Holiday Treats

Last weekend I had a great day out with my lovely girl. She wanted to go to Hackney City Farm as we had spotted it the last time we were in london. It really is a little oasis in the middle of London with a lovely cafe too.

We spent a relaxed couple of hours wandering around looking at the animals and eating apple cake in the cafe.

The donkey was definitely our favourite animal with the pigs coming a close second.

Conveniently for me the farm is only a couple of streets from Columbia Road. Last time we visited most of the shops were closed but we decided to give it another go.

The street has great character and lots of little independent shops. If you visit their website there are pictures and descriptions of all the shops. This fabric shop would have been heaven I think to many of you. I loved the vintage car parked outside.

Back to my kind of heaven, this wonderful shop that was closed last time round. It is crammed with all sorts of vintage treasures especially tea sets and glassware.It has a lovely coffee shop in the back of the shop too, so you can drink your tea surrounded by vintage goodies. I spotted the picture and when I enquired about the price was pleasantly surprised. It turned out it was an old price and the shop owner had forgotten to remove it and re-price . The lady let me have it for the cheap price anyway so I was very pleased. The photo doesn't really do it justice but it is in a faded yellow painted wooden frame and the picture has lovely muted colours.

I took this through the window of 'Suck And Chew' a vintage style old fashioned sweet shop. I wanted to show you the row of lovely dogs on wheels under the table. Sadly they weren't for sale, I would dearly love one of these.

Instead I had to settle for this old photo I bought this week. It has been made in to a postcard and the sender writes that it is her dog that showed at Crystal Palace. I don't know how old it is as there is no stamp but I am guessing anywhere from the 1930s onwards. I love the picture with the dogs at the top of my post too. It is another scrap from my 1930s scrap book.

On Sunday we visited the Bank Holiday Antiques And Collectibles Fair at Lamport Hall. The weather was terrible but I found a couple of things including this pretty oil painting. It is obviously done by an amateur but is quite old and I love the soft colours especially the powder blue background. Sadly there isn't a signature but there is an inscription on the back giving it to someone as a present and saying it was 'painted by Jean'.

Lastly , these are a pretty set of crocheted mats I found in a charity shop this week. I had intended to put them by for the Vintage Fair but yet again Mr C said he liked the colours and suggested we keep them for a while. I am starting to get worried about him !