November already....where's the year gone?

Hello! It's been a busy couple of months which is a terrible excuse for not posting more often, I know. Mostly I've been dashing about doing craft fairs in the Essex region, including King Harold Day in Waltham Abbey, the Truly Madly Vintage Christmas Market, our own Epping Handmade Christmas event, and now I'm gearing up for the last couple before Christmas. On December 9th you'll find me at the Museum of London Docklands' Festive Fair from 6pm to 9pm (nearest tube Canary Wharf or Westferry/West India Quay on the DLR) and then on the 12th I'll be at the Much Hadham Christmas Market with Victoria Rose Crafts.

What else? Making things, of course, and failing to take photos of them - pretty snowflake decorations, , Knitwits charm bracelets, many things with Iced Gems and Lovehearts and I've also given in to the people who keep trying to remove my ladybird decorations and started making some brooches which are selling well.

And - of course! - cooking up baby number 3, due in February....today I've been out in the snow with my big girl and am hoping that this winter we'll have a very mild February, as I don't fancy the trek to the hospital on bad roads!

Folksy Friday 2!

This week's theme is autumn - I love this time of year, the colours are getting gorgeous (if you can see them through the rain!) and the nights are getting longer.

First up, these GORGEOUS coppery Autumn Fairy earrings by Eclectic Creations. You can imagine fairies riding leaves as they fall off the trees so easily...

I love lucite leaves so this is my next pick....the Autumn Leaves bracelet by The Whimsical Wren.

My little girl would look unbelievably cute in this Autumn Fairy dressing up outfit by Ella Bella Fairy!

And you can have autumn indoors too! Red Autumn Leaf window hanging by Dormouse Studio.


Lastly...this Autumn Ring by Kiwi Chick Creations is amazing.

Apologies for posting early....but it must be Friday somewhere in the world!

xx

Folksy Friday!

My kids are loving the frog living in our back garden at the moment, so I found a collection of Folksy frogs to entertain them! Hope you like these :-)

Alice in Wonderland Royal Frog brooch by charlieandelvis

Francis Frog puppet by Rainbow Valley

Frog baby booties by Funky Shapes


Frog egg cosy by Off The Hook


Princess and the Frog by The Seven Seas

Well, that's my first Folksy Friday blog...and before breakfast, too!

And so did these!

Loveheart Rings...which vanished off the last post!

Viva vintage!

I've just spent the day in the rather elegant surroundings of the Shire Hall in Chelmsford at the Truly Madly Vintage vintage & handmade market, in the company of my usual partners in crime, Shivs of Lillyroses Luxuries and Rose of Victoria Rose Crafts. The event was really successful, bringing more than 300 people through the doors and offering a range of fabulous things from clothes, jewellery and fabrics to gorgeous handmade cakes and tea served in beautiful vintage china. I managed to sell one of my favourite pieces - the Cake Shop stretchy bracelet - and a couple of new items like a Loveheart Ring and Sweetie Jar necklaces. We're back there on 27th November for the Vintage, Handmade and Christmas Market!

Rose, Shivs and I are also organising our own Handmade Christmas Fair in Epping on 13 November, in the Catholic Church Hall, Church Hill, Epping (just off the High Street if you fancy coming along!) - we're open from 1 - 5pm, and if you're a stallholder who fancies joining in drop me a line on kirsty@ladybirdbeads.co.uk and let me know.

We're charging £10 for a small stall and £20 for a large one, and all stall fees after we've paid for the hall will be donated to the Neo-natal ICU at Princess Alexandra Hospital in Harlow. We have a great range of stalls so far, including cupcakes, vintage clothing, jewellery, books, handmade cards, handmade soaps, stained glass and others, and it'll be a great opportunity to stock up on some one-of-a-kind Christmas presents. Hope to see you there!

In the meantime, here are some of the latest items - Iced Gem rings! How '70s...the vintage thing is catching...

August!

Once again it's pouring with rain so I've been making my own summertime with lovely kitschy acrylic flowers and ladybirds, in the shape of earrings and necklaces. I really like the colour of these yellow daisies, they're so summery! Other things on the beadmat this week have included these tattoo style earrings with agate hearts and skull & crossbones charms, Hello Kitty style necklaces and earrings (thanks to Daisy!) and Loveheart necklaces. I've had these charms for a while, bought from the wonderful Bead Shop Scotland and have finally got round to using them. You may notice that my stuff seems to be getting a bit brighter - I love all the gorgeous colours of beads I keep seeing, and have a great love of slightly mad things, which is hopefully showing through. I've just bought a pasta machine (gotta love Ebay!) and will hopefully be creating my own polymer clay beads very soon...

