Swarovski Jewels on my Shop...

Both of these catch the light beautifully. As usual, photographs don't capture the real glitter of them. Imagine wearing the bracelet on a sunny day, moving your arm and watching the light glisten on your wrist.

The earrings only have a small drop, but have enough movement that they will also catch each sunbeam.

Third Card for Friend

This one is very 'busy', but I think it works. I stitched the flower heads onto the card using cross-stitch thread.

Tubby Thursday

I lost another pound, making a total of 50 now!!! This is a picture of the new me...

I'm Famous! (Not Really)

The lovely Kerry of Pennydog was recently asked to edit the online forum for Popular Crafts. What a lovely job to have hey - and you may have seen the new magazine recently in the shops. Anyway, Kerry knows that I am an avid beader, and very kindly asked me to write a review on the above book. I got to keep the book too, which was obviously nice for me - never one to turn down a free craft book!

You can read the review here... Please do go along and join in the forum discussions too.

Another Card

This card is rather nice. I got the stamp today, for 99p! Bargain. I decoupaged one of the images near the name, which I really like the look of. The ones on the front of the main card have been smudged with a wet-wipe, to give an aged look. This colour is my all time favourite - if I could only ever work with one colour again, it would be this one.

Cards...

This card has been made for a friend, who specified 'New Home' and 'Girly'. Hopefully she will think that I have fulfilled the brief! It is very fresh and uses a stamp that I bought from Stampin' Up, which uses a roller mechanism.

This was a card I made because I had bought some new stamps. I used the Hero Arts ones to make the flower pots. The other is the heart flower one, which I thought was just too cute to leave in the shop.

Tubby Thursday

Woo hoo, I lost 4 lbs, so I undid the gain last week and more! I reached my 3.5 stone mark and only have 1lb to go to have lost 50 lbs!

I am so chuffed :happy dance:

Pincushion Swap...

I have signed up to do this swap, kindly being hosted by Claire at Claire's Crafty Blog. My partner is Julie at the 'Grey Frog'. I am still waiting for the blog address for her, so will amend this post when I have it.

In the swap, we have to make a pincushion and send it to our partners, along with some haberdashery items (buttons etc.) as a treat. I have already made a pincushion but am doing another one to see which I prefer...I will only post photos when I know that Julie has received it.

I had decided not to enter into another swap, as I have a lot on at the moment. However, how could I resist pincushions? I love them!

Bracelet - New In My Shop

This is one of the bracelets that I made for 'Bead Soup' in Bead magazine. Unfortunately, my work got missed when the pieces went to be photographed, so they weren't in the magazine - although more on that at a later date...

The bracelet is going in my shop - see link on the right.

Three Stone Lighter!

Ok, so I gained a pound last week, but I have still lost over three stone. I got my dad to take some photos of me. Please ignore my closed eyes in the standing one - I always seem to do this and it was the best one of the three standing ones taken. The others had all been taken from high up and I looked like my legs were two feet long! (sorry dad!)

The sitting one is me with my beautiful son. He is like me in that he can never make a serious face or do a serious pose for the camera. He is naturally more photogenic though ;)

Compare this to my photo in this post and you can definitely see the difference!

Edited to add that I bought my first size 12 jeans today and they are 'skinny' ones!

Twisted Bracelet

This bracelet is made using tigertail and then twisting the strands. I then threaded ribbon through, and this has the added bonus of acting as a safety catch in the clasp.

New Ideas

I don't know about you lot, but I find it hard getting inspiration for things. I love looking through Folksy to see what other people come up with but it can then be hard to think of something original that doesn't look like you were copying. I have had so many ideas lately and have tried to get them to become something concrete, but something always goes wrong between the germ of the idea and putting it down on paper! It is so frustrating. I desperately want to come up with my own things and really admire people who are ahead of the trends.

I would love to know how any of you get your inspiration for the work you do, so please do leave me a message.

Ooh, I Forgot Tubby Thursday

I lost half a pound, taking me up to a total of 46. I wasn't expecting much because of my large loss last week (4.5lbs) so I was really happy with that.

Look What I Bought and Made!

I bought these stamps from Folksy, from a great seller called Skull and Cross Buns. I decided that they were perfect for my business cards, because a 'chickadee' is a bird! They have come out beautifully and I am going to be proud to send them out with sold pieces.

Skull and Cross Buns say that the stamps can take up to a week, because they are hand carved after you order them, but mine arrived in three days. Brilliant service!

Cream Double Rope Stitch Bracelet

On my shop. It is lovely and light on the wrist and is making me think of summer. We even have that big, yellow shiny thing in the sky today (if my memory serves me correctly, isn't it called the Sun?)