Feeling Festive?

I'm not particularly, but these new earrings I've been working on might help - they're my first attempt at baking polymer clay in several stages. I'm quite pleased with them, though they did get progressively fiddlier as I went through the process. They have allspice in them which not only colours the clay but also means they smell nice as they bake, and I really like the glittery Fimo I used for the leaves and the 'sauce'.

They'll be on sale tomorrow at the Theydon Bois Christmas Gift Fair, which is the second of a month of weekends when I'm all booked up! You can find all my events here so if you're in the Essex area over the next few weeks pop along and see me - I'm excited that I have a stall at the Epping Christmas Market this year too!  

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...

Nearly Christmas!

And what an exciting week it's turning out to be...all this snow in the days leading up to the 25th get us all hopeful that it may actually be a properly white Christmas, although knowing British weather there will be a huge thaw and we'll wake up to stories of flooding once again. Daisy has loved seeing the snow although she's been unwell so hasn't been able to go out and play in it - her daddy is less impressed as it took him almost 5 hours to get home from London last night. Only an inch fell but it caused travel and traffic chaos across the area.

I've been a busy bird in the last couple of weeks, catching up with orders from the jewellery party in November (one necklace took a week to make) and and with last minute requests coming in from the website. I've run out of Ladybugs bracelets! I had a wonderful request to make 3 bracelets with black ladybirds for a lovely lady whose children's father had died recently, and at the funeral a black ladybird with red spots had landed on all 3 of her daughters and then flown away - I was really honoured to be asked to make something so special, and I really hope she likes them. They're pictured above. I've also made some variations on earlier designs for a teenager (blue squares, elsewhere in this post...).

Since getting everything into the last-post-before-Christmas I have managed to actually make some pieces for myself using the beads I had for my birthday back in June. Who knew it would take so long to get round to it??? The pictures are scattered through this post - my favourite at the moment is the turquoise and copper bib-style necklace made with beads from Bijoux Beads but I also love the blue lariat necklace made with beads and findings from Spoilt Rotten Beads. I still have some gorgeous margarita daisies and some pink glass beads left so will get round to them soon.

I have to admit I'm missing stitching though and will be taking a Flower Fairy off to France with me after Christmas so I can get a fix in while I'm away...it seems ages since I've done any (in fact, it may have been last time I was in France back in May) and I hope I haven't lost the knack....

We're almost ready for the big day - my presents are all wrapped up and ready for Santa to deliver on Christmas Day, the stollen is made and will hopefully last at least until Christmas, and the tree is decorated. I finally have icicle lights outside which make me feel festive every time I look at them, and we've visited Santa at the amazing Victorian Grotto at the Museum of London Docklands. It's only a stone's throw from Canary Wharf so if you're in the area do go and see the grotto, it's gorgeous and guaranteed to make even the Grinchiest Scrooge feel festive.

Time, time ticking away!

It seems weeks since I've managed to post on here! Oh yes, it has been weeks...almost a month...but what a busy month!

The two markets I did - Festive Fair at Museum of London and the Christmas Market in Epping were really successful for me and for the lovely people I shared stalls with. Rhiannon at Mabinogion Crafts brought along her gorgeous chunky necklaces to the Museum of London, which were a great success. Their USP is that as they're made with rather lush ribbons and wooden beads it's almost impossible to be allergic to them, plus the purples and autumn hues are really on-trend. The lovely ladies from Victoria Rose Crafts and Lilly Roses Luxuries were my partners in crime in Epping and we all had a great day - Shivs brought along her newest make, 11 day old Lilly-Rose, and when breaking for feeds she made sure to bring back tea for the rest of us! After a horrendous week of rain and wind we were really relieved to see some sunshine, but it was pretty cold. You can see me all bundled up in this picture - along with my other half and daughters who'd stopped by to see us. The picture is shamelessly stolen from Rose as my camera failed to work on both days....

The slinky jewellery set sold as separate pieces (and I can get the rings again so will be making more), and I was really pleased that the Swarovski crystal tree earrings all sold, as well as my favourite Ladybugs bracelets. I'm now having a small sale over on my Facebook page and all orders will come free with a pair of Christmas Present earrings. I'm now racing to catch up with orders for Christmas as the website has been really busy.

In between all this craftiness, I did manage a day out in London with a gang of girlfriends - our annual Christmas knees-up, which was lovely. This year we went to see Priscilla, Queen of the Desert at the Palace Theatre - an amazing show! Check out a video here...

Lazy day today

Suffering with a sore throat and late pregnancy niggles so haven't felt like working on the big project in the last couple of days - have been working on Cul-Purr-It instead as I can curl up on the sofa and feel sorry for myself! Most of the main cat is done, only the ears and the white left on the body, then there's the flower and the BS to do. I love the BS on these cats.

A visit from the frogs last week meant unpicking the top of the head. Then the eyes were in the wrong place....etc etc etc. Fortunately I noticed it before doing too much of the infill. I hate those frogs!

On a whole different note - I saw Coleford (small town in Gloucestershire where I had my first date) on the 6 o' clock news today as it already has it's Christmas lights up. 71 days to go...how depressing!