Sarah Downton Beads and Jewellery

Thursday morning

It’s general election day and my mind is turning to think about the things that could be done better in this country. And I’ve been thinking about some things that keep getting in my way near the front door, and that seem to keep increasing in number, and won’t go away even when I do what it says on the label. Hmmm, what could it be? Phil the Bag? or any of the number of cheap thin virtually useless plastic bags that seem to keep getting dumped through our letter box, at least one each week. It’s not even like you can use them for kitchen waste as they have holes in them. So I’m going to have a bit of a rant now, because I’m getting really fed up with them. I thought we as a country were trying to do our best not to use plastic bags, and I as well as Dickie always take our own bags to do our shopping now. We’re trying so hard to keep our plastic levels down, and yet the charities seem to have a free pass to dump at least one of the offending bags through our letter box every week. How does that work?

I’m a firm believer in recycling as much as possible, and this week we in Horsham were really pleased to have a new street collection on Tuesday that took away junk mail, paper, newspapers, all types of card, glass bottles and jars, plastic bottles, cans and foil, and basically combined most of what we already recycle with the addition of the things we used to have to take to other centres. The only extra thing we can now recycle is waxed food paper cartons, but hopefully more people will now recycle what we’ve been doing ourselves. I hate to think of all the clothes that are simply thrown away because they’re no longer wanted, and I also know that charity shops are struggling because people that used to give their clothes to them are now selling them on Ebay. I’m cautious about putting my clothes in the recycling bins in supermarket car parks as one of my friends told me how she saw a car drive up to one, the driver then dangled their child out of the window and into the top of the bin to rummage through it and remove what they wanted! Now maybe they were in need, I guess that was OK, but you hear of companies that do kerbside collections for charity, then set up a shop selling what they collect for their own business.

I have to say I wouldn’t mind the bags so much if they actually did what they said they would, i.e. if you have something to put out you use the bag or if not then put it out and they will collect it back. So what actually happens? I’m sure you know already.  You put out the empty bag and it sits on the doorstep until it goes dirty and rotten and looks a complete mess, because when they do turn up in the van to collect the goods people have left out, unfortunately the company that sells stuff will have been around first and nabbed the charity bags…oh yes, I’ve seen it happen, even when the bags were explicitly labelled with the name of the charity on it, then the charity guys don’t even bother getting out of the van to collect the empty bags, and so the pile gets bigger. You can’t win.

So what’s to do? I really don’t know. Maybe they should think of a better greener way to collect. Obviously the bags make people think about donating, and make it easy to just open it and start filing it, but shouldn’t there be some sort of ban on littering our houses with plastic junk?  Just like the amount of junk mail we get, which has increased since some bright spark said it was all right for the junk mail allowance that Posties deliver to go up in quantity. How green is that? IT’S NOT.

Tuesday morning

It’s official, I’m back in my new improved studio. I have insulation, posh lining and a pale laminate floor. I also have a new shelving unit for my glass and a new workbench (well, kitchen worktop). It all looks lovely, now I have to tidy up my jars of glass and organise some way to display and store my huge frit collection without the labels fading in the sun light. I have lots of jars to soak labels off, as I just used to use them as they were, label and all, to store glass rods in that I am using, but no more, I’m on a tidy up spree. I’ve ditched lots of rubbish that was in the old studio, including all those lovely colour wine bottles that I thought I would turn into beads. I’d love to spend the time recycling glass, but to be honest it takes too long for my style of beadmaking. I’ve got really ruthless and have decided to part with glass I won’t ever use and clear out a few bead presses also. All of yesterday was spent sorting out said rubbish and going up and down the steps between the house and garden with handfuls of things to put back in the studio. We can now see the floor in our lounge again, such a relief.

Here’s a couple of shots of my studio progress…..hover over the photos for captions

Friday afternoon

More new beads…..I persuaded Rick to take some photos last night after he got back from band practice, and I’ve listed 4 new sets on Etsy today. Photos below. Unfortunately he forgot one of the angles that I like for each set so the poor duck will have to repeat the process tonight. We also have the exciting prospect of a trip to Ikea at some point this weekend to get flooring for my studio and some shelves to put the glass on.

