Our 1st Wedding Anniversary Celebration

Luke and I celebrated our 1-year wedding anniversary on 3 January 2012. It's hard to believe it was over a year ago now, as I can remember the day as if it were yesterday! With our anniversary date being on a weekday, we decided to properly celebrate it by going to London for the weekend (7-8 January). One of the many redeaming qualities about Milton Keynes is that London is only a 35 minute train journey away. Just think 35 minutes, no stops, and you're in the middle of one of my favourite cities in the world!

We stayed at the Thistle Westminster, not the best hotel I've stayed at in London but for the price (they're having a Winter Sale) and the location (right in the heart of Westminster) it was perfect! As luck would have it our room was ready right when we arrived at 10:00am, so we were able to drop our stuff off, freshen up and go!

We spent the morning walking around Buckingham Palace and St. James' Park, before making our way to Trafalgar Square and the National Portrait Gallery (Museums having free admission is one of the many perks of England). I love London's museums but National Portrait Gallery is my favourite. I first visited it when I was sixteen with my Mom when a friendly tour guide suggested it to us. It always seems quieter than the other museums, which I hope doesn't change since Kate Middleton (or should I be calling her the Duchess of Cambridge now?) is going to be a patron now.

© National Portrait Gallery, London

Data source: National Portrait Gallery, London

After a few well spent hours in the NPG, we made a pit stop into the National Gallery which is having an amazing Leonardo da Vinci exhibit at the moment. Unfortunately the National Gallery is considerably busier than its 'cousin' and the queue/crowd around the exhibit was more than either of us could handle. So instead we walked around the Dutch wing, which Luke jokingly described as "a bunch of pictures of cows or windmills or cows and windmills". Philistine!

That evening we went out for dinner at an Italian restaurant, Il Posto, that is the definition of you can't judge a book by it's cover. We discovered Il Posto with my Mom during my birthday weekend in London, it was right across from the Apollo Victoria (where we were going to go see Wicked). It doesn't look like anything fancy, but the food is simply amazing! The prices are good as well, I mean £7.00 for a pasta dish in London is practically unheard of. It certainly won't be our last dining experience there!

While on Saturday we had visited my favourite museum, on Sunday we visited Luke's - the Natural History Museum. Luke kept pointing out things to me and darting from exhibit to exhibit with the exuberance of a little kid; which happens to be the last time he visited the museum. The museum was a little too packed with kids that didn't watch where they were going for my liking. But I did enjoy looking at the Aurora collection (a collection of multi-coloured diamonds) and the Dinosaur exhibit took me back to my childhood. What is it about dinosaurs that makes so many children fascinated by them? Perhaps it was because we grew up with Jurassic Park, but every child from my generation seems to have gone through a dinosaur phase.

After exiting the museum we took the Underground to Covent Garden for some window shopping and lunch. I was so underwhelmed with lunch that I don't even remember where we ate, although of course I loved the atmosphere. After watching a few street performers we wandered through Soho looking for the giant Waterstones book store that our waitress had told us about. Four storeys of books, yes please! As it happens there are plenty of book stores around Soho,  mostly used/rare book stores. One such store got our custom, even if he did look down his nose at us at Luke paid for his used copy of Dr. No.

By the time we were finished wandering around Soho, we never did find Waterstones, it was time collect our luggage from the hotel and head to London Euston for our train back to MK. As the t-shirts say; I ♥ London!

Erin x

Quintessentially English's January entry for Happy Homemaker UK's Post of the Month Club

Ladies in London

'Portobello Road' clip from Disney's Bedknobs and Broomsticks (1971)

"Portobello road, Portobello road
Street where the riches of ages are stowed.
Anything and everything a chap can unload
Is sold off the barrow in Portobello road.
You'll find what you want in Portobello road."

Bedknobs and Broomsticks was one of my all time favourite films as a child, and I so wanted to visit Portobello Road. I figured it was a more realistic ambition than visiting the beautiful briny sea or watching animal football. Some twenty years later I got my chance last Monday! Lindsay and I decided to have a girly day in London with our main stop being Portobello Road. Although Portobello Road's Antique Market is mainly done on Saturday, there was certainly plenty to do and see. 

