Here I am, writing to you on Caprilicious' 10th birthday. How are you, good people? I do hope you're all well, wherever you are. I celebrated with a few of my Caprilicious ladies who were kind enough to join me in raising a glass to my journey.  I have an annual anniversary gift for you too from the 4th to the 14th of November - use the promo code HappyBirthday to gift yourself 20% off everything on the website for the birthday. Thank you for being part of the Caprilicious family, I value all of you and am honoured to be worn by you.

It's also Diwali this week and I've invited a few friends round to dinner - I always feel homesick around this time as Diwali is a massive deal in India - probably bigger than Christmas is in the Western world, if that's at all possible.
My trip to India looms on the not so far horizon - and I have started a new diet so that I won't shock my poor mother with all the weight that has crept on during lockdown.
I swear that as soon as I go on a diet, there's a malevolent spirit that makes my social life explode - people ask me out, bring me sweets, parties and 'drinks after work' opportunities go through the roof, and if all else fails, hubby brings home crusty white bread - there's nothing as droolworthy as toast made with crusty farmhouse white bread, dripping  with butter, on a cold autumn day. 

This weeks piece of jewellery is inspired by photographs of aerial views of the bulbfields in Amsterdam. I was flicking through the photographs and when I looked up I was looking straight at a Kandinsky print on my living room wall. I put the two ideas together and here's what emerged. The pendant is asymmetrically shaped with a sea sediment jasper at it's heart. Hundreds of little Miyuki beads have been sewn onto it painstakingly in glorious technicolour. The necklace is also made of seed beads - I bought this one ready made. It is mainly in shades of dark green and I decided that the pendant would have acents in that colour and that the rest would be bright and eye catchingly vibrant. 

I enjoyed making the bail in an off loom bead weave and embellishing it with colourful beads to add even more pizzazz. 

I'd best go and sort out the final touches to that meal, it won't cook itself. Have a fabulous week and I'll catch you next Friday, same time, same place,
Until then
​xx

Hello folks, how are you this week? Mike and I have been a bit swamped by problems with our cat, Wilfred. Mike found a swelling at the base of WIlfred's tail one morning and I was barraged by questions, 'what d'you think it is?' until eventually I prodded the offending area and offered the usual advice - observation and watchful waiting. I did point out that I know more about human beings than cats, and that perhaps he ought to be taken to the vet. My provisional diagnosis of an abscess turned out to be right and after a short visit to the vet, a quick incision and drainage, and us £115 out of pocket, the cat is back to his old swagger.  He was given two kinds of antibiotics - a tablet and a liquid that needs to be squirted into his mouth. We're not doing very well with those, I'm afraid. Wilfred seems to sense when we're trying to creep up on him with a tablet and makes a dash for it. When we finally catch him and stuff the medication down his throat, he sicks up in a short while. So, a fun week for everyone!

I showed you the pendant I made last week, as well as the necklace I'd begun for it. I finished the necklace and ran a strong wire through the tube to convert the necklace into a stiff torque that sits at the base of the neck. The pendant was inspired by a photograph of a meadow of alpine flowers in the Alaskan wilderness. I have contrasted strong colours with pastel ice cream shades and the tubular torque is made of green and grey beads, accented with pink. 

I enjoyed making the tubular necklace, spiral peyote stitch was a lot of fun. It can only be made when one is firing on all four pistons, as it is a rather unforgiving pattern. I tried to continue weaving beads late into the night until I found that I was spending more time unpicking all my stitches and gave up in disgust. 

The clocks will soon turn back, Diwali is next week and I have twenty people coming to dinner, and as of today there are 58 days to Christmas. I'm focusing on February when I fly back to India. My sister has already booked a mini getaway for the two of us in Goa and I can't wait. 

In the meantime, Happy Diwali to those of you who celebrate it and may there be loads of love, light and prosperity in your lives.

