Rippling River

My project in Beads and Beyond this month is a long lampwork necklace. The links that I've used between the beads were inspired by a scrap piece of wire that was sitting in my 'just in case I find a use for it' pot on my desk for months. Now, that's not my scrap pot, even though silver does get pulled back out of there if it just happens to be the perfect length for head pins etc, but my pot of bits and pieces left over from previous experiments. They're too potentially good to put with the scrap but just didn't work out at the time. Anyway, this particular piece of wire had been hammered on both sides with my favourite hammer and been shaped. I found the perfect beads to go with it (beautiful lampwork beads from Caroline at Crafted Gems, and Rippling River was created! I usually find it hard to come up with names for magazine pieces, but this one just had to have a water based name!


There's a bonus project on the Beads and Beyond website too - the earrings above. They're made from one piece of wire and are much quicker and easier to make than they look - perfect for Christmas presents!

Tutorial Tuesday - frothy flower crochet pattern

There are an amazing number of fantastic tutorials out there on blogs. I've got dozens of them saved and I've even found the time to make a few of them, but not nearly as many as I would like. Anyway, I thought it was about time that I linked to more of them on my blog .... so .... welcome to my first Tutorial Tuesday!

The idea is that that every Tuesday (obviously) I'll link to a tutorial or two that has caught my eye, and hopefully show you what I've made using it too. I'll include more tutorials of my own as well as - some showing you jewellery making techniques and some for projects that haven't made their way into magazine articles. The first tutorial is for a gorgeous crochet flower by Ali of Craft Matters - and this is one tutorial that I've actually found time for! I'd actually been looking for something to spice up my plain brown winter coat, and I think that this will work perfectly. I think I'll be making a few more too to decorate presents as inspired by Bugs and Fishes - look at that! Two tutorials for the price of one!

Itchy fingers!

You know that feeling when you've got work to do that you actually do enjoy doing and find very satisfactory but your fingers are itching to do something else instead? Well, my fingers are itching and twitching right now! I've got half a dozen or so orders that I need put the finishing touches to so I can take them up to the post office this afternoon, but I what I really want to go is make a start on at least one of the designs that I sketched out late last night. I will be good and get the orders done first, but hopefully I'll have something else to show you either tonight or tomorrow as well!

Old friends

Well, not friends who are old, but you know what I mean!

We had visitors on Saturday, friends who I went to university with and their two girls, the eldest of whom is now B's new best friend. They seemed to spend most of the day in fits of giggles! They'd met half a dozen or so times before, but this was the first time that they'd spent the whole day together since they were toddlers, and it was lovely to see them playing so beautifully together. Of course, Jo and I had the usual conversation that all old friends do, the one that revolves around how amazed we are that time has flown so quickly, surely it was only a couple of years ago and not 1996 that we were sharing a house and trying to find any distraction (even cleaning the bathroom) from studying for our finals, and how on earth did we get old enough to be married with children and mortgages?! Oh, and we must, really must, meet up more often. Jo's going to come over and spend the day with me playing in the shed in the New Year, so that's a start!

Finished projects

I'm feeling rather pleased with myself as I managed to finish two projects last weekend while we were driving up to Suffolk for Grandma's birthday. I finished knitting and crocheting them both a couple of weeks ago, but as usual it's taken me a while to sew them up!


I made the elephant for my friend's new baby girl. We called into see them for lunch and a lazy afternoon on Saturday before continuing onto my Aunt's for the birthday celebrations. I had lots of lovely cuddles with baby Emma and was rewarded with a little bit of sick and lots of smiles! The pattern for the elephant came from this blog, and B and Emma's big brother have put orders in for their own!


And this is the waistcoat I made for Grandma's birthday that I was keeping a secret. I'm really pleased with it - it's not my taste but it's definitely Grandma's, and her favourite colour too. I made it longer than the pattern suggests as Grandma likes her tops to cover her back well. I found the pattern listed on Ravelry (a site that I'm spending more and more time on). The cover of the book it's in nearly put me off as it looks so dated, but I think it turned out rather well.

Cuteable

I had a lovely surprise this morning - my Golden Lovebird is featured on the Cuteable blog! This is one of the blogs that I check out regularly as there are always so many lovely things featured, so I'm really pleased that one of my pieces has been included!

The items in this particular blog post were chosen by Belinda from Shop Handmade UK, and if you wander over to the Shop Handmade UK blog you'll find a nice discount code waiting for you! Thank you Belinda!

Guaranteed Delivery

I've decided to sign up with a courier due to the Royal Mail strikes. I usually use Special Delivery, and while I haven't had any problems with this service during the strikes as Royal Mail have been making them a priority, I don't want to risk any problems as the strikes continue.

So....at no extra cost to you, my dear customers, all UK parcels will be sent by the courier myHermes who will call back twice more if you are out the first time. The parcels are trackable, and I'll include the tracking number in the order dispatch details.

And what's more, they will come and collect the parcels from me so that I don't have to wait in the post office queue - how cool is that!

P.S. On a serious note, I am steadily growing more angry about these strikes - don't they realise the damage that they are doing to everyone, and that most people who have switched to using couriers won't switch back afterwards? I really want to support my local post office and send my parcels through them, but I feel as though my hand has been forced. I'm going to leave my comments on this whole stupid affair at that, as if I go any further this will turn into a long rant!