Brittany Holiday - Rennes and Dinan

Himself and I  had a short break in Brittany. Firstly we stayed in Rennes - A friendly city with almost no English speaking tourists - what a refreshing change! Our hotel was lovelyand quiet although near the city centre, with a smashing receptionist who even came over while we were at dinner to see if we needed help with the menu - it was very thoughtful if him. We also went to the rather lovely Dinan, which is about an hours drive from Rennes.  Both places had numerous very pretty half timbered houses and shops. Some are leaning on their neighbours due to their age! We noticed how tall they are with four or five stories. Properties of a similar age (1500's) in England tend to only be two stories high.

We had the traditional Breton gallettes complet and cider here - yum:-)

Himself loved this carved shop front selling shoes:

Here's me in one of the many cobbled streets:

Notice the 'infill' between the green building and the dull brown one!:

Not much bread left in this wonderful shop:

Dinan castle gate:

Market day in Rennes (the second largest market in France) - These are some oyster stalls in the fish section:

Lovely smiley flower seller:

An Asterix themed stag party, selling condoms and or phallic, hand carved 'megaliths' for a euro each,  to finance more drinking. We bought a granite megalith for €2 - Bargain. We declined the condoms!

Kindle cover

The Whizz Kid asked me if I could make him a Kindle cover as he was worried about the screen breaking as he carted it around to and from work.

It was my pleasure. First I asked him what colour he wanted  "Blue please"  OK, easy so far.

Dug out some of my more 'manly' blue fabrics and discovered a hole in one fabric, last used when I taught a fabric postcard class and took some of my fabrics for people to help themselves to (nothing quite like other peoples stashes to be able to dive into eh?!).  Why on earth would someone do this? It's not even as if there was a motif they needed!

Anyway,  I showed Whizz Kid some fabrics and asked him to pick out as many as he wanted for his cover - this threw him a bit,  you could see the confusion going through his mind so Chic Girl pointed out he could choose absolutely anything as it was being created just for him.

Anyway fabric choices made, I sewed some strips together, I didn't want to do anything too 'fancy' it had to be simple. I then offered him a choice of contrast and bindings - aha, he's now caught on to the concept of 'custom made' and chose a rather 'jazzy' stripe to add some pizzaz.

If I was making this for anyone else I would have used two poppers, one on each corner  but I know The Whizz Kid and just one popper is what he will actually use to keep his Kindle safe.

I made a Pellon stiffener and added three layers of cotton wadding to fit the screen exactly.
 I also made a strap with a caribineer clip attached so it can be attached to his backpack/belt loop/laptop bag to save it getting lost.

I enjoyed doing quilting.

The whizz kid was pleased with the finished article:-)