Petticoats and Kites

The petticoat to go under Jenny's prom dress was becoming a bit of a UFO so on Saturday I made a concerted effort to finish it. With the proper petticoat from the company where we bought the dress costing £49.00, and the net costing us only £4.95 for 5 metres from Dainty Supplies we had a go. With an original 1950s petticoat belonging my mum to copy from and a picture on a website we set off and saved £44.00.

With the dress making theme in mind we also had a long browse in the haberdashery dept of John Lewis on Saturday. Rosie saw this monkey fabric from Creatures and Critters and decided she wanted a skirt made with it. Now there's a challenge. Patterns were on special offer so we splashed out. I haven't got any further on the star quilt for jenny, so the monkeys will have to wait a while.

Today was another mild sunny day so off we went for a walk in Chopwell Woods. Lesson 1 - if you take a map take your reading glasses too, Lesson 2- take someone with you who knows how to read the map.

We set off on the blue route 1 1/2 miles, never saw a blue sign post yet but managed half of the red trail and half of the green trail. We did see these strange sculptures in the woods which weren't even on the map.

Eventually we asked someone for directions and they pointed us on the Red Kite Route and asked if we had seen a pair of red kites flying around. Birds of prey, Red kites have been reintroduced into the area of the Derwent Valley and are now breeding successfully. We couldn't see anything but trees.

Desperate for a cup of tea (and of course a cake ) we drove off to the local garden centre and the first thing we saw gliding majestically above the gardens were the pair of red kites! We sat at a table by the window and watched them for about half an hour in warmth and comfort. Here is a distant picture of one of them, not bad for the view from a cafe window, if I ever master photoshop I will be able to enlarge it.

Happy quilting x