Folksy Friday....Metalwork

I've just started a 5 week beginners silver jewellery course so I am learning to saw, file, hammer, texture and solder, so what better way to start my contribution to the Folksy Friday movement by having a 'metalwork' theme...only problem was once I started looking I had trouble choosing just 6 pieces!!

And whilst I was looking for Folksy Friday pieces I spotted the earrings below, fab resin gummy bear earrings by PennyDog Jewellery and I just had to buy them! Can't wait til these arrive :)

N 

XOXO

California Dreaming

So if you are a follower of mine on Twitter you might have noticed I was rather quiet the past two weeks. The reason…a fortnight in sunny California! A week in Disneyland Anaheim as part of my job and then a week’s holiday to soak up some sunshine and have a bit of a break before returning to work again.

So what did I get up to? Well, it’d be rude not to show some holiday snaps…not too many though!

We drove from Anaheim to Palm Springs where we stayed a few nights.

Using Palm Springs as our base we visited the Joshua Tree National Park…

 

And took a tram ride up 10,000ft to a snowy mountain top…

 

Then, we hit the road again heading towards San Diego where we enjoyed a day at the world famous San Diego, a place I’ve wanted to visit since I can remember.

 

And we also went out on a boat whale watching to catch the migrating pacific gray whales (note, NEVER go inside the boat, it WILL make you seasick!)

But the highlight has to be seeing the ladies below in the flesh…please excuse me looking ultra dorky in my glasses…but just look what I am standing in front of :D

All in all a great trip…but now it’s back to work. Have a few things to look forward to though. Going to learn to knit next week at The Make Lounge and also going to see the Calendar Girls on tour with my mum. Plus, I have just booked myself onto a 5 week silversmithing course in April which I am very excited about!!

That’s all folks, hope you like my pics

N

xoxo 

A very belated happy new year!!

 

Yes, yes I know I am very bad for not blogging at all so for in 2010 but I have been busy with real work (aka my day job that pays for my beads!!) as I am off to the states for a conference in 2 weeks…so I think that is a reasonable excuse!

I am very much hoping that 2010 will be a good year for my jewellery making. Fingers crossed that before I go away I’ll get confirmation of an exciting happening currently in the pipeline, so if all goes to plan I shall let you know :)

I have started a few seed bead pieces in front of the telly in the last week, including a new colourway of my bouquet bracelet. I also got some art clay silver pieces kiln fired before Christmas which I am going to have as charms on some simple strung bracelets. Here’s a sample of what I made:

A couple of silver paste leaves – the one on the left has the better texture by far…chose the wrong leaf for the right hand one, but you live and learn these things!

A textured star…I cut my own texture pad out using some rubber carving block and a lino tool to make the pattern…have plenty of ideas for other texture pads I want to make to use on clay after doing this one – I may well LOS this one to make the texture really stand out.

And some dinky charms – a pair of hearts textured with paste and a mini star that was textured using…sequins! Again I might have a go with the LOS on the star to bring out the detail in the texture.

If I get any of these made up into jewellery before I go off on my American adventure I will be sure to post pictures!!

Well, that’s all for now – sorry there’s not more to show for 2010 so far, I hope to rectify this when I get back from the US.

N

XoXo

Hectic times, but some exciting times ahead too!

 

I am sooooo looking forward to Christmas! For all the obvious reasons (Christmas pudding, crackers, mince pies, seeing my family etc), but also because I will get almost 2 weeks off work! PhD are hard work and I have been working like a busy bee in recent months to meet some deadlines so I’ve had no extended time off since I went on my riding holiday long weekend to France in July. In a nutshell…I need a holiday!!!

I love what I do and it is what I wanted and worked hard for, but when it eats into my life outside of my PhD it sometimes gets frustrating. For example, I joined my uni’s polo club but because it happens on Wednesday afternoons (which all undergraduates get off for “sports”…but postgrads don’t :( ) it means at the moment I cannot justify losing whole afternoon of work time. It has meant that I’ve instead been able to go to life drawing classes on a Wednesday evening which I am really enjoying. I had to give up art at A level to carry on my science stuff so it has been nice to get my hand back in with some proper drawing. I would post pics of my work but not sure whether blogger allows nakedness in the medium of paper and pencil and I don’t want to get in trouble!!

There has also been an exciting development in my jewellery making “career” which I hope to be able to say more about once I know for sure that it is definitely happening. Going to spend the weekend working on “my part” and hopefully in the next few weeks I’ll be able to tell you more.

Hoping to have a productive crafty weekend so I’ll try and take some pics (cos all writing blog posts are a wee bit boring aren’t they?)

N

XoXo

Long time, no blog…..plus the Big Bead Show!!

 

Yes, I know, it’s been a considerable time since my last blog post. Alas, real life seems to keep getting in the way (whoever thought up having to have a day job to earn money for rent and food and stuff, huh?) but I am really trying to get on top of things.

