Victoria at Osborne

My original plan for Monday 21st May involved cake.

As it turned out the cake wasn't needed because something even better ended up happening.

For Victoria Day I was going to bake a Victoria sponge (as shock horror) I don't think I've ever made one before.

Instead I had a brilliant day out at Osborne House with

T, my best friend from school.

Queen Victoria described this home as snug.

As you can see from the two photos below snug isn't the first word which comes to mind given the size of it.

Being a Victorian home, albeit on a grander scale than most, every surface is covered and everything is highly decorated.

Images of Victoria and Albert are seen countless times as you go from room to room 

but it's the small details which caught my eye, such as the carving on the bannister

and the tools of the trade for laying out the dining table in the correct way.

I enjoyed seeing Queen Victoria's private rooms and although they were stuffed to the gills with furniture and treasures and were very grand, they did also seem to have less formality to them than you would expect.
That's where I got to understand the idea of Osborne being a snug family home.

The tour ends with the famous Durbar Room.

It's an astounding feat of workmanship and must have seen some spectacular evenings over the years.

 After we had finished inside we ate our picnic and then made our way down to the beach. Here we sat for ages and ages chatting and eating ice cream. It really was the perfect spot for whiling away an hour in the sunshine.
From there we made our way to the Swiss Cottage where we found a dressing up box. My friend T is a much smaller dress size than me so she was able to get into the children's size dress (although it was a little too short) whilst I put on the adult jacket and skirt. 

Osborne House is well worth a visit. My advice would be to get there early as there isn't a lot of space in some of the rooms and to be able to read the information boards and take it all in you would do this better when the rooms were less crowded. 
The one part I was disappointed with was the 'downstairs'. There really isn't very much to see and again it's quite a confined space. 
But definitely have an ice cream whilst sat in one of the deckchairs as you gaze across the Solent.