and the winner is....

The widget chose a random winner!

Thanks to all who entered my giveaway, I hope you all keep still reading as I like to give things away quite a lot, so there will be more giveaways coming in the future.

Stay tuned and congrats to Michelle!

a Rafflecopter giveaway

Giveaway time!

You may have noticed that my blog has a funky new design, I love it! To celebrate this momentous occasion and to get my blog going again, I am doing a giveaway.

All you need to do is follow my blog on bloglovin and tweet my giveaway, simple!

Here is what you can win, made especially for you in your size :)

My sterling silver stacking ring set worth 50 euros!

You can see more details about the rings in my shop

I will announce the winner next Friday, good luck!

a Rafflecopter giveaway

Shop update

I have added a couple of new things to my shop, my aim is to have 100 items listed and I am at 52 so er, it could take a while :)

Hope you like them.

Bloom necklace

Bloom post earrings

Tiny trios

New bench, new work..

Hello! I wanted to show you my amazing new workbench, made by amazing other half, Dom.  I have been wanting a "proper" bench forever but couldn't justify the price.  After searching, a lot, I stumbled across one made out of an Ikea kitchen island.

"I have one of those in my kitchen!" I thought.

 So that is what it became, my new jewelers bench and it is the perfect size and everything. :)

Here is the original Ikea island

And what it became, the perfect jewellery bench!

...and me working at it

Here is a new necklace I have in my shop, all sterling silver.

Finally a first look at a new brooch I made for the Brooch a Week challenge

Thanks for reading :)

EtsyMetal charm swap update

The charm swap is complete! This one was a bit delayed in finishing but the end result looks amazing.  I am still waiting to receive my charms (any day now!) and I am so looking forward to getting them and opening them one by one.

As Su from Quercus silver said
                                 "I had a very lovely peaceful half hour with some fresh coffee, Christmas music on the radio and a mince pie while I opened each one in turn. EtsyMetal charm swaps are an occasion to celebrate."

Indeed they are and I can't wait!

As I haven't received mine yet, I borrowed this photo taken by Vic from Experimetal, how cool do all the finished charms look?

I have a chain ready, I am going to put them all on and wear them as a charm necklace!
We all made extra charms, one charm will go into the EtsyMetal shop and the other will will go on a bracelet with all of the other charms and be sold with some of the proceeds going to charity.

New!

Just a quick one to show you a new pair of earrings I have made, I love them!

EtsyMetal team and a new piece

I am very happy and proud to say that I am now a member of the EtsyMetal team, if you don't know who they are they are a group of International metalsmiths from all over the world who create amazing work and have shops on Etsy.  Just put etsymetal into your search bar to find out about the Team.  You can also visit the EtsyMetal blog which is updated regularly, and also our shop on Etsy.

I also have a new piece in my shop tonight, it's the Tiny Heart necklace, perfect for everyday wear.

I hope you like it :)

Treasuries

I have had the treasury bug lately and I made 3 in one go, go me!

Here is a snippet of each one, just follow the link to see them in full :)
I hope you find something new.

Treasury #1

Treasury #2

Treasury #3, an Etsy Metal Clay treasury.

New website, new pieces

First of all I have some new items in my etsy shop which I haven't blogged about yet!

Another pierced bird necklace with some stamping and also I have riveted on some sterling silver flowers.

This next one is slightly smaller and has the silver bird riveted on to a copper background, also with some stamped leaves.

Finally some poppy post earrings in oxidized silver which match this ring.

I have also made a new website with Big Cartel, at the moment it only has a few pieces in that are made to order items but I hope to be adding to them soon.  Etsy will still be my main site though and will have contain more of my intricate pieces, here is a screen shot.

Shop Update!

Hello all

I have had a little shop update these last couple of days, it was a bank holiday Monday just gone here in France and I managed to be quite productive!

I have stepped into the realm of rings and I quite like it.
First up I made an abstract poppy ring, I actually got the image from a fried egg but thought it look like an abstract flower once I had soldered in the central ball.

Next I made this rustic floral ring, I originally made it to fit me but as I am a large ring size and I wanted to put it into my shop, I re-sized it.

I have a couple more pieces which still need to be added, stay tuned!

A cuff!

Finally something new to write about! I made my first cuff, it is copper with silver flowers riveted to it, first time I have tried riveting which is exciting, definitely more to come.  I stamped, pierced, hammered and oxidized.

This cuff also won me Cookson Golds, design of the week competition so I was doubly happy :D

I hope you like it, it is in my etsy shop as usual.

New post earrings

I have just made these sweetheart post earrings, I actually made them for myself as I wanted a black pair but I decided to polish them a little and put them in my Etsy shop instead :)

They are cute and tiny and perfect for everyday wear.

Brand New!

Well one new and one recycled!

I made this tiny little heart necklace from sterling silver and it is slightly concave and has been oxidized too. More details here.

