Pipflinks!

Hello everyone!

Hmmmmmm, where have I been since the last blog post? Well, first I had flu and then I had a BIG project to design and make which kept me very quietly beading and writing for at least 4 solid weeks - I can't tell you any more about that just at the moment, but all will be revealed in about 3 months from now. In the meantime I have some other beading  news for you, in that not only has Preciosa Ornela published another new pattern from me on their website, I have also invented a new word. A pair of easy to make cufflinks using the Preciosa Pip™ beads - I give you Pipflinks!

You might remember that I made a pair of cufflinks as part of The Wedding Collection, but I went on to use those flowers in my Pipflower bracelet published by Bead & Button magazine, so I decided to turn the other double layered flower design into a pair of elegant cufflinks instead. I'm a big fan of cufflinks both for men and women and I've made lots of floral cufflinks in the past. Although they can look very smart on a man with the right sort of attire, I also think they make a lovely finishing touch to a woman's outfit. Imagine wearing quite an austere androgynous suit to the office five days a week ... as you reach across the boardroom table at the meeting, your jacket sleeve rises to reveal a flash of electric blue Pipflink! Of course if cufflinks are really not your thing, there's nothing stopping you turning these flowers into earrings, rings or whatever takes your fancy and you can download the FREE pattern here.

I hope you enjoy my latest pattern and as always, feel free to send me pictures of anything you make from this pattern or post them on my Facebook page or Preciosa's Facebook page - we'd love to see them. Another of my new Pip™ bead patterns will be published via Preciosa soon, but I'm afraid I can't guarantee you that a new word will be included as well next time!

See you next time!

Kerrie ♥

The Wedding Collection!

Hello everyone!

Back in June/July it might have seemed as though I had gone very quiet and you may have thought that I was neglecting my beads in favour of the summer sunshine - but actually I was secretly working on a beaded wedding collection for Preciosa Ornela. It's been a long time since I've been to a wedding and when I got married (20 years ago!) I didn't even bead and so I had to really dig deep when I was wondering about what to make. Rather than making random items, I knew I wanted to make a cohesive colour themed collection that would fit an imaginary wedding but I only had a limited colour palette to work with. I decided to go with traditional white for the bride and pink for the flowergirl and then mixed pink and white for the remaining items - apart from a dash of shiny black for the groom. The first person in the wedding party to be kitted out was my imaginary groom who received a pair of black and white floral cufflinks - a touch of beadwork for him, but not too much.

Next I turned my attention to the bride and as I had recently been working with Preciosa's Pip beads, I decided to use some lovely alabaster Pip beads to make her a matching Kumihimo necklace and bracelet set.

I had a few white Pip beads left over so I decided to make the bride a  pair of matching earrings and a set of three hair grips. I also made her a decorated hair comb by attaching a single Pip flower and adding some tiny seed bead leaves and a couple of sparkling crystal AB fire polished beads for a touch of understated sparkle.

I wanted the bride to glide elegantly down the aisle without being too weighed down by beadwork so I left her collection at that, hoping that the soft sheen of the white beads and the odd glimpse of silver would add to her natural glowing beauty without taking over. Next I pictured a pretty little flowergirl of perhaps 3 or 4 years old and first I made her a tiny wrist corsage with a simple pale pink Pip flower threaded onto sheer pink organza ribbon. She also has a matching hair band with three pale pink flowers which sit on top of her hair with a lovely pink bow tied at the back.

Of course being a flowergirl, our little girl needed some flowers to carry and so I created a small posy for her. In order to bring the pink and white theme together I used a mixture of pink and white seed beads for the petals, added some crystal AB fire polished beads for the stamens and some bright shiny green metallic stems. The posy is tied with the same sheer pink organza ribbon that I used for her bracelet and hair band. Can you imagine how long this single item took to make?

