Friday Smiles 2026 # Week 28

 Well I have a lot to smile about this week, and lots of photos to share, but I will start with last Saturday when again the park came alive to the shouts of excited children as TNS (a local football team who play in the Welsh league), organised a fundraiser fun day, with bouncy castles, inflatable football pitches and games. And No! I didn't take any photos even though I met my very excited grand-daughter over there. 

It was also the Oswestry Food and Drink fayre so all the streets around were lined with stalls selling street food, local produce, baked items and locally distilled whisky. It was too crowded to take a meaningful photo, but I bought some very tasty pies and some lovely cheeses.

However, the day before that, on the Friday I took loads of photos when I had a day out with my daughter-in-law Ella. Months ago she told me she had been to Oswestry Ironworks with her sister and I mentioned that I had never been there but woud like to one day. She promised me we would go there for lunch one day but it has taken until now for us to find a day when we were both available! Fortunately it was another lovely sunny day so off we went. I wasn't sure what to expect though I knew they had sculptures made for scrap metal. Probably their most famous sculpture is the "Knife angel" - an angel made entirely from knives surrendered after an arms amnesty. Sadly that was not on show for us as it is currently on a nationwide tour.

But we did see the famous gorilla made from 40,000 plastic spoons collected by children from around the world. 

https://www.blackcountrymetalworks.co.uk/spoon-gorilla

It is in the centre of this collage along with some more fantastic exhibits.

These are some of my favourites, especially the 'Grim reaper' carrying a lantern in place of a scythe. I hope you can click on the image and enlarge it enough to read the caption next to him. 

I also liked the cut away head listening to music through headphones. The work involved in creating each one is amazing.

There were some cute little characters with an explanation of the materials used, and also some characters familiar to the younger visitors.

These fruits stood out because of their bright colours which clearly show the cogs and gears used in their construction.

The vehicles were pretty cool, especially the car made from drift wood, and the van with a millipede wound round it and each of its legs was a golf club.

Of course there were lots of mythical creatures allowing the makers to use their imagination, and all were very striking.

We walked a good few steps as the sculptures were spread over a wide area. I couldn't stop taking photos which is why I have put them into collages, but this is only some of the ones on show. But tired and hot, and mindful of the time when Ella's daughter needed to be met from school, we decided to stop our wanderings and were glad to settle in this lovely restaurant for a very tasty late lunch.

And finally, not an exhibit but my lovely smiling grand-daughter enjoying her day out.

One last happy event for this week is that now the garden is cleared of builders rubbish we decided to buy a little bistro table and chairs for our patio. There isn't much space out there yet but this is big enough for a cup of tea each, and even a light meal if we wanted it. It is a very pretty design, and we actually both agreed on the same one which made buying it easy.

And that is more than enough from me for this week.