My three favourites being:

1.  A number of cool vintage shops. Lindsay said they were either like walking into her grandmother's closet or her closet circa 1984.
2. All of the Mediterranean/vegetarian food restaurants/stalls. I'm a sucker for Mediterranean food, especially if it's vegetarian. Quite a few of the restaurants in the area seemed to cater to this type of eating and with things like halloumi (a cheese from Cyprus) my mouth was watering.
3. The fresh fruit and vegetable stalls. Yes, there were scarves and rings and all sorts of other trinkets for sale but the fruit and veg stalls are what really caught my eye. Because there were so many of them the prices were unreal. I bought two packs of dates for a pound.

Reaching the end of Portobello Road, Linz and I had discussed earlier in the day having tapas for lunch. Linz had found a tapas restaurant online close to Portobello Road, only problem was now we didn't know where it was. Lindsay was consulting her map when we were approached by a rather eccentrically dressed older woman. We told her what we were after and she offered us to walk with her for she knew where I tapas restaurant would be. She was one of the most remarkable woman I've ever met. Not only had she travelled extensively, on her own as her husband had sadly passed a number of years ago, but she was fluent in French and could speak a little Polish. She had taught herself Polish because one of her all time favourite destinations was Krakow. I could have spoken to her all day so I was sad when we arrived at our destination and bid farewell. I considered inviting her to join us for lunch but without the means to communicate this to Lindsay first, I decided against it. It turns out Linz felt the same way about her and was thinking along the same lines as me, but by this point we were seated and she had disappeared into the crowd. I'll always wish I'd asked her to lunch, I didn't even catch her name but the twenty minutes I spent in her company were very pleasant indeed.

The tapas were lovely, Lindsay and I split four dishes (chicken roulade, beetroot salad, squid fricassee, and cheese & pepper croquettes)  and washed them down with a glass of the house wine. After which we wandered through Whiteleys, England's first department store, upon suggestion from our mystery friend. Whiteleys is no longer a department store but in fact a shopping centre but you can see how grand it must have been in its heyday. While there we popped into Zara's to continue search for a black blazer. I've wanted one for a number of years, but not just any old blazer a really nice fitting tailored one. I absolutely love blazers and there were so many in the store I wanted, not just the black ones, but alas none of them fit me right. My quest continues.

Whiteleys Department Store

Disappoint search for blazers at Whiteleys over and done with, we made our way to Kensington Gardens. One thing I love about London is all the green space in the form of the Royal Parks. If I had to choose a favourite royal park, it might just be Kensington Gardens or Hyde Park (which runs directly into Kensington Gardens). On nice days I love to just walk through the Royal Parks, I did this with my mother in October and Amy when she came to visit in March. The parks are usually just so peaceful. I say usually because this time I had a stalker in the form of a very persistent squirrel. He followed me halfway through Kensington Gardens. If I stopped he became motionless in the hopes to make me believe he wasn't in fact stalking me. I nicknamed him Ninja Squirrel and couldn't quite figure out his fascination with me until I remembered the dates I had bought earlier in the day. I refused to give him one, namely because I had no idea what effect they might have on his little tummy. But after being followed for no less than fifteen minutes I felt his persistence should be rewarded, well that and the fact that he was sitting on my boot and it was the only thing I could think of to make him move. He got exactly one date and after he decided that I wasn't going to give him any more, he scampered off so quickly one would have thought his tail was on fire.

Our day out ended in Covent Garden. We arrived just as the shops were about to close, with just enough time to go into a couple. Our main aim in coming to Covent Garden was to have dinner before catching our train home. We stopped at Le Pain Quotidien, which I would go back to again in a heart beat. The food was all fresh and the prices were very reasonable, especially for London. I stuffed myself on an Italian platter made up of cheeses, cured meats, and tapenades. Delicious!

All in all a thoroughly enjoyable day out, and once Luke and I move to Milton Keynes an easier experience to repeat!

x