I had a dream of what my studio would look like when finished and it’s gradually changing into something that I hadn’t envisaged and that I’m not so keen on. I know that practicality should come first, but I’m still a bit sad. But, it will still be lovely and I can’t wait to get back in there and start melting glass again. I also can’t wait to get the new torch that I fell in love with at Flame Off last weekend. It’s a HUGE torch, with a mahoosive flame that melts boro like chocolate. It has a large burner with a Minor burner on top, and you can light one from the other and swap easily between the two flames. Unfortunately this poses another problem in my studio because the flame is so much longer when you have it turned up for the boro. At least I found out at this stage so I can tweek my layout to suit it or install some type of flame insulation opposite where I decide to position it. I’ll have to wait a couple of months before I invest in it as I will also need another oxycon (the machine that extracts the oxygen from the air to supply my torch).

Tuesday morning

Where do I start? Lots has happened here and globally, so what should I talk about today? I decided to write a list of possible blog topics, and it hasn’t really helped, so maybe what I’ll do is give you a very quick run down of what’s new? Or should I? Maybe I should keep all my stuff and eek it out over a couple of weeks to keep you coming back in suspense. Or is too much suspense bad for your health, now who was it who wrote that, was it Douglas Adams?

So here’s what’s been going on, the lounge is still full of my studio equipment and glass, but not insulation boards or plasterboard, Easter came and went, I went on a course then attended Flame Off with Dickie and DD and now I’m so shattered I can’t believe it. Oh and a big volcano went boom and stranded lots of people all over the world including my uncle who lives in Madison Wisconsin and whom I saw yesterday at my parents house. There, I’ve said it. But of course there’s all much more to it than that, and I’m rambling, probably because I’m so tired.

The last few days have been so peaceful, and the sky so clear and lovely. I heard my first plane in days, about 10 minutes ago, and 5 minutes ago looked up in the sky to see a plane very high up leaving a contrail across the huge expanse of clean air…although it probably isn’t, it would be nice to think it was after 5 days rest from aeroplanes. Maybe there should be one day a year across the world where nothing flies anywhere, wouldn’t that be great? They would have to choose a certain 24 hours across the world so it all happened at once, but I think that would be a great idea. Many people have forgotten just how noisy all that daytime background noise has got, and it was a real pleasure to go outside at my parents and not be bothered by City Airport, Stansted, Heathrow or Gatwick noise. It was just so peaceful. Lovely.

Saturday evening

The grand studio refit started today. After 2 days of teaching lovely students Thursday and Friday, I spent the day packing up (again) my beadmaking glass, tools and equipment and moved out of my new studio so we could begin the proper fitting out of my studio that was delivered last May. I can’t believe I’ve nearly had it a year, the time has gone so fast, and it seems really mad that this is the first time in 11 months that I’ve had the time to be able to stop making beads and concentrate on getting the studio to the standard that we planned last year. If they had delivered when they were supposed to I would have had the time last April to do this. But such is life, you just have to get on with what life hands you and try not to whinge (or however it’s spelt… I think that should be spelled, as Spelt is a type of flower…or should that be flour? Oh it’s OK I do know how to spell, I’m just mucking abaaate). I seem to have amassed a large amount of stuff, and lots of mayonnaise jars of glass. Actually it’s interesting to see what jars I have down there, as they are a potted history of what we eat over the years and show our changing preference for the few cook in sauces that we use. We seem to have moved from ‘Bertolli Roasted Vegetable sauce’, to ‘Sharwoods Tikka Masala’ through to’ Dolmio Bolognaise with Extra Onions and Garlic’. I even found some baby food jars hiding the odd dead spider and a HUGE beatle with jaws, which we think must have got stuck inside the slippery overhanging edges.

