Exhausting weekend.....

What a busy weekend this has been, well it all started on Thursday evening when we had a lovely crowd in for a retirement party in the evening - they were far from "retiring" and danced and laughed their way through the evening, popping out in the gardens to chat with us ducks from time to time (although I have to say that the ducklings in the pen are generally getting most attention).

After this we had a lovely wedding here yesterday - they were a bit late coming from the church (very "thorough" photographers - I heard it said!) but worth the wait .... both the bride and groom looked fantastic as they stepped out of their vintage car outside the marquee.

The next thing I saw was one of our resident Harris Hawkes on the arm of his hander coming up to meet the guests.  Apparently the Bride Groom loves the birds of prey and was determined to get some photos on his wedding day.  They all went off down the garden for more photos at this point before going in to the marquee for speeches and dinner.  Shirley (Head Chef) not only designed and cooked a lovely menu for the evening (no duck!) also made the cake for the couple.

 

Then just as we were hoping for a quiet nap on the pond we find that there is yet more excitment planned for today - an antiques valuation day.  David Walters and his colleague have been on hand to chat to people all day - there have been many curious shapped packages brought in and he has been very busy indeed.  Listening to folk in the garden afterwards he appears to have a lot of knowledge and is most interesting.

David Walters - Antiques Expert

Hopefully tomorrow will be a quieter day - but rumour has it that the schools have broken up now, so I expect we ill get a lot more visitors. There are some childrens pottery courses going on (Sophie Binney) and of course there are the new baby barn owls (4)  that Arden Falconry are looking after to interest the youngsters this holiday (as well as feeding us of course!).