Sissinghurst Castle Gardens

We have the week off this week - primarily to head to the Cotswolds for a couple of days to drive around in our temporary little Moggy - but also just to relax and enjoy some time to ourselves. So yesterday we headed off to Sissinghurst Castle Gardens, something which we have been intending to do for ages having not been for years despite iot being just down the road.

We didn't go in the house but just concentrated on the gardens and I have to say they were even more beautiful that I remembered - it's like a fairy tale house and I didn't want to leave!





True to form, our favourite places were the vegetable garden (I didn't take photos - more functional that beautiful!) and the cottage garden, which is simply amazing:





The range of flowers is breathtaking - with so many Iris of all shapes and sizes out at this time of year it really must be the best time to go










They also had a rainbow of Aquilegas the like of which I didn't know existed!




The peaceful flower meadow, next to a little river, complete with bee hives and the odd Grecian Urn gives wonderful views over the house and makes you just want to stay forever lying in the long grass reading a book:





if you happen to be in West Kent over the summer I implore you to go and visit - it really is amazing and if a certain sister of mine reading this blog wants to visit it (you would love it!)you know where we are...

We're all going on a...chicken holiday

The chickens had a special treat this Christmas...they got to travel round the M25 in a box! Lucky them! As we were spending 9 days away from home this Christmas and new year we obviously couldn't leave the poor chickens all on their own so we took them to visit their Grandma and Grandad in Hampshire!!

They had a lovely little holiday home, although the neighbours were a bit noisy...lots of quacking! But they loved it, and whenver they were let out they went on a bit of a rampage around the garden...






And they were even naughtier when we left them on their own for a few days...




...while we were enjoying ourselves in Devon in absolute luxury:





Looking at the photos of the girls makes me realise just how much they've grown over the past 9 months.

This is Hythe:



This is Romney:



This will be even more obvious when, next weekend, we get them two more sisters! All being well weather wise we are going to collect two more ex-batts next weekend and i think we'll be shocked at how skinny and featherless they are. I just hope the snow goes by then or we might have to knit them some woolly jumpers!