Our lounge is now full of jars of stringer and glass, 2 oxy cons, chairs, my pink Maxine (kiln), and various boxes of bits, and a huge stack of insulation boards and chipboard flooring. The plasterboard is in the garage thank goodness or we’d be sitting on it. We’re having to eat from trays on our knees…we normally sit at the table and eat as a family. We’re having to be really careful where we put the jars of stringers on the floor so that we don’t poke our eyes out with them! Oh what a good Easter we’re having.

Monday lunchtime

I’m procrastinating again….can you believe it? And this time it’s not tax or accounts, oh no, it’s sorting out my insulation and lining for my studio. I hate planning stuff when I’m not totally sure what I’m doing, or when I have too many design issues to resolve before I can do it, one reason why we still haven’t decked out the back yet (I want to get too many things out of the project). So what’s the hold up this time? I’m not sure, but I can tell you I’m feeling absolutely drained of enthusiasm or energy. I want to curl up into a little ball and snooze right now. But I can’t, I have to get this stuff ordered, especially as there’s a pesky bank holiday this Friday. Also the sooner I get this ordered, the sooner I can get back to play (sorry, work) at bead making. I’m sure that will be tomorrow now, and if that’s not incentive enough I don’t know what is!

I have a couple of places on glass beadmaking courses to fill again

1 place on a 1 Day Beginners Course Thurs 1st April……yes, that’s this Thursday!!!!!

…..1 place on a 2 Day Beginners Course Tues 25th to Weds 26th May……

contact me now to book your place

And I have also put yet more beads in my Etsy shop, here’s a taster….I know, I still can’t get over how regularly I’m doing this.

Wednesday morning

Newsflash…dit dit dit…I have windows that open again! So my new shed last year had 2 windows that were supposed to open and one ended up very jammed. The lovely ‘Man from Malvern’ came today (first thing)  and fixed it, so I can now have both windows open again and keep the howling gales outside, well hurrah. This is actually double hurrah as I thought I was going to have to wait all day for him to come and wouldn’t be able to make any beads, but my day is clear now, up until 6pm, yay. (Hey come on, I know it’s a small thang, but I’m easily pleased.)

Talking of easily pleased, a couple of weeks ago we were pointed to several websites with a cool form of doodling on called Zentangles, and spent the whole of Saturday after the party just doodling (yes, the whole day, but we were shattered and it was very relaxing). Here’s a couple of mine

The tuition date of 13th May has been taken now, but more glass beadmaking lesson dates are still available for May, June and July. Just drop me a line with your preferred dates and we’ll choose one that suits us both.

Friday afternoon

Life. It never goes to plan. It’s always unexpected. Wa hay, it’s fun isn’t it? Never knowing what’s around the corner, be it good or bad? I’m one of those people who likes a challenge, and I like problem solving, and I believe I’m flexible too. I’m saying this because today I had lots planned, but haven’t been able to do much of it because my poor daughter is home with a little sick bug. Fortunately she seems to be over the worst of it and is now feeling hungry, so that’s probably a good sign. I was thinking of taking the morning off, moseying into town to get my new spectacles adjusted….you know you’re getting older when you get your first varifocals, I couldn’t bear the thought of visible bi-focals making me look older than I am! I was then maybe going to treat myself to a coffee in Costa, then go home and leisurely make beads this afternoon.

But instead I’ve been updating my website, adding new events, writing news for my front page, answering contact forms and getting up to date with little tasks that suddenly seem to have piled up. I’ve been so intent on getting my Etsy shop up and running, and updating it on a regular basis that I seem to have let other stuff slip. I can’t win! Speaking of Etsy, I have added more new beads this week! And I have had my first ever sale to America, so exciting (for me anyway, I’m easily pleased). I really will have to go and lie down in a dark room if I keep this up…which I am doing! Look, there’s photos below of the new beads!

I have also 1 new place on a course, One Day Beginners Beadmaking on Thurs 13th May. Drop me an email to book this place. Have a great weekend.

