Baaa

Oh heck, its been twelve days since I last blogged. That's a bit naff of me, isn't it?

What have I been doing? Well, I've been to the vet with the guinea pig and the cat. Again. I know. I'm sick of going, the vet must be sick of me going and my bank account is sick of the vet too. However, Ruth seems to be okay. She has no bladder stones (a £50 X-ray showed that) and she's on antibiotics for some sort of internal nethers infection. Nigel seems to have some kind of gastritis so I've been cooking him chicken and fish and feeding him small meals. We've got to just wait and see how he goes. (Thank goodness he's insured.) Nigel's also got a new drinking fountain which he loves. He loves both drinking from it and also splashing it all over the place like a child in a paddling pool.

Speaking of animals, I've taken to making them. Glass ones. That don't require special cooking and feeding, or medicine syringing into their faces twice a day.

Sheep.

Baaa.

I've had sheep on my mind recently. Odd, I know. I'm blaming it on listening to Felicity Ford's excellent KNITSONIK podcast and also stroking my Jamieson & Smith pure Shetland wool that I bought as part of a fingerless mitts kit from Kate Davies.

Gorgeous Kate Davies Designs 'Ecclefechan' fingerless mittens kit

So, with the aforementioned sheep on my mind, I sat and twiddled about with glass and after about seven attempts I came up with the little fella at the top of this post. Chris has named him Baaarney. I say I had seven attempts but it was more like fifty-seven. (Seven just sounds less obsessive.) You see, there's no point in me making a bead that I'm potentially going to sell that I can't replicate. Each bead needs to be made in the same way, with bits added and worked on in the same order every time, so that I can make roughly the same bead over and over again.

Baaarney, rearing up like a scared horse and also relaxing

The sheep is tiny. He's only about 10mm tall.

I've turned Baaarney into a stitch marker for my knitting. The sock in this photograph doesn't even require marking but I just like having a tiny glass sheep there, dangling from my needle.

Baaarney doing a knitting-related dangle

Facebook and Instagram seem to like Baaarney so I think I'll make a small flock for the shop.

Have a fun-filled Thursday!

Beads all over the place

Crikey-big-bums*, I'm having a pillock* of a morning here.

I started off by dropping about 180 beads on the kitchen floor. They went everywhere. I rescued them all ... after I'd pulled out the fridge-freezer, the cooker, the washing machine and other assorted kitchen gubbins. Then Ruth started making help-me-Laura-it's-hurting noises so guess where I'm off to this afternoon? Yup, the vet.

I called them and started the conversation with "I know I sound like that lady on All Creatures Great And Small who was always moaning on about her poor dog Tricky-Woo, but please can you see my guinea pig? Again?" Seriously, they must be sick of me. I know I am.

Anyway, yes, I've just put two sets of each of these 'Bottle Green', 'Tangerine' and 'Candyfloss' beads in the shop. Each set is £13.00 and can be found here. 

*Feel free to substitute your own swear words here. I thought I'd be polite. For once.

'Indigo' & Damson'

The colours of these beads are so rich and vibrant. They're blue base beads with a thin layer of transparent dark ink blue (for the Indigo ones) and dark amethyst (for the Damson ones) over the top.

There are four sets of each in the shop right. Each one costs £13.00.

I had a lovely parcel arrive today. A couple of weeks ago I had a spin on the Tea Cup Carousel on the Clipper Teas website and I won a prize!

This morning a box of five fruit infusions and a pack of green tea arrived. What a fab start to my weekend! I love Clipper tea (their everyday organic tea is my current favourite normal-cup-of-tea tea) and their packaging and ethics are wonderful too.

The sun is shining here and Ruth is running around the garden. She's still on a couple of medicines, bless her, but she's much better than she was.

I hope that you have a lovely weekend.

Furry Squeaker

I'm down to one guinea pig.

I've not had just one guinea pig since I was ten years old.

It's a very strange thing.

I've kept guinea pigs for twenty-six years. I must have had at least thirty over the years, not including babies that were born and rehomed. They're perfect little pets. They're clean, they don't bite or scratch, they live thrice as long as hamsters and each one has their own little personality. I adore them. 

