ROCKING YOUR WORLD FRIDAY - 43RD OF 2026

 Good evening, please forgive my tardiness I wrote this very early on Saturday morning but needed the main PC to upload photos and well let us just say that I find myself on Monday evening - apologies. 

So the reason for the tardiness was the fact we've just had a week away.  We enjoyed days at the cottage we stayed at, days out adventuring, reading, chatting and slowing life down, enjoying some of the autumn treasures that the world has to offer at the moment. 

Last Friday we set off just after 12 heading to a place called Oreton which is quite frankly in the middle of nowhere, we went via Stafford (a place we know well), onto Bridgnorth and then travelled on to Oreton.  The roads would definitely give Cornwall a run for its money, so why make the grateful list, I'm grateful that we got there safely and were greeted with somewhere lovely to stay. 

We'd taken our food with us so we didn't have to venture out again, we unpacked and settled down for the evening.  The cottage was small with the main sleeping and living areas together, but the kitchen was separate as obviously was the bathroom.  We had a stunning view over the owners garden into the woodlands below and a hot tub to enjoy. 

On Saturday with glorious blue skies and after a long journey down we had a lazy day, hot tub, drinking coffees outside, chatting and reading and slowing things down. We saw the pheasants stalking around on the land, a muntjac deer wandered across the garden, we'd been warned that they are quite noisy at times and that it can be quite eerie sounding.  Birds of prey above us, the owners indicated they were buzzards and there was rather an angry crow having a go at one.  There was a squirrel having a frenzy in the apple tree.  Blue tits still dotting around, the owners two cats being mesmerised with the blue tits (thankfully not that they were in reach) and then in the evening hearing the owls and then hubby spotting a barn owl before we noted the bats fluttering around, absolutely wonderful.  

Sundays plans were scuppered when we realised that our original destination was shut, so we headed to Wightwick Manor just on the edge of Wolverhampton albeit still out in the countryside. 

A beautiful house to wander around with some great volunteers chatting to us about its history, they always bring the houses to life. 

I loved all the angles of the house

Spotted this cute bat on the outside of the entrance

Saw a nod to Hardwick Hall with the plaster frieze in the main hall

which was utterly gorgeous

and enjoyed wandering around the garden including the vegetable garden where we spied some good sized pumpkins. 

Monday and we'd booked for Blist Hill at Ironbridge now taken over by the National Trust.  It seemed not to have changed significantly, most of the shops open and working, and opportunities to see things in action which was good, albeit that lots of the items to buy were now via donations buckets which led to a lack of car park change for us which we didn't foresee.

I spied these in some of the shops, yes that is a swede that has been carved out, something my Mum did for me when I was little and I can genuinely still smell the charred swede smell when she lit the candle inside. 

The cobblers shop was like stepping back in time. 

Tuesday was a really wet day so we went to RAF Cosford.  Somewhere we've only been once before and whilst we had to run between the hangars we were under cover the majority of the time. 

My issue with it that as I'm growing older and more cynical I just see all things war as an absolute waste of human life so whilst interesting I genuinely found the day really difficult.

Wednesday and  we went to Berrington Hall another National Trust property and had the opportunity to see a Court Mantua dress, something worn in the presence of royalty from the finest materials designed to attract the most attention and with the width of the dress we are assuming this will have done the trick. 

The gold in the court mantua dress is genuine gold thread and the material is woven silk. 

The dress was sold off at some point or given away to another local house and apparently came up for sale at Christies who contacted the National Trust to offer it back to the house from which it originated I believe being purchased for around £6000 around 2015, the season then spent with specialsts tending the dress who cost an awful lot more than the dress itself.  

It is made up of a number of pieces and one of the sleeves is missing as is the main v piece at the front of the dress.  Romantics have it that the sleeve will have been given to a maid as a gift from the owner and the v shaped piece would have been re-used on other dresses. 

This dress after all its work was worn only once, as it was unfashionable to be seen in such a dress more than once.  

It reminded us of the School for Scandal that we saw at the RSC, we genuinely thought the width of the dress was purely exaggerated for comedic effect we genuinely hadn't realised that the dress was a style of the era.  

The dress is due to be put back into storage for a while whilst they come up with another way of displaying it and to rest it as gravity is not being kind so we were lucky to see it. 

I had great fun trying on some of the dresses when we were wandering around, I quite liked the look of this one, perhaps I was born in the wrong fashion era. 

After leaving Berrington we went north to Ludlow to have a wander, it was almost closing time but we found an independent bookstore and bought a couple of books and an amazing church to look around which seemed so big when you stepped inside, the outside surrounded by buildings making it deceptive. The statues on the altar were amazing.  

Thursday was our last full day and our aforementioned postponed trip on Sunday was rearranged to today.  It was the furthest we travelled from our holiday home but was a must as you all know we love our sculptures so we went to the British Ironworks Museum.

There are so many more sculptures than the last time we went and it was wonderful to see 'The Knife Angel' again.  I've still not seen the Manchester Bee although its trailer was there.  

I loved all the sculptures but here are a few of my favourites

This was created for the King's coronation

This one represents Covid

This was one of my favourite ones from the day

I love a gonk

which was hiding behind this

as you can see

All the sculptures are made from scrap and the majority (I'd say 99%) are made on site. 

I know Kate went in celebration of her birthday recently, we stopped off at the cafe for a shared scone and a shared Bakewell tart and a cup of tea and I have to say after the half scone I was stuffed so I'm not surprised that they provide boxes to take home leftovers from their afternoon tea which are simply enormous. 

It was the perfect end to our week away and we were treated to this view as we headed home. 

 I hope you've had a good week too, hugs.