Happy Birthday Catriona!

Today has been a lovely day - my wee sister's 21st birthday! We stayed up late last night drinking fizz to toast the new day, and new year for her, in. Then this morning we headed off to a local fave, Indigo Yard up in Edinburgh 'new town'. (It's not very new. It's just not as old as the 'old town' where the castle is :-)). We spent the afternoon watching White Collar (an absolute favourite of us both) and beading. (Me beading, not Trina. She is NOT crafty!) Followed by an evening in The Living Room on George Street for a gorgeous set menu and some delicious, dry rose wine. Yum!

Made a bunch of earrings, as you can see...

...a bracelet...

...a sweet locket pendant...

...and a necklace. I think this is my favourite.

Look how pretty the beads I used are! Key from mamacita beadworks. House bead from a Finnish bead artist, I'm posting from my phone and can't remember the name off the top of my head, but I will update tomorrow when I'm back at home with my computer. She's amazing! I love the pretty beads I bought from her.

***Update: The artist I bought that lovely house bead from is Elukka. Here's her blog, and this is the set that I bought from her. They are even more lovely in real life!***

Hope you are all having a lovely week :-)

- Posted using BlogPress from my iPhone

More RABs...

One final set of Right Angle Bangles....perhaps! These went to their new home yesterday - they were my friend Pip's birthday present. I LOVE orange and pink...

Topaz Cuff

I've been working for a while on this cuff for my godmother, who's 60th birthday it is on Monday. Unfortunately I have a big audition in Manchester on the same day so I can't go home to join in the celebrations but this cuff will be travelling up to Edinburgh in my place over the weekend! As long as I finish it that is...I started it quite a while ago but ran out of the Swarovski margaritas I was using to shape the beadwork. Who would have thought it would be so hard to get some more in the same size and colour? I am a terrible impulse bead buyer; I hardly ever buy beads with a specific project in mind and I NEVER keep a note of where I have bought things or what their 'official' colour is. But I had thought that 10mm Swarovski margaritas wouldn't be so hard to buy again, and I knew they were light topaz ab. I scoured the internet for these beads, cursing myself for starting the cuff with them when I knew I didn't have enough to finish the piece, and just could not find a UK seller that had these!! Weird. I'm sure somebody somewhere in the UK must sell them. But I couldn't find them! So I had to get them sent from the USA. And then they took over 2 weeks to arrive before turning up this afternoon! Phew! So today I managed to complete the surface beadwork and tomorrow's job will be to attach the velcro and back it. Fingers crossed I get it finished in time for it's cross country journey on Sunday! Here's a finished cuff I did for my wee sister's birthday in the summer.

I love making these cuffs; they take a while but they are more achievable than my mammoth collar projects! Which I also love of course but they are more of a time commitment.