Post Comment Love 13-15 May

Welcome to this week’s #PoCoLo - a friendly linky which I co-host with Suzanne, where you can link any blog post published in the last week. We know you’ll find some great posts to read, and maybe some new-to-you blogs too, so do pop over and visit some of the posts linked and share some of that love. If you were here last week it was great to have you along, if you’re new here this week we’re pleased you’re here.

I have pretty much spent the last week saying goodbye to friends and colleagues in my former workplace, it’s felt a bit like the longest goodbye (in a good way) and yet still a surprise for some to learn I was leaving. It’s been great to catch up with people in person, and as I warned them, I’m not far away and was back there last night attending an awards night and for drinks. I’ve only been away a few days, but it was good to see everyone.

Thank you for the comments about the photo on last week’s post, the tulips are all but done now - but at each stage their beauty has shone through. They seemed an obvious photo for this week, and quite often - and definitely in this case - obvious is good, so here’s their last hurrah:

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Post Comment Love 6-8 May

Welcome to this week’s #PoCoLo - a friendly linky which I co-host with Suzanne, where you can link any blog post published in the last week. We know you’ll find some great posts to read, and maybe some new-to-you blogs too, so do pop over and visit some of the posts linked and share some of that love. If you were here last week it was great to have you along, if you’re new here this week we’re pleased you’re here.

I’ve had an extra long break over this most recent bank holiday, tagging on my last couple of days leave either side of the weekend. With a couple of things planned, and some time to potter around both the garden and the house, it’s been great - and as colleagues are telling me it’s the sign of things to come. I’ve only a few days left at work now, and they’re also trying to ease me into a more gentle day which is really good of them and appreciated. Last night I organised my leaving drinks, and so this post has been written further in advance than normal - but I’m planning on having a good time and catching up with many people I haven’t seen in real life (thanks to the pandemic) for quite a while.

As I sit on the sofa sharing this post, and over the past few weeks, my eyes are drawn towards the orange of the tulips in our back garden - I’ll share more of these here soon - and it’s great to see the hot splodge of colour. Looking for a photo for this post, as I scrolled through I was drawn to this one - not tulips clearly, but definitely their colours. It is in fact outside Liverpool Street station, and one I snapped on a walk around the City when we were finally allowed to travel further than our immediate surroundings. As well as the colour, what I love about this is the mix of old and new, modern and traditional - I just love how it works.

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A posh lunch out

Last Saturday MOH and I got our glad rags on and headed out for a posh lunch, we even put proper shoes on. Mine weren’t quite the heels I once would have worn out, but small steps and all that. As it turned out, it was a good test for the wedding we’re off to later this month, so that’s all good.

Lunch was at Gravetye Manor in West Sussex, and yes, we were back - it’s been a while, but it remains one of our favourite places. It’s not somewhere we go often and is definitely in the treat category, which makes it all the more enjoyable. The attention to detail is phenomenal, and nothing is overlooked. This small table decoration in the lounge is a great example of that - a yellow tulip, and leaves and flowers from a strawberry plant shows how simple can also be effective.

The menu cover picks up the detail of the image panels on the walls around the restaurant, and the view over the garden is absolutely stunning.

And the food. Well, I even managed to remember to take pictures before I started to eat. This was my starter of asparagus, it looks a picture and the taste was sublime. I followed this with hogget and wild garlic and finished with the intriguing fennel, honey and lime - which was nothing like you’d expect, or I’d be able to recreate. All of it was absolutely delicious, and it was great to see more dishes around the table as between our table we managed a good selection from the menu for each course.

The yellow tulips, along with gorse and the purple-blue irises formed another stylish but not dominating table centre.

As it was such a glorious day we opted to have coffee in the garden, which was full of spring flowers - and clearly is well looked after.

There’s plenty of grounds to explore, but after a good lunch and in our finery, a walk to the walled kitchen garden was all we were up for. But even so, the route there was calming and enticing. It was slightly further than I remembered, and previously I’d done this in heels, but we got to the iron gate and let ourselves in.

It’s another huge space, and needs to be as the produce from the garden is used in the kitchen - but what a space.

We headed back towards the restaurant taking a different route, one stepped and easier to navigate, but definitely no less colourful only to be greeted back at the stone porch by the cheeriest pots of fully in bloom tulips. They definitely make your heart sing, don’t they?

Throughout the public spaces there were large arrangements of flowers, all of which we’d seen growing in the gardens. We stopped for a picture making use of one of the large mirrors, and we just about snuck in alongside one of the large displays - so here’s us wearing flowers, in amongst the flowers.

We might not be back for a while, but I’m pretty certain we’ll be back at some point.