Friday morning

It’s a time of reflection and celebration. Our daughter is 11 this weekend, my nephew and his wife had their first baby 2 weeks ago and we’ve been in our second house for 10 years this week. All this makes me ponder how time flies. We’ve hardly done anything to the house, maybe that statement isn’t so true? We did replace the kitchen within about 2 years of being here, and have decorated the toilet, bathroom, the entrance area and the 2 storage areas by the front door. We also did our daughters’ room about one and a half years ago. So that leaves… let’s see…..most of the house. Our bedroom has peeling dirty wallpaper, the back bedroom was papered for the sale and the paper is falling off the walls…..they didn’t do a very good job! and we’ve never painted the lounge and stairwell. You see the problem is, whenever we think we should get around to doing it, something else happens to stop us. Like the many fences around our property. It seems every time we start to sort the garden, another fence gets blown over.

But back to the rest of it……have you noticed how a new arrival in the family always shunts us back another generation? I’m told that I’m now a great aunt, and of course my parents are not just grandparents now, but great grandparents. My brother is a grandfather….how did that happen? Maybe I’ll be a grandma in the dim and distant future but I guess I’ll never get to be a great grandma ‘cos I started a bit late in life!

So today I’m getting ready for the inevitable party. We have a small disco here for 4 friends, I did say small! I bought the food yesterday, and have to make the cake soon so it has time to cool before I ice it. Then I’ve got party food prep and of course the tidy up, which isn’t that bad as I’ve done lots of tidying up for lots of glass beadmaking teaching lately. I should probably get on with it…rats…I have to wash up the mixing bowl first….see what I mean about never being able to just get straight on with stuff? ;.)

Thursday morning

How many musicians can you fit in a cluttered lounge?….lets see…..2 violinists, 1 cellist/guitarist, 1 keyboard player, 1 saxophonist, 1 flautist, 1 trumpeter, 1 bass player (that’s me) and 1 on Bodhran (to be full drums on Saturday)…yay 9! Ok so Rick didn’t have drums out but we were pretty full and enjoyed playing live music last night to practice for Saturday. I wonder what our neighbours thought! It’s OK though as we kept the volume down like last year. tee hee. We all gelled really well and it sounded great. It’ll be fun on Saturday when we have our visiting instrumentalist join us and they play through our stops and quiet bits, lol.

I know you’re amazed, and so am I, but I have yet more new beads for sale, they’re in my Etsy store and here’s a teaser….

I hope you like them, and there will be more to come in the next few weeks. Don’t forget you can click the link on the left to get there speedy fast.

Tuesday morning

This blog post is coming to you from my new super doopa shiney laptop…..and it’s taken me all morning just to get to this point…..gah! So after weeks of looking and waiting I finally took the plunge and got the one we’d settled on before Christmas, which had gone up £20 over the new year (they said it was the VAT increase but it was way more than it should have been) but then suddenly came down by £70, so I’m well pleased I waited. Dickie Doo Dah very patiently spent all last evening laboriously transfering all my files from the old one to this (thank you!) and warned me this morning that I might struggle to find stuff….ha ha…that’s the understatement of the new year….and where’s my spellcheck for this blog gone? Please excuse any extraenous letters (or missing ones) that may pop up in your face. At least I don’t appear to have stickey keys again, you know (or maybe you don’t), ones you press but don’t appear to leave a letter on the screen! These new ones are just very clicky, but I think I like that.

We had a fab day at Ardingly last Sunday, thank you all for coming to say hello and buying my beads, meeting you guys is what makes our day at these events. Unfortunately the preparation and the day itself left me absolutely exhausted again, so much so that I was really flaked out for most of last week. The bad news was that Dickie managed to break our new Pump Pot before the show even began, and we’d only had the pleasure of using it on two occasions before Ardingly. Do they do spare glass flasks for these?  It’s looking very much like they don’t. BUT The good news is that I did manage to get my accounts and tax sorted out in time, and I’m sat indoors today in my new bid to be a good girl and do all things admin at least one day a week. Although the rate I’m progressing with this new pooter I will be here all week before I get anywhere…lol. I’m planning to get some more new pieces in my shop or my new Etsy shop this week, but I will let you know when I do. Toodles.

