First Blogiversary

I've been wittering away on this here blog for exactly a year today. Now that's a lot of waffle!

Yesterday I was stuck for colour ideas so I texted my fella to see if he could think of any. Chris is good like that. He always comes up with great beady concepts when I'm having an I-can't-make-beads moment. Yesterday he sent me some links to underwater photographs which resulted in me spending ages trawling Flickr and Google looking at lots of pictures of vibrantly-coloured fish. A particularly groovy one gave me the idea for these 'Fiesta' beads. Nice and bright!

Love the lovely polka dots!

I'm a bit polka dot crazy at the moment. There's something quite soothing about making these beads. Must be the repetitive dot placement - I kind of get into a polka dot trance . . . . .

I went for a mooch around the shops in town on Saturday and a most excellent thing happened! The other week I had to buy new jeans because my old ones were too big. Yay! The no pudding thing is really paying off. So I had to buy one size smaller than I usually do. I thought that maybe that was a bit of a fluke and perhaps the size was wrong. But on Saturday I found a skirt that I really liked (yes, that might be shocking to you because you may know that I normally avoid dresses and skirts like the plague) and I instinctively picked up my normal size 14. I did have a quick look to see if there was a size 12, but no. I trotted off to the changing room and tried the skirt on . . . . . and it fell down! It just would not stay on my hips. I got changed and when the assistant said 'Any good?' I proudly replied 'No!' with a big grin on my face. I think she thought I was a bit loopy.

Could it actually be that after about a decade of size 14-ness I may actually be a size 12? It was a shame about the skirt because I liked it but to make it all better I bought new shoes instead!

'Blaze' Floratabs

Here are the beads I mentioned earlier. A variation on my Floralentils. Comfy-to-wear tabs in vibrant fiery colours. I like. Do you?

'Strawberry' Rococo

These beads are made with an oddlot of orangey coral-coloured glass that I bought about three years ago. I purchased three pounds of it because I loved it so much and I can't believe I've never combined it with enamel before. The colours of these beads really do remind me of fresh strawberries!

I'm still doing the Wii Fit thing. I'm particularly enjoying the jogging and the hula-hooping. I haven't fallen off the balance board for the past couple of days but I made up for it this morning by falling over in 'real life'. I went down to the shed to switch the kiln on and to fetch my full-to-the-brim-with-dead-beads-and-bits-of-glass water jug and on my way back up the garden I tripped on the patio step and went flying. I dropped the water jug, banged my head on the wheelie bin, grazed my shin against the edge of the step and then put my hand in the spilt water-and-bits-of-glass mess. Plus it was raining. Not a good start to the day! But things got better after I'd picked myself up and then removed bits of glass from the palm of my hand. The postman arrived with the new Marian Keyes book which cheered me up no end! I'm already well into 'This Charming Man', which incidentally has the most beautiful purple spangly cover!

Zesty!

I'm calling these zingy green Rococo beads 'Mexican Lime'. Very bright and cheery!

'Appley Dappley Fusion' Tabs

I'm still enjoying making the tabs! I decided to get a bit more complicated with these ones, though. Here I've used enamels, hand-pulled murrini and ridiculously fine stringer.

On a not-at-all-bead-related note, I've just had the most scrumptious (such an Enid Blyton word) pudding. Marks & Spencer clotted cream rice pudding. Totally lovely!

Hoo-flippin'-ray!

Finally my mojo is back! Tonight's enamel beads.

I like being in one piece

Yep - I'm still crazy about making enamel beads. Seems my lovely bead customers really like them too! The ones above are a selction of some of the beads that I'll have for sale on my website tomorrow night.

I went over to see my sister Sally this afternoon. It was beautifully sunny when I set out and I really enjoyed the ride over to her house. (For readers that may not know, I have a Vespa.) We sat in the garden and had a cup of tea (and a doughnut) while Robyn played in the sandpit. Then all of a sudden out of nowhere it became grey and overcast and began spitting with rain.

The drizzle turned into a thunderstorm and I had no choice but to scoot home in the rain. I tend to only ride my bike when it's dry but sometimes you've just got to face the fact you're going to get wet! Anyone who has ridden a motorbike knows that you need to take even more care on the roads than usual in the rain - things like white lines and drain covers become very slippery. So there I am riding carefully, not going too slow and sticking to the speed limits. But oh no, that's not good enough for some idiot in a huge BMW fat car (I call 4x4s 'fat cars' because to me they are just really fat cars) behind who insisted on getting way too close to me in an attempt to intimidate me and hurry me up. Well, I'm sorry but I'm doing 20 in a 20 limit on a road that is riddled with speed bumps as well as potholes and parked cars. Where is the problem with that? When I reached the traffic lights at the end of the road they were red but when they went green and I went straight ahead Mr BMW Man turned left and revved off in a right old huff. Dang - I pay my road tax and I have just as much right to be on the road as any other vehicle. Why do some drivers think that they can 'bully' others into doing what they want them to do? Grrrrrrrr - it gets right on my . . . . nerves. I love my Vittorio (the Vespa) so the last thing I'm going to do is ride my bike like an idiot and risk hurting him, let alone myself - I like being in one piece.

More enamel beads

I'm still having fun making enamel beads - I just love the orchid and purple tones of the beads pictured.

Oh, and my curly hair is officially back! Not that you're probably concerned, bothered or interested but I just wanted to tell someone the good news!

Bright shiny beads!

I purchased a full set of enamels last week and I'm having such fun trying out all the beautiful colours. These are a few of the enamel beads that I've made over the past couple of days. I just love the effect of enamels on glass - always reminds me of airbrushed paint.

So many colours to try - expect more bright and shiny beads soon!