And so it goes..

Summer is on the wane and it breaks my heart a little bit, I can barely remember what it feels like to be truly cold after months of balmy weather and I dread to think of the faff involved in dressing and undressing a little nipper in really cold weather. I am, at least, seeing it out in style with some good ol' English fun! Firstly a trip to Cornwall to our usual gob smackingly beautiful rented house right down near Penzance.

(That's our house, perched on the cliff top with the rocky cove just below, quite spectacular)
The pic above was taken on a bit of a stormy day where we contemplated swimming for about an hour before deciding we were definitely not brave enough to get in!

In fact the weather was a bit suspect for most of the week although we did get a couple of sunny days where everyone launched themselves in to the freezing brine.

That is, everyone apart from Joseph and I who sat on the rocks and lapped up the sunshine.

One particularly wet day Nick and I left the babe with granny and grandpa and headed to the nearby National Trust property, Godolphin House. I'd been there once before years ago and remembered it to be a sleepy magical place, covered in moss with a sense of having been forgotten by the world. I had remembered it right - it's like a cross between stepping back in time and discovering the secret garden. It helped that it was pouring with rain so there wasn't another soul in sight!

(A pretty heavenly potting shed)

(Look carefully - you can see how much it was raining!)
We also spent a considerable amount of time just pottering with Joseph, he gets better all the time!

Once back in the big smoke we headed down to Clifton Nurseries in Maida Vale, I CANNOT BELIEVE I HAVE NEVER BEEN THERE BEFORE!! If Little Venice wasn't beautiful enough, right slap bang in the middle of it is a this gem of a garden centre. With big juicy bunches of grapes hanging from the vines, a victorian style hot house for the indoor plants and a picturesque (and affordable) cafe it was my perfect Sunday afternoon.... and that's when the penny dropped.. I am slowly but with absolute certainty inching towards middle agedom!

We had some wedding present vouchers burning a hole in our pockets which made the experience even more fun and we bought some fab house plants which look pretty cool; Joseph loves them, in fact so much so that he wants to eat them!

Beautiful Clifton Nurseries is, cheap it is not! Luckily we had managed to pick up a blinding haul of garden plants at a Cornish car boot sale; you should have seen our excitement at finding a flowering pink wisteria for £6 (again that sneaking feeling of impending middle age). I also managed to find a rather lovely ceramic chicken casserole dish as can be seen in the pic below. I have been widely derided for this purchase but I truly believe this is an inspired find and everyone else is just one step behind in the style stakes... we shall see!

Rightio, on to chairs! Over the last few months (ok, maybe a year) I admit that chair chat has been largely lost to waffle about my new tot, my new house and anything else I fancy gassing about. All very nice and I do enjoy writing it but I think the time has come where I should get back down to work and do some more chairs. On that note I am going to photograph all the chairs I have waiting to be upholstered and put them up on the blog and anyone interested in them can let me know.

Till then, have a fab week.