Motley Owl Mini Blog Hop

Welcome to the mini blog hop hosted by Lorelei Eurto and featuring ' Motley Owl' pendants by Erin Prais-Hintz. Erin created these pendants with the idea that the owl world must have it's share of fools, exhibitionists and anti-establishment characters - not what you'd expect from an owl but lots of fun. Historically motley was the name give to the traditional mixed colour costumes worn by court jesters and professional fools which distinguished them as different and outside of the normal social hierarchy and Erin's owls have their own motley plumage.

There is a foolish owl in one of the "Oz' stories who is also distinguished for being outside the norm:

"Is the owl so very foolish?" asked the boy."Extremely so", replied the donkey."notice what vulgar expressions she uses. But I admire the owl for the reason that she is positively foolish. Owls are supposed to be so very wise, generally, that a foolish one is unusual, and perhaps you know that anything or anyone unusual is sure to be interesting to the wise."

The Patchwork Girl of Oz by L. Frank Baum

Well, I'll take interesting every time and my little owl is definitely that. I see her as one of life's flamboyant characters with her pink plumage and her bright eyes darting around...her head's in the clouds and she's a little bit ditsy. No dark woods for this lady, she loves bright colours (especially pink), blue skies, and sunshine - she's a hippie chick and flower fledgling of the owl world.

I'm in two minds about this piece as it didn't quite go in the direction I expected - not that I had anything as grand as a plan. I knew I wanted to incorporate some lovely pink polymer clay beads I had and some gorgeous rose pink silk from Marsha Neal but that's about it.

I started at the front with the beaded section of mixed blue Czech glass beads with brass accents and after much fiddling about with silk and chain, (I'm neither good or fast with textiles) I finally came up with this 'chain within a chain' style which I quite like.

I added a second layer of brass chain with a Vintaj clasp and linked the wrapped polymer clay beads by Pippa of Pips Jewellery -  aren't they great...?  A final flourish from one of my own bronze sunflowers makes sure the the sun is always shining down on my flighty feathered friend...

In hindsight, I'm not sure about the blue beaded section and I'm thinking maybe it would look better with the silk chain all the way around...but then I didn't have enough silk to do that anyway so I'll have to ponder and maybe purchase...

So there you have my little motley owl - definitely not the norm but I hope you found her interesting and many thanks to Lorelei for hosting such a fun event. Use the links below to meet the rest of the motley crew featuring in this mini blog hop:

Lesley Watt: http://www.thegossipinggoddess.blogspot.com   You are here
Lorelei Eurto http://www.lorelei1141.blogspot.com
Chris White : http://dzeyenrstudio.blogspot.com
Raida Disbrow: http://havanabeads.blogspot.com
Penny Young-Neville: http://copperpennydesigns.blogspot.com
Tanya Goodwin:  http://pixiloo.blogspot.com


Lesley

Art Bead Earring Swap...

I recently signed up for an art bead earring swap hosted by the lovely Diana of Suburban Girl which requires each participant to make a pair of earrings for each of their two team mates. Earlier this week I was delighted to find out that my team mates were two lovely ladies - Tania Spivey of Moobie Grace Designs and Jan Onipenco of Lakeside Creations/Molten Mayhem.


Tania creates the most wonderful eclectic jewellery using a mix of media including textiles and found items. Her designs have a lovely relaxed bohemian feel to them, something I often find hard to achieve and greatly admire. The pieces below utilise textiles, buttons, repurposed cutlery and Tania's own polymer clay beads...definitely a master of several trades is Tania.

Jan's jewellery showcases her own lampwork beads which are full of colour and delightful character . She obviously has a love of nature and this comes through in her beads - just look at these little cuties...so full of fun you can't help but smile.

So all in all I think I've lucked out with my team members - I can't wait to see what they create, but in the meantime I have to get my muse working on some ideas to make sure they're happy they got me too! 


Make sure you come back on June 7th to see an amazing extravaganza of earrings in the big reveal.


Lesley

This weekend only....

I'm having a spring clean in my Etsy jewellery shop to make way for new stock and come monday, I'll be taking out a number of items to be recycled into new designs. However, I hate dismantling jewellery so even though these items are already on sale with discounts of 30%, for this weekend only they will also qualify for free shipping. For any item purchased from the DESTASH SALE section of my shop before 12 midnight on Sunday, I will refund the shipping charge via Paypal.

So if you fancy picking up a bargain (like one of the pieces in the picture below) and saving me some extra work you can see what's on offer here.

Many thanks.

Lesley

Bead Table Wednesday 9 May 2012

New bead goodness on the table today...

My lovely Motley Owl by Erin Prais-Hintz arrived from Lorelei this morning. This time next week she (I sense some feminine wiles so 'she' it is) will be starring alongside some of her brothers and sisters in a mini blog hop hosted by Lorelei, so make a note on your calendars.

The postman also bought some Polymer Clay lovelies from Alison Sachs from Beads By Earth Tones. I've only really started using Polymer clay beads in recent months and am developing a growing liking for them. This floral pair are so pretty and I love the more organic style of the turquoise/ochre set, a style Alison does really well.

Check out what's on the bead tables of the world today here.

Have a great day.

Lesley

Beautiful Design...

It's been a miserable wet bank holiday Monday here in the UK so I decided to do something I've been meaning to do for a while as a little tribute to the talented designers who've bought my bronze components and turned them into beautiful designs. After all without them, there would be no point in me doing what I do.

I've put together this little video so if you have a few minutes to spare...sit back, relax and enjoy.

Lesley

Shop upate

Hi there - how is your Sunday going...nice and relaxing...?

I'm busy putting together new listings for a shop update at 7pm (GMT) this evening but I've decided that there is too much to list in one hit so I will complete the listings tomorrow. So if any of you are kind enough to buy something and then find you want something else subsequently, just send me a not with the later order and I'll amalgamate them and refund the postage from the second order. It's a public holiday tomorrow here in the UK so I won't be shipping anything before Wednesday so plenty of time.

Here's a quick peek at some of the new things on their way - hope you can drop by...

Lesley

Eye of the Storm - Bead Table Wednesday

A few weeks ago my BTW picture and blog post were about my preparations and processes for one of my bronze clay sessions with everything neat and organised and ready to roll. This week I'm in the middle of one of these sessions preparing for a shop update and it's a very different picture...

As you can see complete chaos is the order of the day today! Because I make so many batches of components and there are so many stages to the process I gradually become surrounded by trays of clay in various stages of completion...The batch to the left is waiting to go in the kiln, The pieces on the tray are for pre-fire finishing and the ones that have spilt over onto my side table needed repairing.

I don't know why I work like this (other than my work room being a small place) as it's not conducive to clay work...far too much potential for accidents amidst all this clutter. It's usually at this point - when I realise I'm working in that tiny little 3 square inches of space at the front of the table that I stop and reorganise a bit. So now that I've done my repairs and finishing this batch can go in the kiln and I can have a sort out...after a cup of coffee of course.

So what's on your bead table...? Check out what everyone else is up to here...

Lesley