The boyfriend got an invite to one of this year's royal garden parties because of his job, and I got to tag along too :)
We were picked up in the morning by the civic car, along with another couple, and were driven down to London (stopping for lunch on the way). Unfortunately cameras aren't allowed inside the palace grounds but we took a few photos outside before queuing up outside the gates with our passports and tickets at the ready.
I spent the whole day being totally entranced by what everyone was wearing. So many fancy hats and lovely dresses (this dress was particularly popular!), and lots of people were in uniform or national costume and lots of the men were wearing top hats. Needless to say it was the most posh party I've ever been to...
As you can probably tell from the photos, the weather was fantastic. We had a delicious afternoon tea (with mini cucumber sandwiches, little pastries and cakes, and chocolates with little gold crowns on them) and had a lovely time exploring the gardens. I didn't see the Queen and the other royals in attendance but the others saw her leaving.
There's a nice video about the garden parties here though it doesn't show my favourite feature - a wonderfully quirky 15 foot (5 metre) high urn that sits in the rose garden. Every garden should have a giant urn!
I'm busy catching up on emails etc now after my day off - being my own boss makes it much easier to take a day off in the middle of the week, but gosh my inbox fills up quickly when left unattended...
