Birthday celebrations

This time of year is always manic for us as we have five birthdays and our wedding anniversary in the space of five weeks. Not very well planned you might say and I would heartily concur! But thats the hand that has been dealt to us and so we just have to grit our teeth and not think of our bank balance!

The first of our birthdays belongs to my elder son. This year  to celebrate we decided that a family day out to the New Forest was in order. Travelling time for us is probably three quarters of an hour to an hour. We love the New Forest and last year we often had a Sunday afternoon picnic- complete with Sunday papers. I have very fond memories of those trips.

This year we headed down to Beaulieu (pronounced Bewley)- I know I know it looks like it should be pronounced the French way.

Beaulieu is a lovely  unspoilt village  popular with tourists. Along the high street is a fabulous family run Garden centre - Fairbrothers. This garden centre has great plants and a lovely shop area selling lots of lovely pretty gifts. Its the sort of place that you know you will find something there for even the most difficult of people! We love browsing there.

The garden centre also has a lovely cafe called Steff's cafe where there are lots of fabulous ( good sized cakes to choose from). Their lunch menu includes many delicous options- eg local sausages and mash as well as crayfish, omlettes and panninis and so many more lovely gastronomic delights. Here we had a very enjoyable lunch before visiting Patricks Patch.

 This is a fantastic kitchen garden  which  apart from supplying the kitchen with the produce, is used to teach primary school children all about growing fruit and vegetables. I love browsing the garden - getting inspired by all the varieties grown there and dreaming of having  a similarly neat and well tended plot!.

We headed down the high street visiting the little shops and spotted some of the New Forest donkeys sauntering down the street nibbling on what ever took their fancy.

 The boys lead the way down towards the Beaulieu classic car garage where we drooled over the fantastic cars on offer.

The owners  must have had a lot of people wanting to touch and view these fabulous cars as they have a notice on the door -which made me smile.

Beaulieu incidentally is also home to the Beaulieu Motor museum- which often has some of the James Bond cars on display. A must for all car fanatics.


We made for home and arrived in time for friends to arrive for an evening barbecue. A good time was had by all!