Saturday 15th October sees the return of the Big Bead Show at Sandown Park, which is fast approaching. I’m busy getting ready for this event and look forward to welcoming you to my stall on the day. Please look out for my show newsletter when I hope to be able to offer some free tickets and show specials.

and a big woops…….this post was supposed to be my news on the front page and as such is rather formal, but never mind. The next blog post should be more fun.

The Beadwork Fair – Sunday 28th August, The de Havilland Campus, University of Hertfordshire, AL10 9EU  10am to 4pm

I have been persuaded (thank you Paul), to do this bead fair this Bank Holiday Sunday. As you know I normally do the Stourbridge Bead Fair, but decided to take a break from it this year and enjoy the summer, but due to one thing and another and not attending the Ardingly summer fair in July due to my mums’ sudden death, I thought maybe I should take the plunge.

So I will be at this event, this Sunday, with my usual mix of handmade lampworked glass beads, sterling silver chains, New Designs of Cloud Beads and my range of contemporary jewellery. There are many new £1 bargain beads to be had, together with some old favourites.

I hope you will come and say hello and make the effort to attend this fair, being a Bank Holiday Sunday of course means the traffic will be minimal for a Sunday. Go on, you know you want to!

Hello peeps. It’s a been a long time hasn’t it? I’ve been really busy over the last few months doing a City and Guilds course, and I’m now eagerly awaiting my letter to tell me I’ve passed. I was really surprised how long all the homework and class preparation took, especially towards the end of the course. Anyway, that’s over now, and I have got my life back, sort of.

Horsham Open Studios started this weekend, and we have had a lovely first couple of days with so many visitors that we didn’t get time to eat lunch until 3:30pm on Saturday. Thank you to everyone who came this weekend, you made it really special for us, and we look forward to welcoming more of you next weekend. I have a cabinet full of colourful jewellery, with some new designs, lots of beads to choose from, my fun earrings (using sterling silver) and lots of big hole beads starting at just £3 each to put on your Pandora style bracelets (they don’t have silver in them). I also have other small bits and bobs to choose from, including my ever popular £1 rummage dish. Here’s a couple of photos to tease you.

I have several new tuition dates listed on my tuition page. The next available date is a 1 day Beginners course, Weds 29th June, 10am to3pm. Special rate of £79, class size of 2. Contact me to book your place now.
As always I have other availability if these dates do not suit, drop me a line for my list of dates to choose from.

I have one new listing on Etsy and will be adding more during the day, just follow the link on the left.

Hey there, I am still alive. So Big Bead came and went in a haze of work, then Flame Off, and then the school Easter hols, followed by THE wedding of the decade. Thank you to everyone who came to say hello at the Big Bead show, we had a fantastic day and were so busy that we were still serving customers 40 minutes after the show closed and I didn’t get a proper chance to go shopping myself, apart from the odd snatched minute or two before was summoned back to my stall.

Enough of that though, today the most bizarre and freaky thing happened. We almost had a re-enactment of Hitchcocks’  ‘The Birds’. I saw movement outside the back door, a couple of minutes later I opened it to cool down and noticed a pair of birds hovering around a shrub and squawking really loudly.  I looked down to see a cat holding down a bird on our lovely gravel sitting area, shooed it away and the bird fortunately flew up into the tree above. The cat scampered off and jumped the 6 foot fence nearby. Sounds OK so far? I kept watching while the 2 starlings kept chirping alarm calls and flying from tree to tree to next doors roof and then back again, all the while followed by a little Coal Tit. So far so good. Well, this went on for a while, and I kept watch to see if the bird was injured and make sure the cat didn’t come back. After a while of this, the birds moved to the holly tree over my studio, directly in front of the kitchen, and some blackbirds and blue tits joined them, still chirping alarm calls. Very sweet, they were acting like a pack, and sticking together.