I had to say goodbye to Jemima last week. She was six which is quite old for a guinea pig. This left me with Ruth. (That's Ruth up there. She's named after Ruth Goodman.) It also left me with a decision to make; get more guinea pigs or make Ruth my last one. I could get a pair of guinea piglets but something is telling me not to. I'm a big believer in gut instinct and for some reason the idea of getting baby pigs just doesn't feel right.

I know that guinea pigs are not solitary animals and because of this I've spoken to a couple of guinea pig owners who have single pigs and they all gave me the same advice; make Ruth an indoor pig, give her lots of attention and cuddle her daily. So that's what I'm doing and so far she seems fine. She goes in her outdoor run during the day and in the evening she comes inside, has her dinner and a bit later on she settles on my lap and we watch whatever soap is on (she likes EastEnders) and then she goes in her indoor cage for the night.

I'm keeping an eye on Gumtree and the like in case anyone has a three year old guinea pig lady that needs a home because I would jump at that. I'd be more than happy to adopt one for Ruth as long as she's about the same age as her. So if, on the off chance, you know anyone in the Cambridge area who is trying to rehome a three-ish year old female guinea pig, please send them my way.

Nigel is intrigued by Ruth and I'm careful to keep them apart because I don't trust Nigel. He's murdered waaaaay too many birds, you see.

So yes, it's very strange to open the back door and not be greeted by a chorus of squeaks but at the same time it's kind of nice to have Ruth indoors with us. I'll just see how it goes ...

'Little Bit '80s' & 'Pinkurple'

I cannot believe it's over a fortnight since my last blog post. That's awfulness. I've had flu, Nigel was really ill and another of my guinea pigs died so it's just been one thing after another but I think things are looking up now.

I was digging about in one of my glass boxes the other day (I don't have fancy organised glass rod storage because I know it would never stay organised) and I found half a rod of Effetre Amber Rose. This was an odd-lot of glass from about, oooh, ten-ish years ago now. Effetre never replicated it but it is such a pretty colour; kind of a pinky-peachy amber, as its name suggests. I teamed it with some CiM Chai and some soft grey to make this 'Little Bit '80s' set. Peach-pink and soft grey together always conjures up images of legwarmers and bubble perms in my mind.

And I also made a pink and purple set which I called 'Pinkurple' because it's pink and purple. Yes.

Both these sets are £18.50 each and they're for sale here.

I'd best get on with the beadmakery. Have a good day.

Alright?

I'll not lie; I'm finding it flipping hard work keeping up with all the digital places I'm supposed to be. Facebook, Twitter, Pinterest, Instagram, mailing list, blog, website - it's crazy, this cyberwold in which we live!

Anyway, I'm here. And I've got two lots of new glass beads to show you. The 'Vanilla & Honey' ones up top ...

... and these 'Midnight' beads are available in my shop right now as I type.

So what's happened since I last blogged?

Well ... Nigel got ill but then he got better and then Martha, one of my guineas, got ill but she didn't get better and all in all I've spent far too much time at the vet.

Nigel is due to have his manparts operation next week so I'll be back there again but hopefully that'll be quite straightforward. For me. Nigel, not so much but it's for his own good. He's also being microchipped (I'm referring to his vet appointment as his 'Chop-n-Chip') as the bugger will NOT wear a collar. We've got through four collars and tags since he came to live with us and he only wore the last one for a couple of hours.

I've caught up with all my bead orders (there were moments there where I thought I'd never reach the end of them but YAY I did!) and I'm now working on a couple of new bracelet designs. Hoping to have those ready by the end of the week.

Lots of other life stuff has been happening but that's not for here. I think it's all on the up now, though, so that's good.

