The Collection is Growing!

I really thought when I received these watch faces they would be too big and look ungainly but when the bracelet was added it looks stunning. There is a lot of detail in the watch.

The clasps really do finish them off. I have posted them larger than I would normally, just to show the detail on the face. The beads are a pinky colour and silver spacers have been used between.

This is the same style of face but in an antique gold. There are two kinds of beads used, wooden and hematite. The thread was knotted to form a circle in the bracelet, this gives it a nice detail rather than straight.



And, I have made some little BIA books to take with me to Wolsingham Show, thought the children might like them. I have made quite a few more and I did not mess up one wire, I think I may have got the hang of it now. I spent two nights making these nice little notebooks. Just right for going back to school!

New Toy

Wow, I have given myself a treat and bought a Bind-It-All, I have been thinking of buying one for quite a while, Lynn is the culprit and the inspiration after seeing the books that she produces.

I have posted my efforts so far but I am am not letting on how many times I got things round the wrong way. Needless to say I will probably need to buy more wires.

The book above is covered with one of the Artylicious papers, front and back. I used polymer clay with a Ten Second Studio mold for the main feature on the front. Once fired and cooled I coloured it with the Tim Holtz alcohol ink and a corner swirl from Maya Road, painted and embossed.

I was quite pleased with this book. I decided I needed an album to store my holiday photographs, usually, I take them and download them and they don't ever get printed. Well, this year it will be different. So when I get back from holiday I am going to print and stick and finish my album.

I have added tags inside so that I can journal where the photographs were taken. The tags were first distressed and then stamped using some of the elements from the Journalling A4 themeplate. I finished the book with the little closure from Zutter, they really are nice and look very good. When the album is finished rather than it gape open with all the bits and pieces that I intend to put inside, I will be able to keep it neatly shut using this ingenious little fastener. You get two little decorative keys with the closure, these I threaded onto ribbon along with a few beads and tied it to the wire binding.

A Collection of Wires

In my last post I said I was doing a set to match one of the wire bracelet watches, well ta...da............I got it finished.

All using the same basic pattern, the necklace consists of six of the flower diamonds and is strung together using 6mm jump rings.

The watch is made up from four diamonds with two half diamonds to hold the fastener.

The bracelet is made up using seven of the diamonds.

In each diamond I have placed one Hematite bead.

Thanks to Emma for lending me her neck and wrists.

A Collection of Watches

In a previous post I mentioned the fact that I had bought two watch faces and attached them to bead bracelets, well one thing has led to another and I have bought several more, as you can see.

Some have been beaded and others have their bracelets made with twisted wire using the wire jig.

I have combined this watch bracelet with beads and I am currently working on a necklace and bracelet to match.

The bracelet watch above is done from twisted coloured 18 gauge wire, gunmetal, although in this picture the colour is not showing up too well. It is joined together with silver jumprings. The connectors between the watch and bracelet are done with 18 gauge silver wire

Purple and blue beads made this little bracelet very striking.

My favourite is this antique gold watch face which is inlaid with Mother of Pearl. It has tiny black stones around the outer edge on one side. The clasp finishes it off and gives an elegant look to it.

I liked it so much I have kept it for myself!

Black and cream made a lovely bracelet for this watch, the middle two strands in black have been twisted while beading. A close up of the twisting can be seen below.

Coffee and cream beads have been twisted to form this bracelet.

I have no excuse now to be late anywhere with all of these watches!


Time is of the Essence
"I'm late, I'm late..." - White Rabbit in Alice in Wonderland.

I have a stand at Wolsingham Show on Sunday 7th September, so if anyone is in that neck of the woods please feel free to stop by and say hello, I will have plenty of Christmas gifts for you to buy!

View from a Window

Now we all know about Health & Safety and the regulations about spending time at a VDU, you need to have time out to adjust your eyes. Well how's this for a nice view to help adjust your eyes.

We have a lovely patch of grass outside our office window and these little creatures come out on an afternoon and sit and munch away to their hearts content or lay sprawled in the grass sunbathing, until of course you shut the window and scare them away. You can have at least a dozen at any one time, the babies are so cute.

I don't think the people who own the allotments are quite so fond of them, they sneak under the fence and eat the veg!

We visited Hamsterley Forest a few weeks ago, we often stop for a picnic, weather permitting. I took a few photographs while we were there. It is a beautiful place to visit.

