Monday, a bit chilly but patches of sun trying to peep out. I went up to the material shop to get some grey fur fabric. We are making squirrels at the YMCA art workshop on thursday to add to our bluebell wood picture!

I had my sketchbook on me, as I am trying to get back into the habit of carrying it around with me, and remembered that just down the road is Beech Bottom Dyke. Amazing how you can just step off the road into an enchanted forest. I just walk a few steps up the path and sit down on the ground. I can still hear the traffic a few feet away but the birds singing out their territorial songs and the power of the trees in this wonderful place soon make me forget.

But it is impossible to draw in a few lines and sqiggles the sweep down into the deep ditch all covered in tumbling twisty greenery, and the froth of masses of white cow parsley. It is a magical place, I will go back another time with my paints.

Later on in the day, around 5.30pm the sun comes out a little so I walk across ‘Winnie’s Hill’ thinking I might go into the ‘Scrap Woods’, but I am taken by a small group of trees right by the road. The white hawthorn blossom is out and still a few bluebells and a little cloud of forget me knots. They are growing in amongst a mass of that sticky plant I don’t know the name of. For the second time today I find myself sitting very near the road with cars rumbling past, but somehow captivated by how lovely a little corner can be. Nothing spectacular, but beautiful in it’s own right.