Junk Shop Finds

or in my case Charity Shop finds of which we have many on our little island and at least 7 (doing a quick count in my head) in my town of Shanklin.

I popped into the British Heart Foundation today and thought I would share with you what I bought.

First up I bought this necklace, look at all the lovely chain and that interesting arrangement of jump rings that all the beads are hanging off.

and look at these lovely chain connectors.

This necklace only cost me £1.99 and then there's this piece

Look at all those lovely sparkly black crystals and that wonderful tassle. A bargain at £1.49!

and finally

Lots of gorgeous antique gold chain and only £1.99 for this one.

I mostly buy pieces for the chain and only re-use the beads if they are good quality.

I have a large collection of chain sitting in a couple of glasses on my windowsill.

I sometimse get some great inspiration from charity shop finds for example I made this necklace for the Bead Soup Blog Party this year

The necklace that I bought was the basis for the design. I added the copper focal and my own glass leaf headpins to finish it off.

I love upcycling jewellery and was one of the reasons I chose the name of my business 'Earthshine'.

Incidentally the mannequin I used in the photos above was bought from a QS (Quality Seconds). it was £6.99 which I thought was a bargain. It was a bit dark to go with my display so I sprayed it with some enamel spray paint to lighten it up. I think it works quite well don't you?

Thanks for looking.

Linda
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Result!

Well the results are in from The British Bead Awards. They were announced at the Big Bead Show.

Yesterday (Oct. 18th) I travelled up from the Isle of Wight by car with my husband. I snapped this photo from the ferry of the sunrise looking over towards Ryde with it's church spire in the distance.

We made good time to Sandown Park in Esher (about an hour up the road from Portsmouth) and my Mum and cousin were waiting for us when we arrived.

We were treated to bucks fizz and nibbles and got our first chance to view the other entries into the competition.

I entered my peice into the 'Beyond Beads' category. I would have like to have gone into the 'Lampwork Beads' category but I felt that because my piece was made with headpins (ie glass in the end of a piece of wire) that it didn't qualify as 'beads'. I think there were about 5 pieces that had been picked as finalists but they had a barrier which was a bit too far away from the tables where the pieces were displayed and it was a bit difficult to read what the labels said.

This is what my necklace looked like on the table.

Once we had all had a chance to have a look and finish our bucks fizz we all headed to the seating area to hear what place we had won. There were quite a few people as there were lots of categories.

Congratulations to my friends Jennie Totterdell for 1st place (sorry can't remember what category) and Madeline Bunyan for 2nd place in the lampwork category and finally it came round to my turn and..........

2nd place.

I went up to shake hands and collect certificate

and prize

I won a years subscription to Bead magazine and Bead TV as well as some Kumihimo discs, chainmaille books together with some jumprings and some artistic wire.

I worked so hard on the piece and got so many positive comments that I have to say that I was a bit disappointed not to have got 1st place. Especially when I went back over to the table at the end to find out what the winning piece was, and here it is.

 

I appreciate that a lot of work has gone into this piece also and I will let you make up your own mind. Congratulations to Lucilla Nasau anyway.

Having looked at the entrants into the lampwork category I did notice that one of the pieces, to my mind, wouldn't have qualified as beads so I went up and spoke to one of the organisers and asked whether they thought I had gone into the right category and they said it was fine but it would have been ok to go into the lampwork category. I wished I had contacted the organisers and asked before I put my entry in but there, it is done now and there is always next year.

I had a lovely day and said hello to a few friends as well as bought a few bits and pieces that I might share with you another day.

Thanks for looking.

Linda

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Etsy Treasuries

Etsy treasuries are a collection of up to 16 items someone has picked out to create a theme in order to promote their work. Items from other Etsy sellers are usually included to help spread the word. A lot of care and attention has gone into some of them and they can be works of art.

Many people belong to teams, I myself belong to Craft Pimp and Bead Smitten but admit I find the treasuries a bit too time consuming to create myself. I do my best to promote them on Facebook though.

Occasionally I get an email from someone who has chosen to put one of my items in their treasury which is always a lovely surprise.  Here are a few of the ones I have had items in lately, you will notice a distinct autumnal theme.

If you click on the image it will take you to the treasury.

 

 

Thanks for looking.

Linda
x

Creativity Squared

Having had a bad experience with Vistaprint, I recently purchased my first business cards from Moo. I bought them in a sale and was impressed with the quality but not the price. Anyway, I digress. The reason for this post is that I received an email from Moo about a competition run by Moo and Scope called 'Creativity Squared' the idea is to submit some artwork via Instagram so it has to be squared. I guess it is to promote their new square cards.

So I got to thinking that it doesn't necessarily have to be artwork but could be a photo of artwork. I had professional photographs taken of my two competition necklaces and decided to have a play and see what I could come up with.

This is the original photo of my 'Circle of Fire' necklace.

Here is the first of the Instagram photos I played with

and here it is in black and white

The photographer who took these photos was Steve Therle and when he had taken the shots I wanted he had a little play and took this shot

and the black and white version

My 'Snowqueen' necklace was photographed by Doug Baldwin from America

and with the Instagram treatment

I'm quite pleased with these. I don't expect to win but it was fun having a play.





If you would like to enter the details are here: http://uk.moo.com/partner/scope/?utm_campaign=us_verte_scope_dec14&utm_medium=partner&utm_source=scopemiami



My Instagram feed is here: http://instagram.com/earthshinejewellery?modal=true


Thanks for looking.


Linda
x

Autumn is here!

Yep, Autumn is definitely here. The leaves are falling off the trees and we have lots of rain :-(.

So to cheer myself up I have been making leaves and these cute acorn headpins. All available in my Etsy store

I've been playing around with Instagram too. I just love the effects that you can create with it.

You can follow me here: http://instagram.com/earthshinejewellery

Glass leaves, the ones above are big enough to be focal beads.

 

I also have these patinated metal oak leaves which I think would look great with the acorns as a necklace.

 

and finally I have some autumn spacer bead mixes.

Thanks for looking.

Linda
x

Finally!

I can finally reveal the necklace that I entered into The British Bead Awards 2014. As you can imagine it has been very hard to keep from showing it off to you before but judging has taken place so I can share it with you now.

It is made entirely of glass headpins each one created by me in the flame. The glass is mainly 104 coe but there is some 100 coe too. in white, transparent and blue. Some of it has been etched and I've also used some mica powder.

It was inspired by this Dale Chihuly chandelier that I saw in his London exhibition earlier this year.

It will be on display at The Big Bead Show on the 18th October and I will find out then what place I have been awarded. There is also going to be a best in show so if you are going to be there please consider voting for me (if you think it is the best of course).

Thanks for looking.

Linda
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