 That's me for now, folks. Have a wonderful week and I'll catch you next Friday, same time, same place.
Until then
​xx

Hello people, how are you today? I've been so busy this week with one thing and another that I haven't had a moment to catch my breath. And it hasn't ended yet - I'm working all weekend and am sitting in front of a computer at work, trying to catch up with you during a lull in the proceedings - hopefully not the one at the eye of a storm, but a harbinger of the rest of the next couple of days.

I've had time to make a little pendant during the evenings - I made it to go with a necklace that I have - the plan was to make a beaded bail and thread it onto the necklace. Unfortunately I made a boo-boo and the bail is too narrow to fit the end caps of the necklace - however, if I had made the bail any taller, it would have been disproportionately large and unbalanced. C'est la vie and the best laid plans, etc, etc. So now I was left with a pendant and no necklace to hang it from. What a pain in the proverbial! I decided that I was going to make a necklace myself - I've always wanted to try this stitch, and I decided that now was as good a time as any to take the plunge. Like most people, I have to push myself to leave my comfort zone and it takes circumstances to click into place for me to decide that I should get on with it. However, I didn't have the time to finish the whole necklace, so have to show you pictures of half finished work, taken with my iphone.

Last weekend, I was rummaging through my stash of beads and found a string of 'Desert Rose' beads that I had picked up a little while ago. At the time, I just needed to have them in my stash because they are so pretty and so different from anything I have ever seen. I've been wracking my brains since I bought them for a way to make something with them and I decided I would mix them up with something dark, and super shiny. Whatever I used would also have to be light, as these beads are pretty heavy. I couldn't come to a decision at the time, and the beads went into my bead box. As I couldn't find anything in my stash to match the description of what I detailed earlier, I decided to make them myself. I looked to a tutorial by Debbie Crothers, an Australian polymer clay artist and designer, who specialises in surface techniques to embellish polymer clay. She makes some really interesting 'grungy' artefacts and I love her style. The beads were made with Ultra Light polymer clay, and then coated with liquid clay and foils, with a final cure using a wallpaper stripper type heat gun.

That's me for this week, folks, have a good week, and I'll catch you next Friday, all being well, same time, same place.
Until then
​xx

Hello, how are you, lovely readers? Winter draws closer and closer - but I'm still stubbornly clinging on to my summer clothes and colourful jewellery - I refuse to get depresed by the onset of cold and damp weather. Instead I'm focusing on the celebrations that are on the calendar - Diwali, Halloween, Christmas - and then my long awaited trip to India - yes, I finally have my tickets and will spend almost all of February with my family. 

It's been a while since we've had any music on the blog - here's the lovely Eva Cassidy for you.​

I started 'Rainbow' by putting a beaded bezel around a slab of orange agate and then waiting for inspiration to come to me.
​And it literally came out of the clear blue sky! I was driving home from work after a squally rainstorm and there it was, a beautiful  rainbow arching over the M6. I came home and pulled out all the beads I could find in VIBGYOR colours and began to sew. It seems rather a large pendant, but actually isn't too big when worn - I wore it to work to try it out and it is very comfortable, especially as it is  light. It is on a simple torque necklace that sits close to the base of the throat. 

I almost forgot, Caprilicious' tenth birthday will soon be here - another celebration in the offing at the beginning of November. I never thought all those years ago that I would still be playing with beads and baubles and loving every moment of it. There will of course be a party and a giveaway - watch out for it at the end of October. 

That's me for this week, folks. Have a wonderful week, and I'll catch you next Friday, same time, same place,
Until then
​xx

Hello people, how are you doing this week? Guess what? It's almot time to start using the 'C' word again - oh, yes, as sure as eggs are eggs! 77 days to Christmas - I think I'm rather looking forward to it this year. After the last couple of years, we could use some fun and festivity.
​We went to a wedding last weekend and I wore a 'The Heat is On' - it matched the outfit I'd chosen and loads of people came up to me to say how fabulous it was, which is always nice.
It was wonderful to be out and about, meeting people, dressing up and enjoying the experience thoroughly. I'm not sure about the fascinator, though. I bought it a number of years ago for another wedding ad decided that I had to get value out of it by wearing it again.