Then, one of the starlings did a loop down at my eye level, from the tree towards me standing in the doorway, and then back again. I thought it was maybe sort of coming to thank me. How sweet. Yer right. A few minutes later the same bird came storming out of the tree, straight at me in the door, and hovered, flapping it’s wings and  squawking very angrily at me for a few seconds. Ah, OK then. Then a couple of minutes later it did it again. OK, so now I’m getting worried, this is no lovely thank you, but a full on hate campaign. eeeeeeek. Rick’s also in the kitchen watching this, and decides that it’s time to shut the door in case we end up with a bird in the house.

He then ventures out after a bit to see if it’s OK, and nothing happens, but when I try opening the door and standing there the bird twitter campaign starts again. I thought maybe I would be stuck indoors all day, but I stayed in and away from the door for about an hour, while Rick decided to placate them with some food. Phew, and there I was thinking it might end up like the day we were chased indoors by marauding bees when we attempted a honey glaze on the barbecue several years ago. Now there’s another story. They we all banging against the windows trying to get in, hundreds of ‘em!

OOO, and I have a few new beads in my Etsy store, including these…….ciao.

Big news today…….I have booked my space at the spring Big Bead Show at Sandown Park, Esher, Surrey, KT10 9AJ. This huge show is on Saturday 2nd April and is well worth a visit. I’d be resisting booking, but the lovely Maria at Bead magazine said she’d squeeze me in if I wanted to come. So here we are, all of a sudden getting revved up for the big one. It’s great news for my mojo as all of a sudden lots of ideas for new beads are flooding in at last. Long may it continue. I hope you will all come and see me here, I will have some free tickets up for grabs later too.

Here’s a little sneaky peek at what I’ve been up to lately. At last I’ve had time to practice the skills I learnt last April at Flame Off with the hugely amusing and talented Sharon Peters, and have found some time to design some of my own characters. Here’s a green one…..

Hellooooo there, thank you to all my friends, customers and students who came to say hello yesterday at the bead fair. You all make my bead fair days so special, it’s great to catch up with you all and share news and coo over beautiful beads and bits.  I’ve spent the day recovering from all my preparation efforts from the fair, as I had 4 full days bead making and spent all Saturday stringing up sets, pricing stuff and packing up. Of course we celebrated the day with a lovely curry when we got home, yum yum.

So now all I have to do is finish my accounts (ha ha) and get my tax out of the way, then I can start on my new efforts for this years business. I’m hoping to spend some time developing some new designs and hopefully some new colour combinations, although I will be continuing my favourites, as they are so lovely. I’m looking forward to spending time playing with new ideas without the pressure to stock up for an event, I just hope my mojo doesn’t go go.

Here’s some snaps of the bead fair from my stall, and ‘the boys’, sorry Jim, you’re out of focus….

Happy New Year to all my friends, customers and family.

Ooh my! almost a month since my last post. It always happens when I’m really busy, too busy really. The last 30 days have gone in a haze of exhibition preparations, stewarding trips to Guildford, Christmas shopping trips, Christmas day itself, then …the inevitable illness that always seems to follow. Oh yes, just when you think you have survived, you (well me) get struck down with something seasonal. I managed to hold out until Boxing Day, when I was home caring for our little one, when I started the inevitable sniffle, then masses of sneezes. I’ve now been unwell for 9 days, I’m feeling much better but I’m still struggling with feeling giddy, especially now as I type, and I’m also struggling to breathe properly.

But of course with a new year, those pesky resolutions come to mind. I think I managed to do most of the ones I made regarding my business last year, all except one….wannna guess which? ha ha, you know already! That would be the one where I keep up to date with my accounts, which I didn’t, of course. Actually I did make a decision this last year about 4 months in, that I wouldn’t try, and that I wouldn’t beat myself up about it either. And here’s why.

