weekend to end.

The 'Granary', was super. All the bedrooms had en-suit and the rooms were beautifully furnished. The only snag was that the place was huge so we were all exhausted having to walk miles to get from the kitchen to the bedrooms!

The weather wasn't too bad on Friday and Saturday and we managed to have a fireworks display on the Saturday evening as planned. We roasted a huge leg of pork and we ate it on soft rolls with homemade stuffing and apple sauce, yum! Then we all piled outside for the fireworks. We asked the neighbouring house if they wouldn't mind if we set off a few fireworks and they said it was okay, but I don't think they expected the show of pyrotechnics we put on, they where awesome. We had only one misfortune when the stick of one of the rockets snapped off and only went up about 20 feet, arghhh my ears are still ringing!

Earlier in the day we went to Ironbridge, Telford in Shropshire, the birthplace of the "Industrial Revolution" and the site of the first iron bridge in the world which was built in 1777-79 by Abraham Darby III and designed by Thomas Pritchard in 1775. I didn't go over the bridge because I have a phobia of bridges! But I did take some photo's and so did Lonnie my daughter. Here is a stunning view of the bridge looking over the river Severn.

Iron Bridge Shropshire, England

I'll post a few more photo later in the week as I haven't had time to go through them all yet.

Sunday was very wet and windy so we decided to stay in, some of us played cards, others just chilled and read or watched TV and kept the fire fed with logs. We all chipped in to make tea as we didn't want to go out into the awful weather.  It's amazing what you can do with a bit of Bree, pate, cold leftover baked potatoes, sausages and onions.  We made a meal for 15 for pennies and there was plenty of it to.

The journey home was hell though as the fields and roads were flooded, trees were down and there were a number of accidents on the road.  It took over three hours to get back to Hampshire.  But it was all part of the adventure and certainly something for us to talk about over supper for months to come.

Next year we want to go to the Cotswold's, we have our work cut out for us though as there will be 19 of us going in 2009.

I can't wait, I love my family so much!

Hugs