Friday evening

They’ve been sat outside in our new nut dispenser for birds since Sunday now, and have they touched them yet? I’ve been concerned about the birds and wanted to feed them during the snow, and I know it can take up to 3 weeks for them to find a feeder, but how sad that they don’t seem to have noticed it yet. My daughter thought she saw movement on it late this afternoon, let’s hope she right. I’ve been trying to entice them with fresh water in the large pot saucer that the blackbird normally uses, that definitely caused a stir when I uncovered the dish and refilled it yesterday with slightly warm water… a female blackbird came and wallowed in it for about 15 minutes while all the other birds bobbed around to see what she was doing. I also moved the filled coconut shell near the bath and nut feeder and put out a halved apple. If that doesn’t work I don’t know what will!

It’s been a lovely week watching the birds forage for food. They’ve been raiding the Bud-lea next door and the shrub we have which I don’t really like, but I may decide to keep for the sake of the bees in the spring and the birds in the winter. We’ve had our regular robins and blue tits, sparrows and blackbirds. But we also have some other finches, I’m not sure yet what they are. Don’t forget next weekend is the Big Garden Birdwatch, you can get details from the RSPB website

Wednesday evening

And again, all over the place. Woo hoo it looks so lovely but also means that our daughter was home again today. More work has been done on her igloo, and she even made a snow girl. We had to use celery instead of a carrot for a nose as I can’t eat celery and I’m reluctant to use what veg we have left! Needless to say I’ve found it very hard to work again today after my huge success yesterday when I worked hard ALL day and ALL evening not stopping until midnight. I think I burnt myself out, oh dear. I was also worried about getting to the surgery for my flu jab as I thought I’d have to walk there and back (3.2 miles) in the snow and ice. Fortunately I got the car off the drive and we had a quick jaunt there and back. So I finally succumbed and had the jab! Well they did ring me and offer it, so I thought maybe I should have it, although our daughter did get swine flue in the summer and we certainly didn’t. So far no odd effects, not even the achy arm she promised.

And today I also got excited about my first advert! If you get Making Jewellery magazine I have an advert in the free courses guide, complete with a photo of my pink frit swirlers as can be seen on my tuition page and the home page….yes….more excitement, Rick actually put some new photos up for me. And even more exciting….they used my photos on the front page of the courses guide too. If you’ve looked at my tuition page since yesterday you’ll also see that I have at last announced my first special courses. Just drop me an email for details on how to book and to choose your dates.

Tuesday morning

Still snowy out there, and very cold. Far too cold to be in my studio at the moment, but hopefully it will be warm and snugly by February when we’ve put in the insulation.  Normality is sort of returning, as today is the first day back at school since all the snow, they had 4 days off in total and my how it disrupted my work plans.  I’m taking a very quick break from doing my accounts, as I have thrown myself headlong into getting them done in time. I have so much to do this month it’s crazy, as I also have a bead fair at Ardingly on 24th January, and lots of other jobs to be ready for the 20th January….but I guess I can’t tell you about that, you’ll have to wait and see what I’m not talking about ;.)

I’d have to agree with the statement of my title, it’s not taxing, but doing my yearly accounts is. I was feeling very despondent last night as it all seems to be taking so long and all the things I did throughout last year to make things easier don’t seem to have worked particularly well. I appear to have a few receipts missing in action, although these are from when I was officially on sick time off and following that when I was technically taking it a lot easier. I have to admit that my head was a bit all over the place then, and they’ve probably been ‘put’ somewhere that seemed sensible at the time. Some of the processes I put into place did work, sort of, but it’s still a mix of some bits been entered and others not, which means I have to check everything. NNNNrggghhh.

