So here I am in Appledore, a beautiful village in North Devon.  We are in are rented house and apart from the fact I have no torch it is perfect!  We are right on the rivers mouth and the inspiration provided by the views and the sunsets and sunrise make me long to be back on the torch.
We are hoping to be in our new house by the end of November, fingers crossed and I am planning to give a little celebratory bead party once the torch is lit!
I was however lucky enough to attend a course at my friend Manda's studio : Mango Beads in Barnstaple with Astreid Reidel.  I have admired Astrid's beads for a while and it was awesome to be able to meet her and she was very generous with her knowledge.  Here are my class beads, the shapes leave a little to be desired but I really enjoyed learning new techniques.

I am doing a sale locally at The Beaver Inn on 3rd November, It is a Wine and Shop evening Ladies only!  Should be fun and lot of different stalls to buy from.

So that is the news bead wise..........and it wouldn't be the same without showing you how Milly is enjoying her new 'rented' place!

Keeping an eye on what is happening on the beach!

Bye bye for now

Jenniex

Times They Are A Changing!

So the season is changing and as I took Milly for her walk this morning I was aware of a crispness in the air, the berries in the hedgerows and the chill behind the Autumn sun.  This time of year has become a poignant time for me since my mum lost her 5 year battle with Cancer in November 2008, I can remember the smell and feel of the season as my father and I walked around the Hospice gardens during a her last days and I can sense that in the air today.  Her death also marked the start of my journey with glass, the total absorbption that melting glass demands meant that the grieving process was softened and I felt supported by the mesmeric and wonderful effects of the glass.   So her passing created a huge change in my life and I found a new path to travel .   But other changes have followed on the heels of that as Ian and I reassessed our future at the beginning of this year.

As some of you may know we have sold our house and having lost two houses due to Grade II listed problems we have moved into a friends house in the beautiful village of Appledore, North Devon were we lived when we first met and we are renting for a while.  This change means that I lost my studio and have been unable to make beads.   We also decided earlier in the year that we would sell our shop Bazaar in order for me to focus on my glasswork and for Ian to go back full time to Stage Management a job he has been doing on a part time basis for the last couple of years and loves.  What we hadn't bargined for is that this sale would happen so quickly and it looks as if we will be completing on the sale next Monday .

So for the first time in a long long time I will be without a home of my own and without employment!!    A strange feeling indeed, Ian luckily has lots of work between now and Christmas so we will not be on the breadline!   The long term plan is to, first and foremost get a studio and we have put an offer on a house here in Appledore which has that option and we are hoping to be in before Christmas.  Once I am set up again and if all things work out, I will be doing some Christmas Sales from Appledore for anyone who would like to buy my beads or jewellery as Christmas pressies.  I also have a couple of regular customers chomping at the bit to hold Bead Parties for the festive season so I will be doing that as soon as I am able to.

So this is the final week of Raspberry Rings being in the shop and although the stock is running low there are still beads available and I will give a 10% discount to anyone who comes in and mentions that they read this blog or saw the discount mentioned on Facebook!!

Once the beads have left Bazaar I will be focusing my time on making jewellery and going back to my Wire Wrap work which is how my journey into jewellery making and beads started.  I will be posting on Facebook and blogging the results of this journey who knows I may end up with a seperate site for jewellery!!   I have been asked to become a member of the West Quay Fund Raisers here in Appledore and I will be doing a Ladies Only Wine and Shop evening on the 3rd November at The Beaver Inn in Irsha Street......All Ladies welcome!

The other unfortunate thing about our new situation is a very poor internet connection and I am currently just about linked online but do not have sufficient speed to upload piccys so you are going to have do without Milly for now I will have to get to an internet Cafe to upload new pictures.

So thank you to all of you who have supported me and Raspberry Rings over the last year and I look forward to being able to get back on the torch as my head is bursting with ideas that I want to share with you all.


Jenniex

Summer Time....I love it!!

So at last summer is here......................

Personally it has been a really busy time, we are in the process of selling our house and downsizing...... apart from my studio area which is expanding. LOL!   We are hoping to exchange in the next week or so and complete beginning of August...fingers crossed!

My sister is also on the move she is off to LA.  Her husband works for Warner Brothers and has been offered promotion and is all ready over there.   She is packing up her house here all by herself so I popped up to Oxfordshire to keep her company for a few days and as Ian and I are now legal guardians for Hannah my sisters eldest I have been to the school to listen to A Level Options and meet some of her teachers and friends.  I cannot believe what is available at school now, mind blowing.   I will be visiting LA as soon as I can and if any of you Americans out there have any suggestions of Glass Artists or Studios/Shops I should visit in California please let me know!!

I have managed to get some torch time in too and have been organising stock for a number of bead parties and fairs, the two biggest are yet to come and worth a visit if you are in the area: on the 17th July Green Man Festival in Barnstaple and then the Maritime Festival at Clovelly on the 18th July.    If you don't know Clovelly in North Devon check out the link it is a beautiful cobbled village that hasn't changed for hundreds of years.   The stalls are all pitched along the Harbour and it is (weather depending!) my favourite Festival/Fair.  

So what is new on the bead front well continuing with my 'sea theme'  I had an urge to do some fishies and here are a few of them....

Then I had a little obsession with round beads.....here are a collection some are 5mm and I have popped in Silver Rivets these are available to buy right now on my website

 

I have also added a shop to my Facebook Page and as always you can keep up to date with all the latest news by joining my Page,  just head on over there and hit the 'like' button at the top of the page.  I am 10 short of 500 Fans and once I hit the 500 I will be having another little giveaway as a thank you for all your support.

