England, part 2 of 3, mingling moments

post #229
      I promised shops today, in the small but well known Cotswold town in England where I spent the week before last doing errands, fixing some meals, and enjoying another visit with my English stepmother.  I thank her for my airplane ticket and a place to stay and the chance it gives me to catch up with the changes in the town and with her friends and neighbors I have known over the years!
       As I wrote last week, I hurt my shoulder on the way over, so I resorted to taking these shop photos with my lightest camera: my iPhone.  The important thing is to believe that these small shops still exist and contribute to the neighborly feel of a small town, despite the year round onslaught of tourists -- though not so many in February....

       First, here's a newly spiffed up mini-mini-mall, with a bookstore! The owner carries mostly children's books and books that are published in the region. Independent bookstore propiertors are brave souls, no matter in which country or in which location they may be.  Bravo!

I liked her display just outside her store entrance.

    The butcher in the meat store was also OK with my taking his photo, and I say thanks!

    The rest of the photos of the shops were taken from the sidewalk, looking in, on the sly:

outside the Green Grocer, where I'd go to buy vegetables and fruits -- the spring plants are for everyone tired of the damp and the cold.  They give all those English gardening fanatics one way to hold on until spring.

And since Valentine's day was coming soon, the Green Grocer featured these flowers in its shop window.

a tea/coffee shop, showing one plate of goodies down to the crumbs, which appear to have had chocolate bits...

looking at sheep, trying to lure me into the tourist office....

Several hotels and restaurants/pubs compete for the tourist trade!

a stationary store, where the Royal Mail counter is located in the back,

but the letters and postcards with stamps can be mailed in this red box outside the store.

      I am saving the best to last -- my one drive in the car, to visit June and Bill.  First, here is the butcher shop in the really small town of Mickleton, on the way.  Next week I will be showing some of my favorite photos from earlier visits to this area, and I will include how this shop looked under the previous owners, before increased regulations by the European Union.

        This last image shows the warming hearth in Bill and June's house, with its welcoming plate of biscuits (what we Americans call cookies), and the wonder of this big enough house which is mostly at least 400 years old!  Needless to say, as a tall person, I stand up with care, lest I forget a beam. Notice also the laptop, the TV, the plugs and other such signs of the old and new bumping up against each other. 
        I love, love, love being with them and catching up with family news, theirs and ours. We always have a lot to talk about.  Thanks, June, for the OK to use this photo!!  I will probably have another photo from your place next week, in my selection of favorites from England.