THE ladies of Cardross SWI hosted their first 'daffodil tea' event in many years in the village this week – and the afternoon has been declared a great success.

More than 30 customers visited the event at Cardross Parish Church Hall on Monday afternoon, despite the chilly winter weather, in a new venture for the group.

Mary Robins from Cardross SWI told the Advertiser: "It was a fairly busy afternoon – we were pleasantly surprised by the turnout for a Monday.

"It was a bit of an experiment for us. Our regular meetings are usually held in the evenings, but we decided to organise afternoon events in February and March because some of our members find it a bit hard to get out at night when the winter weather is bad.

"In February we went to the cinema, and we decided on an afternoon tea as our March event. It's the first time in my memory that we've held a daffodil tea and we're very pleased at how it went."

In Cardross, as in many communities across Scotland, the SWI branch is keen to try fresh ideas in the hope of attracting new members to an organisation which is focused, as much today as it always has been, on teaching useful life skills.

Formerly known as the Scottish Women's Rural Institute, the word 'Rural' was dropped from the organisation's name in 2015 in a bid to widen its appeal.

"A number of new groups have been formed in inner city areas and have been very successful," Mary continued.

"Despite the name change the SWI is still very much a skills-based organisation. We try and update what we do by having a really good range of interesting guest speakers and giving members the chance to try new things on a hands-on basis.

"We still have our competitions for baking, knitting and other items at our meetings, to practice particular items that are going to appear at our annual show."

The Dunbartonshire SWI Federation's annual show will be held in the Kilmaronock Millennium Hall in Gartocharn on Saturday, April 28 and will show off the skills of branch members from throughout the area. The show is open to the public in the afternoon following the judging of all the entries.