This has to be my favourite photograph, the piece is called The Green Man. It is carved logs which are placed at intervals, when you are close to them or at a different angle they don't appear to be anything much. It is when you stand away from them directly to the front that you get the true picture. Good eh!

We do have some wonderful scenery up here in the cold North East of England.



Tunstall Reservoir, Wolsingham.

A rainbow that appeared above the rooftops after one of our heavy rain storms and the hot air balloon that followed shortly afterwards.

Just a few bits and pieces

These are just a few of the bits and pieces I have made over the past couple of weeks. Some of the jewellery is made from shell and stones that have been bought and I have added a few other details to them.

I have also become interested in wire working. You can make some very intricate designs using a wire jig and different gauge and coloured wires.


This pendant necklace is made using a foil stone, threaded onto an ornate headpin and the wire is twisted using a wire wrapping device.





A lovely piece of Abalone Shell forms the main part of this pendant.











I recently bought three watch faces, they were so dainty, they cried out for small pearls as a bracelet. This one is coffee and cream. It is strung on the invisible thread and includes the tiny heart and arrow fastening.













This is an example of the wire working. The main bracelet is made by winding 18 gauge silver wire. I used a Celtic pattern on this one. The 'flowers' were then fastened together using silver 7.5 jump rings. The fastener on each end of the bracelet is again 18 gauge wire bent to form the hook and ring. Quite effective.












This bracelet is perhaps a little more intricate. You can see from the close up it is made up from segments that were twisted using the wire jig and again held together with jump rings. I have added small seed pearls to the end of the wires.














A shell pendant threaded onto 2mm leather cord.
and a bracelet and watch made from Hematite beads.

An Evening with Sir Elton John

On July 5th, Steve and I went to Darlington Football Club to see Sir Elton. Wow, what a show, he was brilliant.

The day dawned wet and miserable, in fact it did not stop raining till we got there at 5.30 pm. The show was due to start at 7.30 pm. The sun shone throughout the performance, in fact you had to shield your eye's at one point to see anything. We were some distance away but my trusty little Canon took some great photo's and video. He came on to rapturous applause at 7.30 pm and did not leave the stage until 10.30 pm. He sang all his hits, the audience sang along with him and at one point he stood with his foot on his piano stool waiting for everyone to sing. He congratulated Darlington on their new stadium and said he didn't think he would ever visit it as a concert venue, he had visited the old one when he was with Watford Football Club.

Richard Fleeshman was supporting Elton . I think he sang for about an hour before I realised who he was. Oh yes, it's him from Corrie!

It was a great night, I only hope more concerts are held at this venue but how do you top Sir Elton, well perhaps by Rod Stewart!

We had nothing but praise for the way the whole show was organised. Once in Darlington several park & rides were in operation making it easy to get both to and from the venue. We had none of the usual traffic hold up's going home, straight onto the bus, back to the car park and out. Fantastic.

And we even had our photo's in the paper. Not that we realised we had had them taken, that's why I was pulling a face, squinting into the sun, honestly, I wasn't pulling faces at the photographer, in fact we did not even see him. So pleased I wasn't doing something I shouldn't!

Long Time - No Blog

It is an age since I have put anything at all on my blog. So.......... to make up for it I have loads of photo's of various items of jewellery, clay figures, pottery etc. May take me several days to get it all on!
Quite a bit of my jewellery is now on show at Bradley Burn Farm shop in the Durham Dales, it is a lovely part of the county and well worth a visit, they do a lovely cup of tea and a scone if you are ever passing. If you would like to visit their site follow this link.
www.bradleyburn.co.uk/

Some of the items that are on show in the shop.

I have just done another 10 weeks at my pottery class, only produced one item but I was pleased with it. The idea is to put a light inside the house so it shines through the windows. The roof should be a nice russet red but the colour did not take too well, so it has to go back with me in September for a make-over.

This is in it's unfired state, it was stuffed full of wet newspapers for weeks to keep the walls from drying out. The paper burned away once it was in the kiln. It is now sitting with a tea light shining through the windows, looks quite nice.

Two wizards from a previous 10 weeks at pottery. Incidently, we have just put our house up for sale, we need somewhere larger to house all of these.

One recent little polymer clay figure is the Indian Chief. This one was made for Derrick, a little get well present. The feathers took a little but of doing, I sat up till 2 am trying to perfect them.