OOOH, I'm expecting the arrival of a new laptop this week! This is very exciting. You know mine broke yonks ago? Well, I've been borrowing Chris' one but it's a work machine and I don't have full time access to it. Also, I'm unable to download any software or useful stuff (like Acrobat) without Chris getting it authorised at work which is a pain. The laptop won't talk to my laser printer either so it's all been very annoying and irksome and I'd be right up the swanny without my iPhone. But yes, I have ordered a lovely Dell Inspiron 15R laptop which is due to arrive on Wednesday. I was after a red one but it was an additional forty quid and I figured that most of the time the lid will be open, facing away from me and I didn't see the point. So it's black and silver which is fine by me. It'll just be amazing to have my own computer again. We seriously do not realise how much we need these things until they're not there.

I've not done a discount code for a while so here you go - just enter AUGUST10 at checkout to get ten percent off anything on my website. (Code is valid until midnight on 22/08/13)

I think that's pretty much it from me. I hope all is dandyfine in your world?

Have a good rest-of-your-Monday,

Beads and stuff

My goodness, last week was one of those weeks where nothing seemed to go right. Amongst other things, one of my guinea pigs, Lisa, died. She was one of the younger two and the vet and I have no idea what was wrong with her. Very sad.

But hey, I'll keep it light.

I've been having a warm indoors day today. My feet froze yesterday and the walk to and from Slimming World finished them off. I haven't been able to get my foots properly warm since! So I've been inside the house, cleaning and photographing beads and playing with Mister Nigel.

Nigel seems to like the snow. He was a bit unsure of it at first but he keeps asking to go outside and then he runs around like a maniac for about three minutes and when I open the back door to let him in, he skids into the lounge, across the laminate floor and greets me with a "Brrrrrmmmiaaow!"

Anyway, yes, beads. I've strung and sorted the orange and pink beads at the top of this post into sets and they're on the Freshly Baked Beads page. There is also a large strand of Lonelies beads waiting for a new home as well.

And lots of you seemed to like the etched heart beads sets I made last week so I have made some of them available for ordering. There are currently five colours to choose from and each set of thirteen beads costs £20.00. All the details can be found here.

Have a super duper Tuesday evening!

Busy Bee

It has been such a beautiful spring day here.  It was quite crisp and chilly but the sun shone and it made me feel all smiley.  I sat in the garden with a cup of tea at lunchtime and I saw this big bee buzzing around the crocuses.  He was caked in pollen and I was only able to take one photograph before he flew off.

My first purple crocus bloomed today.  Its petals are kind of crinkly and wrinkly (I don't know if that's how it's supposed to be) and it is such a fantastic colour.

The guinea pigs were enjoying the weather too.  Here's Lisa on the grass :

She's hiding behind the pig igloo - pigloo, if you will - which is a much better hiding place than the one she found yesterday.  For a horrid few minutes I thought she was lost.  Chris and I were searching all over the place for her and we eventually discovered her wedged between two bin bags behind the wheelie bins.

I hope the weather was nice for you today too?

New Guinea Piglets

Meet Lisa and Ruth, my two new guinea piglets.

These little ruby-red-eyed furry squeakers are sisters and they are about ten or eleven weeks old. They're unbelievably cute but very timid at the moment.  It might look like they're on the grass in these photographs that Chris took but they're actually on our living room rug.  Lisa (on the left) is a beautiful mink colour and she has one white back leg and a splodge of ginger on her back.  She is named in honour of the wonderful and inspirational Lisa Lynch. Ruth (on the right) is a mix of brown and ginger, is a little smaller than her sister and is named after Ruth Goodman from Edwardian Farm and Victorian Farm.  (You know how much I admire Ruth Goodman!) 

Lisa and Ruth haven't met Brenda, Edith, Jemima and Martha yet.  The two piglets are currently in the indoor cage and when it's a nice sunny day I shall let them out on the grass for a little while and I'll gradually introduce them to the older guineas.  By the time the warmer weather comes they'll all be out mowing the grass in guinea pig unison.  Utter cuteness!

'Fruity'

These 'Fruity' beads and more will be for sale over on my website tonight at 9.00pm (UK time) tonight.