Last weekend I really got to grips with my bedroom and bought myself a desk – note: when you are trying to carry 17kg of flat pack desk in a box that is about an inch too big to carry under your arm, the trip from the bus stop to your front door which usually takes 5 minutes can, and will, feel like a lifetime. Chivalry is clearly dead…several people walked past me clearly struggling with the box without a second glance…and by the time I got to the flat lugging it up the stairs to our (top floor!) flat was well, torture!! But, once the feeling had returned to my hands, I cracked on and made it up and now I have a nice work/beading desk to use.

And speaking of beading…it was the Bead Magazine Big Bead Show on Saturday at Sandown racecourse so I eagerly hopped on the train from London to go and drool over stall after stall of fantastic beads. I was looking for some different things to usual as I have just started to work with art clay silver and wanted some different stuff to go with that than my usual seed beads.

The first stall I bought from was Ilona Biggins. I had to be VERY restrained because the entire stall was crammed with semi precious gorgeousness (I could have bought every kind of purple coloured stone on display they were so pretty!). Eventually I settled for some lovely purple crazy agate ovals and some chunky blue goldstone chips/nuggets. Neither of these photos does them justice (light was poo when I took pics) – the agate is a wonderful dusky lavender, and the sparkle on the goldstone is to die for :)

Then I bought some more semi precious beads from Twinkle Pieces – rounds this time. I’m not normally much of a pink person but these were so beautiful and I’d not seen any round matt rose quartz before so I had to have them.

And I also couldn’t resist these lovely impression jasper rounds either…my housemate says they look like little planet earths with the sea green and rock colours. Unfortunately my camera decided it didn’t want to download the pic I took of them for reasons best known only to itself. But I promise they are really nice too!

I spent a few pennies at the Bead Time stall – they had an offer on some nice glass pearls so I bought a selection in colours that work together in a few sizes.

And I also snapped up a few packs of acrylic flowers just because they are so sweet!

And I couldn’t quite manage to stay away from the seed beads and bought an adorable ladybird bracelet kit from Spellbound Beads that I started the other night – will post a pic when I have finished.

It was a great way to spend a Saturday and I’ve definitely found a few places where I can find stuff I want as my jewellery making takes a slightly new direction. Roll on the Big Bead Show 2010 :D

N    xoxo

Craftacular, markets and general creativeness

It's been a busy week at work for me so not had time to update the blog until now.

So, last weekend I dragged myself from my bed (went out Friday night, intended only to stay out a few hours...ended up not back til 2am, oops) and hopped on the tube to Bethnal Green to pay the Bust Craftacular a visit. Wasn't really sure what to expect, but despite the venue reminding me very much of school assemblies, there were lots of people surrounding most of the 50 stalls.

There was a mixture of the cute, the retro, the unusual and in some cases distinctly bizarre (!) but some great eye candy and worth the trip. Favourites included the cool wooden animal brooches on the OFFCUT design stall, the gorgeous birdie artwork on offer from Little Doodles and the very cool Tatty Devine stand where they were attempting to make a record breaking charm bracelet. My sole purchase of the day was this adorable little horse brooch on the Fine City Friends stall.

Since my housemate was away for the weekend, on the Sunday morning I headed to Spitalfields market to see what was on offer there. Lots of clothes - some handmade, some bought in, plus plenty of jewellery and food from pretty much every continent you can think of. Some equally cool market stalls can be found further up towards Brick Lane at the Sunday Upmarket and the Backyard Market. So if you are at a loss for something to do on a Sunday I recommend a trip there.

So what have I got up my crafty sleeves in the coming weeks? Well, I have a silver clay workshop booked for a few weeks time that I'm really looking forward to, some belated birthday present jewellery to finish and I'm also brainstorming some ideas for a piece to enter in the Beads and Beyond magazine jewellery designer of the year competition. I'll let you know how that turns out

N

XoXo

A little netted cuff....

No, your eyes do not deceive you, I do indeed have a picture to show you of something I've made recently! Not an original design, but a project from Bead and Button - I don't really use netting much so I fancied a go at this. Not too struck on the colour but I love the labradorite chips I've used as the toggle buttons.


I have so many ideas for pieces I want to make...plus a couple of UFOs, but at the moment I am so busy at work that often I can just about summon up the energy to make and eat dinner, let alone get out the beads and thread. But I do really want to make a go of this jewellery making lark. Yesterday I signed up for a Misi account and I intend to use there and Folksy to sell pieces rather than my own website. It's a start in the right direction anyhow!!

So in the spirit of this, I have a very crafty weekend planned. On Saturday I'm off to the Bust London Craftacular to have a look at what other crafty and arty peeps have been up to, so, with the additional aim I have of blogging more regularly, look out for a report back on that in a few days time.

On Sunday I'm heading off to Spitalfields Market - in a brainstorming session I had and idea for a bracelet and I remembered that last time I was at Spitalfields there were a couple of stalls where I might be able to pick up some of what I need to make it. Fingers crossed they are there when I go, otherwise I may end up trawling Ebay for what I want.

So, to summarise...in the future, look out for my jewellery being up for sale on Misi and Folksy, and for more in the way of blogs (I hope to start featuring other craft artists in Blog posts...we crafters have to support each other after all!).

TTFN

xx