Afternoon Tea, Wine Tasting, Shoes and William Morris.

'Have nothing in your house that you do not know to be useful, or believe to be beautiful.' William Morris.

Not a bad mantra to live by, that's my excuse for a house packed full to the rafters with "things" anyway.

This weekend thanks to Soo I finally got to visit Kelmscott Manor, the Oxfordshire home of William Morris. Bit shameful really, it's only 25 years since I was an art student who did paper on the Pre-Raphaelites  and it's been on my doorstep the whole time.

We chose a beautiful day to drive into the Cotswolds, as you can see the village of Kelmscott was just idyllic

you felt your cares melt away.

No wonder Morris lost his heart to this house the minute he saw it.

Sadly no photo taking was allowed inside the house, which was just beautiful and surprisingly uncluttered!

You could take plenty outside in the pretty gardens though.

We wondered to our hearts content and ate lunch in the tea rooms before ambling back to the car park through pretty country lanes.

The British countryside at it's very best.

If that wasn't good enough we then jumped in the car and headed back to Soo's village for a spot of  afternoon tea.

The teas are run once a month by a mutual friend who not only collected all the wonderful vintage crockery and champagne glasses, but makes all the scones and cakes herself. Delicious it was too.
That was a strawberry, elderflower & white chocolate cake in front of a chocolate, rum & hazelnut cake. As you can imagine I was stuffed after that little lot.

As it turned out there was an alfresco wine and beer tasting going on too so we waddled down there afterwards.
Not only could you taste, but you could then also buy a glass or a bottle of what you tasted, bloody inspired.
I quaffed a couple of large glasses of a rather lovely Pinot Grigio Blush whilst talking America with some of Soo's friends. I was sorry to go but knew I had to get home before my last train so headed off around 8pm.  Trouble with the trains meant I finally got in just before 10, but all in all it was a fantastic day.

No blog post of mine would be complete without a purchase. I needed some more summer sandals but as my toe is still gammy I wanted some that covered it and found the perfect pair, rather surprisingly they are white!
A huge deviation for me.

 I ended up picking up a very 80's-tastic t-shirt too!