Cor blimey it's hot in my shed today! The last few days have been nice - not too sunny and a little overcast which makes for good beadmaking conditions. This enabled me to work from about 9am to 4pm but not today. I gave in about half an hour ago when the hotness and mugginess became pretty much unbearable. So now here I am talking to you while sitting on our brand new sofa. We ordered it a few days after we moved in and a week or so later we were informed that there was a delay but it finally arrived today! I can't say I'm sorry to say goodbye to Chris's old sofa - the thing was beyond dead and it was more comfortable to sit on the floor.

Going back to the subject of the shed, I had a couple of visitors today. Not human visitors but small, squeaky types. I was sat making beads when I heard a rustling noise and then a squeak. I turned around to see Martha and Jemima at the shed door.

Jemima was nosing around the bag of guinea pig hay that I use to prop the door open and Martha came into the shed, looked at me and uttered a few 'Mweeps!' as if to say "Oh! It's YOU in here! Fancy you being in our garden!"

As you can see from the photos I am literally working in a bare, no frills garden shed. Outside the door are a Laurel bush and two massive evergreen-type trees (I don't know exactly what they are yet but I will find out) that are around about the forty year old mark. When Dad was visiting the other day we measured the circumference of one of the trunks and with some mathematical jiggery pokery Dad calculated the tree age using some complex formula that he found online. The trees mean we have a whole host of birds in the garden which is wonderful. We have a couple of very tame collared doves, some sparrows, blackbirds, pigeons, thrushes and also a massive amount of starlings. I know that some people think of starlings as pesky birds but I like them. There was about thirty of them in the garden the other day eating some food that I'd put out for them.

Tomorrow Chris and I are going to tackle the front 'garden'. This is a gravelled area that is full of weeds. It looks a right old state so we're going to just pull the weeds up which should improve it no end and then we'll work out what we're going to eventually do with the area. So it'll be yet another trip to Homebase tomorrow morning to get some gardening gloves and some kind of magical anti-weed product. I'll let you know how Project De-Weed goes .....

'St Clements'

Ooooh, it is nice to be blogging on my laptop again. We finally got our internet up and running on Wednesday night and I cannot tell you how much I've missed the old World Wide Web.

As you can see I've been busy making beads and there will be some for sale over on my website at 8.30pm tonight. I'm quite enjoying my new shed. It does get a bit warm in there in this weather but I'm looking forward to making it 'home'. It's very bare at the moment - just my bench, kiln and torch but in the coming months I'll give it a bit of a makeover.

Chris and I are settling in nicely here. It's very bizarre to think that this is our house! The guinea pigs are loving the big garden - we pig-proofed it so they can't escape and they've been spending their days roaming free. Brenda used to be The World's Laziest Guinea Pig but since we got here it's like she's got a brand new lease of life! I'm missing Buster terribly, though - it's so odd not having a cat about the place.

I'm gradually getting my bearings. I've told you before what an awful sense of direction I have. I actually got lost the first time I went to the postbox. What should have been a five minute walk there and back turned into a twenty minute one. I've got it sussed now though! Chris has marked all the local landmarks on GoogleMaps on my iPhone so if I get lost again I should be able to navigate my way home. Sad, or what?!

Martha's Bath

I've just had to give Martha the guinea pig a bath. She keeps getting covered in mud from climbing in and out of flowerpots and she doesn't wash it off. I keep cleaning bits of her but today I decided it was time for a proper full-on guinea pig bath.

A hair wash with warm water and a dash of Johnson's Baby Shampoo .....

A rinse .....

A towel and blow dry (with the hair dryer on cool) ......

And I finally had one clean, fragrant and pampered guinea pig.

Martha seemed to enjoy it. She was so calm and she was rewarded with a lettuce leaf for her good behaviour. I wonder how long it'll take for her to get muddy again?

Pig Palace

I bought my guinea pigs a swank new house on Saturday. Their old one was starting to get a bit manky and parts of the wood were starting to rot. Also, Martha and Jemima, the two younglings, are growing at a rapid rate and the old hutch was starting to become a tad cramped.

So they now have this wonderful guinea pig sty which is very spacious and best of all, the whole roof lifts up for easy cleaning and it makes catching the furry squeakers a much easier task too!