I really want to get to grips with this so I don’t have so much stress next year. So I have another resolution…..wait for it…to try and do my accounts monthly or every 2 months (sounds familiar doesn’t it!)…..if possible…remembering that I need to work a couple of months behind so that I have all the relevant paperwork and statements. I honestly tried so hard last year, but as I was trying to do January at the end of Jan I got unstuck straight away. Hmmmmm, I wonder if I will manage it?

Thursday evening

Snoooooooooooooooooooow. Yes it came 2 nights ago and there’s loads of it. Yesterday we went for a walk and admired all the huge snowmen and women. Normally when you make a snowman all the snow on the lawn disappears and you get left with patchy snow and a straggly sad looking snowman. Not this time. There are loads of monster snow families around the place and still masses of snow left to play with. We had several snowball fights, my daughter came off worse than me (oops) and I made my first snow angel. So she’s home again tomorrow, that’s the third day in a row, let’s hope she can go back next week or I’m really going to struggle to get my work done. I’m loving it, but below I’m going to have a rather huge moan about something…..

So my question is, what on earth is going on with this country when people are too scarred of being sued to clear the snow? I remember when I was a kid, most people used to clear the snow in front of their house, much to my annoyance. Now it would appear we all sit home and whinge about the councils not gritting everywhere, instead of taking responsibility for our paths and clearing up. This really gets me hot under the collar, especially as my approach to life is that if you need to complain, then something obviously needs doing about whatever you’re complaining about, so why not get off your derrière and do something about it? But apparently now people won’t clear the snow because if you do and someone has an accident, then it’s your fault! What’s that all about? I think this government should do us all a favour and make it compulsory to clear snow and ice like many of the countries in Europe and stop pandering to this compensation culture. I think things have got into a bad state when people are too scarred to help their fellow human beings when help is needed. Moan over!

I have to say though that all this snow keeps reminding me of a Cat in the Hat story I had as child. The Cat had a bath and left a pink ring around the bath, and his friends tried everything to get rid of the pink, which gradually got transferred from one item to another. Things came to a head when they used a fan and splayed all the pink on to the snow outside and ended up with a huge pink snowdrift! And on that note…have a pink warm and toasty evening.

Tuesday morning

Oh yes, it’s the time, and it seems to have come around so quickly, that I have to do my tax return. And guess what? I think you’ve guessed it! If it was just a matter of filing in a form with a few details it would take about half an hour tops, but of course it isn’t. Yet again I have let the finance side of my business slip dreadfully, and actually this year it really bothers me, well it sort of does and kind of doesn’t. I was reading an article in Glass Bead (the magazine by the ISGB) about the 7 deadly sins of business, and ‘Running in the Dark’ was one of them. So what is this?….It’s what I’m doing! I have a rough idea of how much money is coming through my business, but I don’t know exactly how much until I do my yearly accounts. Hmm. This would be a real problem if I was driven by my company profit (or loss), but I’m not. I am doing this professionally to earn money, and I am running a business, but huge profits are not my primary aim.  My main objective is to be creative and to teach others the wonderful creative experience that is glass beadmaking. I guess this attitude goes with being creative, I would rather use my time making beads and jewellery than doing boring accounts. Oh well.

So maybe the question is should I get all accounty and do forecasts and monthly accounts? Would this help me focus more or would it just use valuable marketing time? You see the problem with running your own business, especially where you spend time personally creating art to sell, rather than buying in stuff and selling  it on, is that you only have so many hours in the day, and way too many other jobs to do to keep up with everything. I have written about this before, probably last January and the one before!

Anyway, I’m not going to ponder this issue for long, well, at least not here. I have stuff to get on with, and maybe I should be grateful I have to do office stuff this week as it’s way too cold outside and I still have to go get my warm studio boots from my friend. I’m not procrastinating my jobs, and have ‘set to’ with vigour to get this done, the first thing being to finish tidying my desk, especially since I need to fit a new larger laptop here.

Toodles.