Next I thought about the wedding guests and I remembered that they would need a buttonhole. So I made a larger version of the flowergirl's pink and white speckled flower and added a bow and a pin to make it easy for them to attach it to their outfit.

After that I turned my attention to making items to decorate the tables for the wedding feast and of course I wanted it all to be pink and white to be in keeping with the wedding jewellery. First I decorated a plain white candle with some pale pink flowers.

Then I thought the guests might like something to take home to remind them of the beautiful pink and white wedding and so I decorated some simple white bags with pink and white seed beads, added some pale pink flowers, filled it with heart-shaped chocolates wrapped in silver foil and tied it with pink ribbon. Those chocolates are delicious by the way!

The little flowers that I had made to decorate the candle and favour bag were quick and easy to work up and so I made a few more of them, along with some tiny seed bead hearts to use as table scatters to decorate the top table.

And to round off the collection I decided to create a place card holder so that everyone would know where to sit. I made a freestanding flower with the same randomly speckled pink and white flowers that I had used for the flowergirl's posy and the guests' buttonholes and added some leaves, a long crystal stamen and a pink bow and I invited a very special guest.

So there you have it - the results of four weeks of quiet beading! Although some of these pieces are very tricky and time consuming to make, I enjoyed every minute of it and loved the opportunity to let my imagination run wild - thank you Preciosa!

See you next time!

Kerrie ♥

Fifteen Flowers ...

My recent work on a new range of floral earrings meant I needed to make much smaller flowers than normal. I find it quite a challenge to get in lots of detailed shaping and still keep the flowers dainty enough to be wearable. Last weeks bluebells were made using size 11 cylinder beads and each bluebell is only 1½cm high. This lead me to want to make not necessarily even smaller flowers but to be able to get more detail in - hence I have splashed out on some delicious new size 15 seed beads in a range of gorgeous colours. As you can see, pinks and greens are the predominant colours I have gone for and these tiny little beads look as though they will be perfect for my future experiments with all things floral. Looks like I will finally have to give in and wear those glasses I have been avoiding for months though!

On the subject of bluebells, it's expired now, but I managed to create another Etsy treasury this week 'She sells bluebells' - which of course I do! I am not comfortable including my own work in treasuries and so I searched for other artist's work with 'bluebell' in the title and look what beautiful items I came up with!

A new trend!

I've been busy busy making floral cufflinks over the last week or so. I came up with the design for these some months ago and sent them to a beading magazine to see if they would be interested in them as a project - they wanted the flowers ... but not as cufflinks! So the flowers will appear in a future publication as a charm bracelet, which I am quite happy about, but I still think that floral cufflinks are a nice idea - maybe I'm just ahead of my time ;)

So I was quite surprised on a shopping trip last weekend, to see that this season all the major stores are now carrying not only gents, but ladies shirts with cufflinks! They are lovely as they are, but to me they look a bit plain as most of the cufflinks that come with the shirts are just little cream or white enamel discs. So I thought I would become a trendsetter - I bought myself one of these shirts and made some floral cufflinks to wear with it that also match a beautiful amethyst and teal angora top I have - perfect as the weather has become decidedly cool here in the UK!

When I first started making floral cufflinks, I tried to make relatively life-like flowers, such as poppies, apple blossom and wild rose and I have sold a few pairs of these, but now I have decided to add to this range with some 'fantasy flowers' that are just beautiful rich autumnal colours with either glass pearl or freshwater pearl centres. There are currently five pairs of floral cufflinks for sale in my Etsy shop or via my website and I will be adding to these in the near future - I am also happy to take commissions for any colour.

I used to call these 'ladies cufflinks' as I also make much plainer 'gents cufflinks' (see above) but I have sold a couple of pairs of poppy cufflinks to gentlemen, so I now consider them to be unisex, although of course you have to be a pretty cool guy to wear them! Both types have a sterling silver chain and bar attached. Why not treat yourself to a pair of beaded cufflinks and be a trendsetter with me!