I think it actually uses more time up to do accounts once a week, as you have to get everything out, get into the mindset, then do your task. You also have to remember what you did before and not replicate the task. I believe it’s better to save it up to do in one hit or a few smaller ones, so that is what I plan to do this year. Although things are easier again as I did all my filing and tidying up for this years accounts after I did last years work, always a good idea that, and I had a mega filing session half way through the year too, so invoices and receipts only need sorting from January to April. It also helps to be more organised with the paperwork, and I’ve been far more disciplined this past year with where I put my papers and printing out relevant paperwork. So I’m not going to get disappointed with myself, but pat myself on the back and hope that I can get through my accounts as quickly as possible. Here’s hoping.

Dreams. We all have them. But I’m not talking hopes and dreams, I’m talking of gently coming out of a deep slumber type dreaming here. I get loads, so many that it’s unusual for me not to have one in the morning. They often have recurring themes, and I often visit the same places regularly. I wasn’t going to divulge what I dream, but I may as well tell you that one of my regular haunts is a very big modern house with lots of rooms and a massive garden that stretches off into the distance. We don’t have the real luxury of that but at least I get to enjoy one of my dream properties regularly, including the joy of rediscovering a room that I had forgotten existed. We wouldn’t mind that here in our real house, although several months after we moved in our present house we rediscovered the cupboard under the stairs.

Dreams can often confuse and disappoint. Take this Saturday, when I had to get up early and continue with my preparations for the exhibitions I have to set up this week. I got up and ploughed on with my work really well, feeling relaxed and on top of things, enjoying the early morning weekend peace downstairs,  only to wake up at 10:30 and find that I’d seriously overslept and had to remake all the stuff I’d already done that morning. Oh that sucked.

Still, I successfully prepared my pieces for the Winter Exhibition at the Bank Gallery at Chobham, and now have today and tomorrow to prepare for the Surrey Guild Guildford Exhibition ‘Unique’. I’m feeling very jaded but also optimistic. Let’s hope the snow stays away so I can get stuck in. Here’s some more snowy photos to get you even more in the Christmas mood. Please excuse the dodgy photos, my camera is on it’s way out and Picasa isn’t playing ball either, it keeps changing the photo next to the one I’m trying to tweak. Bye y’all.

2 posts in one week, boy we’re steaming. So it’s full speed ahead in the run up to Christmas, I know it’s a bit of a dirty word, but the event can’t be ignored, in fact I don’t wish to ignore it, I just wish it wasn’t all such hard work.  I used to do loads of fairs in November and December, but gradually whittled them back until I was only doing 2, and this year I have none for the first time. This is good because it means we actually have some Saturdays available, not many, but a couple, and we’re planning to use them fully.  Now this may sound like I’m sitting back and doing nothing…so wrong. I have 2 exhibitions with the Surrey Guild of Craftsmen, one at Bank Gallery in Chobham which runs from 7th December to 16th January 2011, and one in Guildford from Friday 10th December to 24th December (this means more stewarding dates and lots of jewellery to make and catalogue). More details to be found on my events page.

We’re also in the throws of having a good old clear-out, general tidy up and major reorganisation downstairs and anywhere else that things are being moved to….you know how it goes…..

‘Let’s move this’ says Sarah
‘OK, but where shall we put it?’ Says Dickie, trying not to laugh at the Darth Vader mask that Sarah is wearing as she has a real problem with the dust.
‘Oh, that could go in the _____ (insert place name here).’ replies Sarah
‘But if we put it there, then we need to move the ________ (insert name of object or furniture).’ whines Dickie
‘OK, but where will we then put the ________ (insert name already inserted above) that we move?’ says Sarah, trying to sound chirpy but getting annoyed at the amount of work to gain an extra 2 square metres of floor space.
‘Dust, dust, anyone? High calorie or low? Dust?’

…..and so it goes on.

So the plan is to regain as much lounge space as possible, I’ll let you know how we get on, maybe, if it goes well. I also probably should put on a face mask.

Now I can blog the 10′s…..cool.