Thursday morning

To quote Britney Spears  ‘Ooops I did it again’. This is becoming a bit of a bad habit, not blogging for days on end. But, well, you know how it is on the lead up to Christmas and over the holiday.  At least Rick didn’t put Buffy on again the day after our mammoth Buffy Fest. Unfortunately we now also own the complete box set of Angel and 2 series of Dr Who, the ones with Billie and David Tennant (no 2), and one with Martha and David (no 3) ….I really have no idea when we’ll be watching these, as contrary to popular belief we do not spend every hour of every evening glued to the telly, as we have rather of lot of stuff to do all the time. And did I mention Shaun the Sheep? I also had series 1 of this given and was staggered to see there are 40 episodes…I had no idea there were so many.

It’s been a good holiday so far, probably far too much relaxing going on in all honesty, but I certainly needed a rest after all my running around to Guildford and back and keeping my exhibitions topped up with jewellery. So what else did I get for Christmas? I have to say my favourite present is a Wally trolley! Oh yes, I thought I’d never be seen dead with one, but they’re coming back into fashion, all the trendy ladies in France use them. I really don’t see much difference between a trendy trolley (and it does have to be trendy) and a suitcase on wheels. I was also very encouraged to see about 4 ladies my age and younger using them for their Christmas shopping in Horsham town centre. I shall be using mine for my exercise power walk to the local shop and back. This summer I was totally weighed down with very heavy bags of spuds and copious pints of milk and it was really getting very tiresome and sore on the hands and my back and shoulders. So I shall now parade to the parade with my black, red and white spotty bag on wheels (oh my dear, a plaid one just wouldn’t do….I wouldn’t be seen dead with the traditional looking ones).  Mine also has a built in coolbag, a pocket for a brolley, and various pockets for different things. Click here if you fancy a sneak peek at my designer chic! Oh what a wally trolley dolly!

Dates are booking up fast for beadmaking tuition in the New year…..see my tuition page for details and contact me for available dates.  I have 1 space for a beginner on Friday 5th February. I also decided to add some of the many testimonials regarding my courses that I’ve been collecting for the past few years. Thank you to everyone who has written such lovely comments in our book, you’ve all been great students!

Have a Happy New Year!

Monday night

EEEk, almost a month has just gone since my last blog entry. Looks like I’m slacking a bit here…..OK, so I am on the blog front but it’s been all go. After a couple of months of hard preparations for my 2 exhibitions and 2 school craft fairs I can now see light at the end of the tunnel. Both exhibitions are in full swing and are going really well, details are on my home page and events page that I updated tonight. All I have to do now is to keep my work topped up with new pieces as they sell before Christmas, as both venues are attracting lots of attention, as is the Surrey Guild gallery in Milford. So if you are in need of inspiration for lovely Christmas gifts then you could do no better than visit one of the 3 venues, or even all 3 of them!

I’ve also updated my events page with some of my Bead fairs for the coming year, it’s already starting to look busy.

Today has been a bit of a weird one, as Rick stayed home still trying to get over the cold he got last weekend. The naughty boy put on an episode of Buffy the Vampire Slayer just to have a peek, and 8 hours later we had got through half the 4th season….that’s 11 episodes for the uninitiated…..oh my…sounds terrible, but we have NEVER done anything like that before, and in my defence I did sit at the table the whole time and make 5 pairs of earrings and core 15 of my Cloud Beads. I also managed to break 2 as usual, I always break one in every 9…..I hope he goes to work tomorrow!

Wednesday morning

What would you do? I mean with that much money? I was pondering this question on Monday last week as I drove to do another day of duty in the Surrey Guild Gallery. We all know that 2 bunches of people won that much in the lottery, one half was shared by a syndicate, but the other by a couple. They say that amount of money is life changing, and I suppose it is for the couple who won it.

So here’s what I would do with it.