I've been inspired to get on with these things and take new (and hopefully more professional) photos by an application I've made to sell on Amazon, and also a new venture run by Elise Steedman-Green called Eegee.co.uk, a not-for-profit sales site for handmade goods. They are charging listing fees but not sales commissions, which will hopefully make a difference to us small-timers. The site launches at the beginning of September and I wish Elise the best of luck with her new venture.

On the stitching side (yes, really...) I've been working sporadically on the Fumitory Fairy, and need to get it finished as I have two baby feet pictures to do for colleagues who have recently produced, and then I really need to get my daughter's birth sampler done before she turns 2 - and before no. 3 arrives in February.

Got me thinking...

The post below about my friend Rhiannon's '30 things to do before I'm 30' has got me thinking, which is never a good sign. My next milestone is - rather terrifyingly - 40, and I'm all too aware that there are an awful lot of things I haven't done with my life so far. Jobwise, I love what I do and I'm really pleased I'm doing something crafty as well, but what else have I missed?

For example, I have ALWAYS wanted to learn to tango. I'd also love to learn silversmithing - either with the actual metal, or these days with artclay (thus opening up copper and bronze as well....ooh!). I'd like a proper cooking lesson, to go in a helicopter, to learn Welsh and/or French, I want to finish (oh, OK, start) the cross stitch version of Seurat's 'Sunday Afternoon', to learn to make a dress...and wear it! I want to go back to West Wales and show my kids where I used to spend my summer holidays and where I went to college. Soooo many things.....

Better start that list now, and then I have 3 years to do it!

Rhi's 30 before 30: 30 things to do before I'm 30

A really exciting project by a friend of mine....almost inspiring me to make a '40 before 40' list....


Rhi's 30 before 30: 30 things to do before I'm 30: "Thanks for taking an interest in this blog. This is a personal project to do 30 things before I turn 30 on 3 June 2011. These are either th..."

The Gaslight Anthem: Baba O'Riley live @ Brixton Academy 2010

'Seven Deadly Sins' Teaser

Here's the LGMC with a teaser....

Where did June go?

All of a sudden it's July and I haven't managed a post for almost a month. I'd like to say it's because I've been out doing really exciting things but mostly I've been asleep!

On the few evenings I managed to stay awake I did get out and about occasionally though! I had a stall at a local school's Pamper Evening, which meant I avoided another dire England match - I didn't make much money but it meant that people could see what I do and they've invited me back to their Summer Fete next weekend. I'm making piles of pocket money items like worry beads and phone charms as these are what sold the other week. Here's some of my new stock - it'll be available on the website and in my new Faceboook shop soon! Find the new shop here - just click on the 'Shop Now' tab at the top of the page.

I also had a fun packed birthday weekend, including a fabulous night out at Camden Roundhouse where I saw a friend perform with the London Gay Men's Chorus in their Seven Deadly Sins show. You can see a video of it here, and if you ever get the chance to see them then jump at it! I'm trying to embed the video too, but it may be beyond my limited technical capabilities (if it's not copy & paste, I can't do it...I do seem to be able to 'share' it directly from youtube, though, so keep your eyes on this blog). On the day itself we took the girls up to High Beach in Epping Forest and had a picnic in the sunshine, and in the evening we saw The Gaslight Anthem at Brixton Academy, who seem to get better and better with each album!

Right, back to my making for the school fete!

Enchanted Garden Wedding

How excited am I? Ailsa Heinlein-Thompson Weddings got all inspired by one of my tiaras and designed a wedding concept around it! See it here....

Other than that, my NY resolution to blog weekly has failed miserably but I have had a lovely time in France and am currently engaged in making stock for a Pamper Evening next week in North Weald, supporting St Andrew's Primary School. I'm also eagerly awaiting beads for a statement bracelet (my favourite kind), necklace and earrings in purple, coral and orange for a birthday party at the end of the month. Sadly not for me though!

Helpful stuff for the crafty person!

A couple of weeks ago I was lucky enough to be picked for a Facebook giveaway by the lovely people at Persephone Moon, who wanted testers for their Crafters Bookkeeper range of Excel spreadsheets for the crafty maker/seller. I have to say that as a frequent Excel user in my day job - to balance the budget, track evaluation etc etc - I wasn't expecting to be terribly excited by this and certainly didn't expect to learn anything new.

However, I do admit to being a bit if a random pricer when it comes to my jewellery, occasionally thinking 'I can't charge that!' when I've used one pricing theory (and in consequence wiping out any profits....duh!) so I thought I'd give this a go. And I'm properly impressed! This is a really professional-looking, user-friendly document which comes with a flash tutorial explaining exactly how to use the sheet in layman's terms and with enough tips and assistance to help even the most beginning beginner. The spreadsheet offers two different methods of working out your prices (the hourly method and the times method) and even offers a calculation for wholesale suppliers. Both methods are explained, and there is the option to add photos to the sheet so that you can identify your own inventory products easily (along with random pricing, I'm a random namer...). I'm sure you could do this quite easily yourself if you were really, really comfortable with Excel and it's many amazing properties - but, honestly, at these prices (this sheet is sold on the Etsy site linked above for $5.00 - about £3.50 at today's exchange rate) why would you want to? Highly recommended!

