Playing with Polymer Clay

I recently went on a Polymer Clay course at The London Jewellery School and received some expert tuition from Polymer Clay Artist Debbie Carlton.

Debbie gave us an introduction to this versatile material along with many different techniques! What a wonderful material! It has so many possibilities and can be combined with other materials such as Silver.

Here are a few examples of what I produced on the day

This Pendant was a lesson in making texture. I also had a fiddle with the metallic powders which I applied to this Leaf Pendant

Metal leaf can be applied to Polymer Clay too as I have applied to the flower below.

Image transfer was so simple - The leaf image on the heart below came from a photocopy!

More experimenting with the metallic powders, cutting and stamping in these small Pendants

Polymer clay is great for bead making and we were taught how to produce our own beads from the conditioning of the clay all the way through to finishing and polishing the final piece. We played with making different shapes and learnt how to make 'canes' which produce the intricate patterns on beads.

But the really great thing about Polymer Clay is it's really hard to mess up! If you go wrong you just roll it up and start again!

Competition Winner!

Florence Beads Giveaway

I put the numbers 1 - 10 into the Random.org generator and the number it threw up was number one.

The Winner is

********FAIRLY GIRLY********

Congratulations!

I hope you are able to put the beads to good use!

Sorry to the the rest of you - please come back another time and enter another of my giveaways.

Florence and Your chance to win some Beads!

Florence

I had a short but sweet trip to Florence in honour of turning Forty! I think I'm over that number now - life just goes on in the end! We were blessed with fabulous weather - hard to believe it was October!

I was pleased to find the Bead Shop I had read about in Bead Magazine some months prior - The Beaded Lily . I had a very nice chat with one of the owners and Lampwork Beadmaker extraordinaire Tim James . Naturally I couldn't leave without a little stash of his lovely beads to use in my Jewellery!

I still haven't found the time to start making my own beads yet - watch this space!

Giveaway Time!

It's time I had a little giveaway - I'm going to share a few Beads from my Florence stash. If you would like to be the recipient of these lovely 4 beads (above) from The Beaded Lily in Florence then all you have to do is:

1. Become a follower of my blog

or

2. mention this giveaway in a social networking medium of your choice - e.g. Twitter, Facebook, Blogger

Leave a comment at the end of this blog and I will enter you into the draw. I will pull a name out of the proverbial hat next Sunday 18th October.

Thanks!

I have a couple of Thank you's to make. First to the wonderful Michele of By Your Side who featured one of my bracelets in her handmade goodness feature - Check out no.3 in Michele's picture!

Thank you also to Monica at My Funny Bunny who wrote a lovely little piece about me! I made this baby bag charm for her Mega Mother and Baby Giveaway. Keep an eye on her blog so you don't miss the details of that competition!

I haven't handed out any awards yet but if I did these two ladies would be first in the queue!

I have been added a few little things to my Misi shop so please take a look if you get the chance!

Next up for me is a lesson in Polymer Clay Beads. I look forward to sharing the results with you!

Here is one of my latest creations - this wire crochet necklace with Garnet beads

Jolicious is Forty-licious

This week has been a bit strange. I turned 40! I don't know why but that number seems to be such a milestone. I'm not sure how I feel about it - it's a mixture of good and bad. Unfortunately I have no means of stopping the wheels of time - it waits for no one! I guess I'll just have to accept it!

Anyone who knows me will know I am not a party animal or even that sociable! There was no big party just a quiet Dinner with my hubby who constantly reminds me that he is still in his 30's! We went to Claridges and had some great food at Gordon Ramsay's restaurant. I was even presented with a teeny weeny cake with a candle!

I received a fabulous gift from my friend Anne. It is a Pastel portrait of my three boys done by mutual friend and Artist Sarah James. I took it to the picture framing shop to be framed yesterday and can't wait to get it back to be hung in pride of place!

Sarah has recently set up her own Blog and Facebook Fan Page so please pop over and take a look at her pages - she is very talented.

My birthday celebrations aren't over yet! Next week I am having a long weekend in Florence with Hubby!

Before that I will try and get on top of listing new items in my shop. Here is a sneak peak of some of my new creations

I still have a tiny piece of the birthday cake the boys picked for me, so I might just go and finish it off before the return from school!

Hot Head Adventure!

I thought that some of you would like to see the results of my Lampwork Bead session with Beverley Hicklin at the London Jewellery School recently. So here goes!!

I really enjoyed the day and I am now the proud owner of a brand new Hot Head Torch! All I need is some time and space when the kids start school on Wednesday to get stuck into my latest venture!

Here of my personal favourites

I will be having a clearout in my Misi Shop soon and restocking with some new creations for the Autumn so I will keep everyone updated with that. It'll soon be Christmas!

All the nice shop Sellers at Misi have clubbed together to create an amazing Autumn Giveaway. If you'd like to enter please visit the Misi Blog and you might be the lucky winner of all the goodies below! There is also a second prize on offer.

Busy Summer

Highland Adventures!

I've had a long busy summer trying to entertain the kids and not getting much else done in the process - it's good to have a break from the normal routine though! We started off our Summer break on the Isle of Mull in Uncle Jim's Cottage which is converted from an old water mill. It was the perfect place to get away from the hectic routine of Urbanish life!

An old Mill Stone

Scottish Thistle

Beautiful deserted beach!

Let's not forget the lovely Tobermory (but let's keep quiet about the childrens' tv programme filmed here!)

I did take a little project with me! I couldn't go all that time without being creative so I decided to revisit Viking Weave. The process is to weave the wire onto a dowel as shown in the picture (left). Next you remove the wire from the dowel and pull it with all your might through a drawplate and you end up with something quite pretty and pleasing!

The one I did first was a single weave and the result is shown in the picture on the right. I eventually turned this into a bracelet with Silver end cones (below)

En route home from Scotland we made a pit stop at my parents' in Cheshire. We always make a point of visiting an ice cream farm (Cheshire is big on Dairy!). This time we went to Snugbury's where they have the added attraction of a Straw Sculpture - each year they have a different one. Check out pictures of previous years on their website! This year it was Big Ben - London's famous clock. The clock on the straw version really works too!

Today was a bank holiday in the UK. We took the kids for a ride on The London Eye where we had a great view of the real Big Ben!

Giveaway Winner Announced

I went all high tech to draw the winner of this giveaway and used Random.Org - The number it threw up was number one :

KNITWITS

So congratulations Elaine, the Flip Flop Charm and Beads are yours!

Yet again I feel bad that you can't all be winners. Keep coming back - I'll be having more competitions!

I've had a busy week with my MISI Shop - all those last minute Teacher gifts people have been buying! There is so much great talent on Misi and the community on there is like one big family always there to help each other. The sellers on there are always happy to take on a challenge.

My boys, who will be starting school full-time in September, went to visit their new class yesterday and I had the chance to see how their new chair bags looked. They were Custom made for me by Carolyn of Carolyn's Creations who did a fantastic job. She made exactly what the boys wanted with their names embroidered and pictures of their choice.

We will soon be going on our summer break - first to the Isle of Mull and then Aviemore in Scotland, finishing in Cheshire to see the family. If anyone knows of any great Crafty places or Bead Shops I can visit on my travels please let me know. Keep it quiet though - it's just between us - don't want hubby thinking I've got alterior motives!