And yes, that's Jemima and Edith sat either side of the steps that lead up to their mansion. People always seem to find this amusing but my guinea pigs are free range. The whole garden is guinea pig proof with discreet bits of mesh and netting here and there to stop them escaping. I open the hutch door in the morning and they come and go as they please throughout the day and then in the evening I put their dinner in their house (fresh lettuce, carrot and apple every day) and they all head home and I shut them up for the night. Honestly, guinea pigs are the best pets - they don't bite, they don't smell and they're oh-so-sweet and very amusing to watch. Each one has their own little personality. I've kept guinea pigs since I was about eight and I'll be keeping them for many years to come!

One down, one to go

Here's half a pair of the Dead Simple Lace socks that I mentioned in my last post. Better get on and knit the other sock or I'll have one warm foot and one chilly one!

No real news today so I thought I'd share a couple of photos with you. The one above is a shot of a gorgeous daffodil (I just mis-typed that as dafoodil - ha!) which is part of a huge bunch that Veryan kindly gave me.

And the picture below is Jemima and Martha enjoying some newly-laid turf. Aw!

I'm off up to Cambridge to see Chris this afternoon. Fingers crossed that when I come back I'll have some beadmaking ability. Have a great weekend!

New Additions

I'm still here, making beads and pootling about in my glass world. I've been quieter than normal, I know, so I thought I'd poke my head out into the blogosphere and say hey.

Those two beauties up there are my new guinea pigs - Jemima and Martha. I wanted to get a friend for Brenda and Edith so I rang around several pet shops on the hunt for a female guinea pig but nowhere had any. I eventually tracked down a shop that had two six-month-old females for sale but the shop owner said they had to go as a pair. The lady she was selling them for was adamant that they shouldn't be separated as they're sisters and have always lived together. So who was I to argue? I fell in love with them both instantly.

I'll be back later with some beads .....

Fantastic Day!

I've had such a incredible day today! Jelveh, a very talented and experienced beadmaker, came over to melt glass, have lunch and have a good old chat. We've only spoken by email and today was the first time we actually met face-to-face and do you know, I feel like I've known her for years. You know when you 'click' with someone? Well that's exactly what happened.

Jelveh came bearing gifts of pudding! And gifts of glass - she gave me a strip of the most gorgeous dichroic glass you've ever seen as well as some goldstone ribbon and some cute star murrini cane. Watching Jelveh work was wonderful. She has so many skills and she showed me some pretty nifty glassy tricks and techniques. Jelveh also fell in love with Brenda and Edith, my two guinea pigs.

Jelveh also gave me a good talking-to, in the nicest possible way. Most of you know what an utter pain-in-the-behind perfectionist I am, yeah? Well, I think Jelveh may have helped me with that particular problem trait of mine. She tipped out and sorted through the contents of my not-so-good-beads bag. All of my recent students have seen this bag of beads and most of them do the whole "Laura, why don't you sell these?" thing and to be honest, when I look through them sometimes even I can't see the reason why some of them never made it to the website. Like I say, I have a problem. So Jelveh spent ages grouping the beads into colour sets and she made me look at my 'rejects' in a whole new light. The beads aren't seconds (I kill those in the water jug or bin them) and I've promised Jelveh that I will add the sets she put together to my Etsy shop over the course of the next few days. In fact, tonight I was going to list the Lonelies from the last post but instead I put the first of the Jelveh Groupings up on Etsy instead and guess what - they've sold while I've been writing this post!

I'm really glad that Jelveh and I spent the day together. I've learnt a lot from her and she's shown me a whole new way of looking at my work and enlightened me about the way other people see my beads. She is such an amazing lady and I loved listening to her American accent. The way she says 'aqua' and 'awesome' is so cool! Most of all I feel like I've made a really good friend and it is such a shame that Jelveh is moving back to the States next month. I hope I get to see her again before she goes.

Make sure you check out Jelveh's beautiful beads in her Etsy shop and also pop over and have a read of her blog.