Right, I'm off to put my prices up....only joking...

Mad March!

Spring is finally starting to spring here in sunny Epping - I'm loving looking at the daffodil spikes appearing along my route to the station, and Epping's many crocuses (croci?) are starting to bloom along the verges. Although I'm definitely an autumn girl I really love all the gorgeous yellows that seem to pop up about now - it's still cold but there is a feeling that winter might be on its way out. Something is getting me down, though - what is it about dog owners (in this town, at least) that makes them think it's ok to leave piles of crap all over the place? Who thinks 'oh look, there's a bed of daffodils, I'll let my dog foul it?' I'm a firm believer in personal freedom and object to the abuse of council spying powers generally, but if they want to use my council tax to catch the disgusting people who encourage this, then hey - I say yes!

On a crafty front....this time of year also makes the creative mind kick into high gear and so I have ideas for patchwork, the urge to stitch, the need to knit, as well as the beady head to contend with. Work really is the curse of the crafty classes...

I bought some fabulous charms from ebay recently, lucite ones from Hong Kong, and I've been waiting for the inspiration to make the most of them, and here's the end product.

Springtime Riot

Once again I've been slow updating this blog - I can only make the excuse that I've spent most of the last week either salsa-ing or sleeping! But inspiration did strike in the shape of this Springtime Riot bracelet, which follows on from the Harvest one posted last autumn. This one came out of seeing the daffodil shoots on my walk to the station - I do love spring blooms and the colours of the lucite flowers in this really made me think of them. As well as the lucite flowers and leaves, there's a host of Czech crystal flowers, hearts and firepolished rounds in pale pinks and frosted colours to give it a bit of a sparkle.


On the subject of the Harvest bracelet, I've entered it into the bracelet competition in February's issue of Making Jewellery magazine - I had a moment of bravery and went for it, so I hope reactions to it are positive. I've also been asked to turn the design into a necklace, which is lovely - I really like seeing what other people see as the potential in my designs. I'll be adding black ribbon, I think, and maybe a leaf clasp to echo the rest of the design.

I may have been a bit premature with the spring flowers though....it snowed after I posted these pics on Facebook!

Lillyrose's Luxuries and I are now looking for a market or two to do in the spring, preferably close to home....any suggestions?

Tiaras!

Inspired by a red-themed Valentine's salsa party....

and this one is for all those of us who are away with the fairies!

Merde, il pleut..

...which at least removes the niggling worry that we wouldn't be able to make it home tomorrow! Daisy has been missing her daddy hugely this time round and is very excited at the thought of heading for the UK tomorrow.

We finally made it out of the village yesterday to Pontivy for the market and a bit of shopping - Tove has her first big-girl shoes and Daisy has some funky new bouncing boots courtesy of their granny and the 50% off sale, and I have new jeans and a swishy dress for salsa dancing. We didn't make it to the craft shop as we had to get back to Pont Augan - still, its something to look forward to on our next visit.

I have managed to get quite a lot done on the Fumitory Fairy and I've really enjoyed the time spent stitching. The background half-stitching, the fairy's arms, legs, face and hair are complete, and most of the green on the dress and the flowers are finished - the wings, the red details on the fairy and the flowers are left along with the backstitching. I think I'll be taking it on the train with me when I get back to work!

Right, now I need to go and rescue Granny from the kids....

Il est tres froid...

Greetings here from sunny Brittany! And it is sunny, but very cold - Mme. Colombelle in the Maison de la Presse in Baud tells us we're going to have some snow on Thursday which will be exciting for Daisy. Yesterday we made the most of the freezing sunshine and headed for the beach at Port Louis, where Daisy tried to convince us to let her paddle! No chance....we're living on delicious spicy turkey soup and fresh bread from the wonderful boulangerie,

I am managing some stitching in the evenings when the girls have been persuaded into bed, which is lovely. I'm working on the Fumitory Fairy from DMC and in my usual backwards fashion I'm getting the half-stitched background out of the way so I can do the interesting bits afterwards.I really must decide what to do with these poor fairies at some point, I have 18 of them under the bed and it seems such a shame. Suggestions most welcome....

Due to a severe damp problem in the back bedroom at home my poor Rose Flower Fairy has had to be stripped from its frame and will have to be professionally cleaned, I think, so I have lots of fairy decisions to make. This was one of the first things I ever did and I know there are lots of mistakes in it, so maybe this is a sign that I should stitch it again....