Papillion

Just a quick note to let you know that I've added Poppy and a few other new pieces to the website. One of the pieces is this one, Papillion, that I actually finished a couple of weeks ago - I must must get quicker at taking photos and uploading them to the website but it takes longer than you'd think to do it and I much prefer creating new jewellery. But...how am I going to sell if I don't upload my new pieces? I know I do quite a few craft shows, but not everyone lives down here on the south coast!

Anyway, I'm really pleased with Papillion. It was one of the rare pieces that I had sketched out and made exactly as I'd sketched it. More often than not, the pieces I make insist that I adapt my designs as I'm working - yes, silver and beads do talk to you as you work with them! Didn't you know?! I cut both layers of the butterfly from sterling silver sheet, hammered the bottom layer to give a line texture, soldered the layers together and finally oxidised the pieces to highlight the texture. You'll find Poppy here and Papillion here. Poppy is obviously unique due to the beautiful bead, and Papillion is part of my Limited Edition collection.

By the way, I've made a few changes to the website menus as it was all getting a bit cluttered. I haven't removed any information, but some links have been moved from the menu on the left to the bottom of the page, and some pages (the jewellery party ones and the jewellery information ones i.e. the ones about the materials I use) have been made into one page. I think the website looks a lot neater and easier to find your way around - I hope you'll agree!

Yellow!

Here it is - proof that I can work in yellow when I put my mind to it! In hindsight the yellow week of the challenge has been very good for me as it's made me use beads in a different way than I would have before - I guess that was the whole idea though!

Here's the lampwork and citrine bracelet I finished at the weekend. The lampwork beads are by Clare Scott and I've had them for a little while now. They were always intended for a bracelet and matching pendant (on it's way!), but I would have put blue and green crystals with them if it wasn't for the colour challenge. I'm really pleased with how the pale yellow brings out the lighter tones in the glass.

I'm not sure whether the butterfly fits into last week or this though, as the hessonite garnet is a golden honey colour. Either way, they'll be on the site soon!

Blue Monday!

Well, the Colour Challenge has started! It actually helped me get a couple of pieces finished in good time for delivery to Between Dreams this afternoon.

I sat and designed the necklaces and did the wirework yesterday evening and finished them off this afternoon while B was having his nap. I'd made the base of the butterfly earlier last week as I've decided to keep a couple of bases for each of my butterflies and daisies in stock, and decided to add turquoise to it to keep with the theme - oh, and also because turquoise jewellery usually sells really well in the shop! The first necklace is amazonite, smoky quartz and freshwater pearls by the way.

I'm in the middle of getting my stock ready for the Southampton City Art Gallery shop too. The exhibition they've got on when my jewellery first goes into the shop has a water theme so blue should fit in there nicely too! I've realised though that I'm going to have to break away from the colour theme at the weekends as I've got a couple of commissions to do. I don't think it'll go down too well if I put the pieces off until I get to that colour in the challenge!

It's been really hot working in the shed this afternoon as the afternoon sun streams in through the door. I am definitely not complaining though as the forecasters say it'll be much cooler by the weekend. I think it was too hot for B though - he didn't have such a good nap as usual. Unfortunately it is not too hot for mosquitoes. My face looks like I've got the mumps on the left hand side, or as if I've just had my wisdom teeth out. A lovely friendly mozzie decided that they liked my cheek this afternoon and as I'm allergic to them I've swelled up nicely despite lots of anti-histamines. Oh well! It could have been worse - it could have been a wasp!

Yes, I know!

I haven't been very good at getting back to blogging after being away, have I? Sorry!

We had a lovely, lovely time - great weather, great apartment (for the money we paid!). Blanes was perfect for a holiday with Ben as everything we needed was within walking distance, except the train to Barcelona which was an easy bus journey. I'll write more later but I wanted to show you the treasury on etsy that I put together this afternoon.

For those of you who haven't visited etsy, it's a collection of online shops selling handcrafted or vintage goods and craft suppliers and you can find my etsy shop here. There's not much in it yet though - I've got so many photos to take and upload this week! A treasury is a temporary collection of items chosen by a member of etsy - anyone can put a treasury together as long as there are spaces, and that's where it gets to be fun! Etsy only allows new treasuries if the number falls below 333, so the only way to get one is to either work out when the number will be low enough and log back on a bit before then and wait or just happen to look at the right time - which is what I did!

As I saw the first butterfly in our garden this afternoon (poor thing, hope it's not out too early) and I've got a few butterfly pieces of jewellery to put in the shop this week I thought I'd fill my treasury with butterflies. If you fancy a closer look you can find it here for the next couple of days!

Bubbles

Okay, the AGM yesterday......

Every year there's a Secretary's Challenge and guild members are challenged to produce a piece of work on a particular theme. As the guild members include workworkers, spinners, embroiders, potters and many more the entries are varied. This year the theme was 'Holes and Cavities' - maybe Sue (our Secretary) had been to the dentist? - and I was determined to enter something this year as I hadn't done before. As I've mentioned just a few times before I've been practicing my soldering and I've had an idea for a double chain with large round hammered links floating round in my head, so I decided to give it a go.

And 'Bubbles' (below) won!

What do you think? The chain and the clasp were hand fabricated, soldered and lightly hammered, and I decided that some beautiful lampwork by Izzy Anderson was perfect for the theme as the beads contain 'bubbles' of fine silver. It's a long necklace - 25.5" with 1" extender chain (about 69cm in all). I've cut the rings for a matching bracelet and for a finer version of the chain too, so I'll be soldering again this week!

I've also soldered frames for a butterfly and a daisy shaped woven wire pendant. I've made a butterfly before without soldering the frame and I'm expecting that a soldered frame will make life easier when it comes to wrapping the finer wire around! The butterfly below was pictured in the second issue of Beads and Beyond magazine. I put it in one of the galleries that displays my work and some lucky girl was bought it for Christmas!

I haven't decided what stones to use in my new butterfly - unless I have any requests/suggestions I guess I'll see what takes my fancy tomorrow!