1. Move…yay! Well actually I wouldn’t move straight away (probably) but I’d love to buy a plot of land (preferably near the sea) with a lovely view and location and build a Huf Haus, or maybe 2 or 3, one for my parents and maybe another for my brother if I’m feeling generous…lol. Although the other houses would have to be somewhere else, I wouldn’t want to be living on top of relatives now would I? Our house would have to have several outbuildings also, one for my lampworking studio and jewellery workshop, another for Dickie and his bits and bobs which would probably be a recording studio, and another probably for fun or maybe a guest house/suite for having people to stay. Now that would be good for students wanting an overnight place. Oh and I mustn’t forget the garage, and a workshop for doing ‘stuff’ like storing bits and doing odd jobs. Did I tell you I went to see a real live Huff House once? I fell in love, especially with the laundry chute which I thought was well cool. Imaging being able to chuck your dirty laundry on the floor and it land up right next to the washing machine? bliss.

2. Not have to worry about earning money any more. I know, maybe this isn’t a job, but it is something you would have to do, as well as trying not to worry about having so much money or feeling guilty about having it when so many people as so poor. Not easy this one.

3. Have a party to celebrate. Of course you would. And you’d probably have some extravagant stuff too like non stop flowing champagne (over a pyramid of champagne glasses darling) and Beluga Caviar…do you like caviar? Not so sure I do but you’d have to have it just cos you could! Actually I’m not so keen on Champagne either, I prefer something like Pinot Noir Brut, so maybe we would have that, although I expect the best Champagne is going to be nicer than what we would normally buy.

4. Go on holiday. Lots. To lots of nice places. I think I’d ditch the caravan, although it does have it’s uses, hmmm, now there’s a conundrum. No, I’d keep the caravan, on site and use it once a year when we go to our Whitsun camp with friends. Oooo, that would also mean I could afford to go and see the Northern Lights.

5. Have a spending spree in Heals or somewhere with dead cool furniture, to furnish the Huf Haus.

6. Have a beautiful lampworking studio, and stop worrying about having to cover costs all the time or do as much work as I feel I have to at the moment. I’d also host ‘get-together lampworking fun days’ for my beadmaking pals.

7. There’s lots more I could add to this list, so I think there will have to be a part 2….coming soon.

I have to get on with my exhibition prep, which involves going to my studio and making beads for part of the day, but I don’t wanna go out in the cold and wind!

Monday evening

Oh dear, I’m really slacking on the blogging front at the moment. It doesn’t help that I can’t move my laptop from the desk, it seems to have turned into a desktop machine, as it crashes when I try to move it. I do need a new laptop, and I’m very disappointed that the journey to buy a new one is frankly rather boring…and I’m not talking about the drive from Horsham to Crawley. I’d been thinking for years that getting a new one would be so exciting, but alas, after a small amount of research it looks like I’ll be going with the same make of Acer again, in a boring colour. I’ve been watching all the Dell ads on telly, and have browsed their website, I’ve even fallen for one of the wacky patterns…this one…Horizontel del Infinto but honestly don’t see the point in paying an extra £75 for a pretty pattern….this is the engineer and tight wad in me! Although a quick look at the website whilst putting this link in would make it look as though the pattern is free at the moment…no I just checked it’s an extra £89! forget that. That aside, they don’t seem to have what I need for a price to match the Acer. rats. Also I’ve left it so long now that I think I may have a mercy mission this week to rush and buy a new one, rather than waiting for a custom job. ho hum.

This week I’m getting ready for another show, or rather a month long exhibition. This is with the Surrey Guild, and we’re setting up this Friday. The event is a selling exhibition at Guildford House Gallery in Guildford High street, and opens this Saturday, running until Christmas Eve. After that I am preparing for another Surrey Guild Exhibition at the Bank Gallery in Chobham. Then it’s prep for the 2 school craft fairs I’m attending. So it’s all go at the moment. Fortunately (or rather unfortunately) I didn’t sell much at the fair the other week, and so have lots of pieces made already for the Guildford show, but I do have to re-label everything and do my inventory sheets (joy of joys!)…let’s hope the laptop copes.