The first thing we did after arriving in Paris was eat mounds of cheese with baguettes, cakes and drink wine, followed by a boat ride up the Seine to see the popular tourist attractions, which I have to say always live up to expectations. With only one more day to explore the rest of the city we consulted the book Paris: Made by Hand by Pia Jane Bijkerk which took us to some really interesting areas. The book is laid out in chapters that cover different parts of Paris and the interesting boutiques one can encounter. The first one we took led us to a large street that didn't seem to have anything of interest until we stumbled upon a fabric and coat making shop. There were several looms and about 5 people sewing on machines producing the most beautiful coats.
As we continued down the street we came across an umbrella maker, violin maker, sculptors, chair designers and map specialists. The next shop we came to was an embroidery boutique with amazing fabrics and exquisite embroideries lining the walls. It's probably been about 15 years since I cross-stitched and I thought it might be fun to give it a go so I bought a pattern.
The next section we decided follow was through a beautiful, perfectly parisian area full of paper shops. The boutiques had amazing insect prints, rubber stamps, journals, letter paper, basically anything to do with paper.
After our tour of not-as-touristy Paris we took the metro out to the last station to have dinner at a lovely little restaurant with Toby's parents. The desert was amazing! No photos of that unfortunately because I ate it too fast.