I am experimenting with some new floral and Goldstone beads which I will post in due course in the meantime here are some more of my round beads this time with 3mm Core:

and a little Ice Cream Sundae to cool you all down.................

And lastly Milly................well we have found some time to play this month and have been out kayaking and Milly came too, she has also been playing in the sea and then getting filthy in the sand and wearing her new frisbee toy as a hat?!!


Thanks for looking  JENNIEXX

Octopus, Jellyfish and Wet Lakies!!

So yet again I am writing this and wondering were the time has gone!  The winter is trying to be over here in Devon and the sun is shining once again.  I still wonder at the capacity of us UK dewellers to suddenly become open and optimistic once the sun shows her face!!

I have been inspired by the longer days and the longer walks Milly and I are having on the beach and have been producing a few sea inspired beads.  I must also at this point credit a fellow bead maker Julie Fountain at Lush Beads for a certain amount of inspiration as she wrote a lovely tutorial in a Bead Magazine recently which hugely helped my barnicles!!  Coupled with her own beautiful seaside beads you can see her work at www.lushlampwork.co.uk.

So lets start at the beginning Jellyfish, having been completely wrapped with paperweights, marbles and beads with little worlds within I bought a tutorial on Jellyfish from Etsy and had a go……here are the results!

Then came the seaside beads and the Octopus.....

then the seascape beads.....

Then a little detour and a little Owl.......how the hell did he get in here?

And I just cannot get away from those big summer wheels.....

  Life goes on and I found some time to put together a necklace with my Clio Bumpy Beads......

In amongst all of this playing I manage to set up a shop on my facebook page which has proved very popular and have sold a few item through there....thank you!  I have added a few focal beads this one of them.....

So there we are May in a nutshell!  If you would like to see more please visit my facebook page at http://facebook.com/raspberryrings

As always all of my beads are available so if you see something you cannot live without do get in touch....and so the time has come for Milly who has spent most of this month in the sea!!

New Toys to Play with.....No time to Blog!!

So yet again time has escaped me!  So much happening in the real world that the beads seem to have slipped behind.  My father got married again last week....age 71!!  My sister is moving to LA!!  We  are moving house!!  So these three events coupled with abit of ash in the sky which threatened to keep most of the family from the wedding has meant a really busy and stressful April with a greatly reduced torch time.  

April was also the month of Flame Off! one of the events for British Lampworkers hosted by Tuffnell Glass  This was a fantastic opportunity to get my hands on some lovely glass and alot of new toys!!  With demonstrations from Lavender Creek Teresa Laliberte, Diane East and Sharon Peters the whole event was really inspiring and with three very different demos and lots of glassy chat I came away full of ideas and tips for my own work.

I have still been playing with Clio, Glow in the Dark Dust and big bumpy beads.  I love bright colours  and the combination of transparent glass with Clio Double Helix glass creates some great effects.  The three beads above are a selection using those effects.  The big wheels continue to sell well and I am experimenting with putting some flowers into them instead of bumps.  This is very much work in progress as so far I am having a frustrating time trying to make them perfectly round.......

My flowers have improved so much since I discovered a Japanese tool, the 3D Flower Rod this really simple tool creates real depth too flowers...here are a few beads using the same tool.....

Talking of making things perfectly round I purchased a Marble Marver at Flame Off!  No one warned me how addictive they can be so I have spent the last week or so chasing hot balls around my bench and floor and burning little tread marks in my carpet..

These are all made with soft glass but my plan is to buy some Boro and start experimenting with hard glass once we have moved house.........Now because I can't wait I thought I would try some off mandrel pendants anyway (in soft glass) and actually I was quite pleased with the results, like the marbles they have become a hugely addictive way of playing with glass LOL!   Here are a couple of experiments.  I am loving this off mandrel work and the freedom it  brings, I would just love to have a go at paperweights I am in awe of the work of Chris Buzzini

I would just love to have a class with him.......A girl can dream can't she!!

So there we are, a short overview of April!

Milly also had her first ever haircut in April, here are the before and after shots.....seeing them together makes me realise just how much she needed that!

Flower Wheels and Pirates!

So another couple of weeks pass, and for the first time since plunging into lampworking head first I had a couple of days of complete disasters, no inspiration, bead release busting at the crucial moment and generally got very depressed and was doubting that any creativity would return.  I then decided to go back to basics and in doing so discovered flowers!!  Not encased flowers, far to stressful on my dear old hothead but raised flowers.  I love doing raised bumps and these are a variation on a theme.  I have produced a crop of them some huge flower wheels which look lovely on a silver chain or just on a leather thong.  Then some 5mm beads, larger than the traditional Pandora style bead and some 3mm.  I am planning to sit down and make some jewellery with them which I will post in due course.  I will also be posting them on my website but for the moment they all available in my shop, Bazaar, Barnstaple, North Devon.

Here is a selection for you to see:

So there we are......I am really pleased with them and they are improving in style with practice.

On a completely different note I took a day out to go to Crufts Dog Show last week and saw literally hundreds of Lakeland Terriers!!  Couldn't resist buying Milly a few bandanas and her she is in her brand new Pirate one.....posing as usual

So that is it for this week will post again once I have made up the beads into some jewellery.  Have a good week everyone xxx