Then there is the missing piece necklace which used to be made from fine silver but this one is now made from sterling. You can see more details here.

Four A Month- January

I joined the Four A  Month (FAM) challenge on Flickr, and here is what I made for January.  The theme was birds and branches so I made 4 pendants from copper and pierced them.  I am pretty happy the way they turned out too.

I think it is a really good challenge as it pushes me creatively and it also means I get at least 1 new listing in my Etsy shop each week :)
Now I just have to think of a theme for February and you can find these necklaces in my Etsy shop.

Making a comeback

I have decided to re-stock some of my older items that I used to have in my shop as these were some of my best selling items and people seem to love them.

First up is my paint palette necklace.

Little red heart necklace, for Valentines of course :)

The ever popular missing pieces earrings.

And this little guy

Let me know what you think!

New everyday earrings

I have been making a lot of post earrings lately, gives me a good excuse to practice my soldering too.  These are the latest pair, I call them tweed earrings.  Another pair is to come once they have posed for pictures.

A Bat Necklace

Another new necklace I have made, this one has actually been sitting around for some time but I have only just got the chance to photograph and list it.
This one is all sterling silver and the bat has a brushed satin finish.

A New Necklace

I have just finished making this new necklace.  It is a pierced copper pendant strung on sterling silver and it is now in my shop, hope you like it.

New Year's Resolutions

I thought I would make some resolutions this year and er, actually try and stick to them.  My list seems pretty big! I am obviously not satisfied about the way things are right now!

Here goes....
1. Stop biting my nails, yes this is my resolution every year.  I have bitten my nails pretty much ever since I can remember, I have never had nice nails.  I bite them to the point where they hurt and sometimes I can barely see nail, pretty gross I know. So far 3 days with no biting, go me!

2.  Lose weight & get fit, this is another resolution I make every year....so far the healthy eating is yet to start.

3.  Read 25 books, first I thought read 100 and then I thought, impossible! then 50 and even that is 1 a week so no life there.  I think 25 is a reasonable number and my sister and I decided we are going to do this one together.

4.  Say 'I Love You' more, just because it is a nice thing to do.

5.  Get another 50 sales in my Etsy Shop, well a bit far fetched but you never know....

6.  Join a challenge on Flickr, and stick to it.  I joined FAM, should be interesting.  A good way to help with achieving No.5.

7.  Blog at least 3 times a week, and get more followers in the process.

8.  Go to the dentist, I hate the dentist....a lot.

I think that is it so far, I will see at the end of the year how many I have achieved!

2011 Recap

I like to try and do a yearly recap of all that is happened, I think it is fun to look back and remember what has happened over the past year.

January

This was a pretty cool month, I turned 30 and my mum organized an amazing surprise party for it.  As we live in France she had arranged for my sister Dani and her boyfriend Mike to come over as a surprise and it was amaaaaaaazing.  Now I will be 31 in 13 days and I am not sure it will be as good as last years celebrations :)

February

In February I joined Macro Mondays on Flickr, every week there is a theme and you have to take a Macro shot using the theme.  I only did it for a couple of weeks but I would like to get into it again as it's a really good way to challenge yourself.

I was alo nominated for the stylish blogger award! ;)

March

I really started to explore working with sheet metals this month and I was practicing my saw piercing using copper.  This was when I started getting addicted to the jewellery saw!

I also found this surprised kitty!

April
April was a pretty funny month as we bought a new large cage for our 2 rats Bella and Bo.  We then decided we wanted a couple more ratties to add to the family so we went off to the pet shop.  We were only going to get 2 and then Dom decided he wanted this other big black rat so we bought her too.  2 days later she gave birth to 10 babies, it was a bit of a shock at first but we kept therm all and got the 5 boys neutered so they could all live together happily. :)

May
This month I was moving forward creatively and made more first all sterling post earrings which I had soldered all by myself!  This is something relatively new to me so I was happy I had cracked the process.

June
Busy as ever this month with the cake toppers and it was scorching weather over here in France.

July
My poor old girl Bo passed away this month, it was really sad as we went to the U.K for a week and she died while we were away.  She got a bad case of mites and unfortunately just didn't recover.  RIP Bo Bo!

August
In August we decided were going to move apartments so the search was beginning!

September
Packing! and not much else :S  We also lost another ratty, RIP little Dora :(

October
We moved to an awesome house on October 1st, much bigger than our previous tiny hole of an apartment.  I actually really hate moving as we have done it sooo many times over the last couple of years but hopefully we will be in this place for a while.

November
More house sorting, oh and we decided to get a puppy, more on that later :)

December
We had a great Christmas this year, we hosted Christmas dinner and my sister and her partner were here for the festivities! Their friends also came over on boxing day from the U.K so we all had a great week.  Topped off with and amazing and funny New Years Eve in Basel watching the fireworks.

Hope you all had a great year, heres to 2012!