We went to a tiny village in Essex called Ingatestone - it was as if time had stood still - the tiny railway station, only 3 stops away from London had no signage at all, we couldn't find the exit and had to ask someone how to get out of there. Of course there were no taxis, in fact there appeared to be no one in the village at all. The houses were huge and when we finally managed to phone for a taxi to come and pick us up, the driver said the average house in the village cost over two million pounds as befits a village within commuting distance of the CIty of London.

I had a couple of days off whenI got back and new goodies had arrived in the post while I was away. This pendant has 5 dragonflies aligned into a mandala shape, inlaid with tiny semi precious stones, abalone and little cubic zirconia radiating from a central turquoise. It reminded me of the kaleidoscopes we used to play with as children. I hung it on a necklace of rough cut rose quartz and amethyst separated by colourful semi precious beads to echo the colours in the pendant. Rose quartz is the stone of love, and there are many legends about how it came into existence. According to one, Cupid, the Roman god of desire and affection, was said to have bestowed rose quartz upon the Earth as a gift of love, passion, and happiness for all. 

The necklace is striking in it's simplicity and contrasts with the busy pendant. I let the beauty of the rough hewn nuggets do the talking. It was nice to design and make something simple for a change, although I have started on another embroidered pendant, which ought to be ready next week. 

That's me for now, folks. Have a wonderful week, and I'll catch you next Friday, same time, same place.
​Until then
xx

Hello folks, how goes it with you this week? I've been snowed under with work at the day job and am so glad the weekend is here as we're off to a wedding. The bride is the daughter of an old friend and it ought to be fun. Of course it won't be crazy and noisy fun like an Indian wedding usually is, but it's nice to have something to get dressed up for and wear jewellery to after ages and ages. 

I spent the week embroidering a pendant around a slice of blue agate. I imagined the core of a flame with the edges glowing in reds, orange and yellow, shooting sparks into the air as it burns fiercely. The part of the flame closest to the candle or the wood is usually blue/ white, since the temperature is usually greatest near the fuel source. The farther away from the fuel source that the flame reaches, its temperature decreases, leading to the bulk of a flame often being orange while the tip is red. Here is my interpretation.

There is a crystal embedded in the centre of the agate surrounded by 'sparks' of red bugle beads. Two layers of beaded flames shoot upwards from the central stone. The pendant is hung on a torque necklace in the interest of simplicity.

Right folks, I'm off to pack my case for the wedding. I'll tell you all about it when I get back. That's me for now, I'll catch you next Friday, same time, same place. 
Until then
​xx

Hello folks, what a fabulously warm and sunny week it has been here in Warwickshire. It almost made up for not being able to abroad on holiday - well, almost! I hope you've all had a good week too and are ready to settle down with the blog for a little read. 
We're winding up the garden, cutting back dead foliage in time for autumn and deadheading flowers, giving the lawn one last cut and soon there will be nothing left to do outdoors - well, it will be too cold to do anything even if we wanted to.

This week, I was looking for beads in my stash and found a pack of agate slices, and I knew immediately that they needed to be in my next project.  While I was thinking about a design for them I came across this pair of earrings made from polymer clay (on a blog called Polymer Clay Daily) to an abstract design, and knew that that what I was going to do with them.

The colourful bracts of bougainvillaea are so common in India that I never rated them until I moved to a temperate climate. In my mind now, bougainvillaea are firmly connected to warmth and sunshine and I crave a glimpse of their beauty. Pinks and reds are very common colours, but there are also yellow and white varieties that are equally beautiful. 

The pendant is made in bougainvillaea colours and the bail is studded with pink and red crystals. I put it on a beaded necklace that I picked up in Hong Kong a number of years ago - a lot of the colours in the pendant were matched to the necklace. I wore it to work the day after I made it and everyone loved it.

I love the Christmas Cactus - it is irresistible when in full flower, but does nothing for the rest of the year and is usually killed off by the resident pot plant murderer, aka Mike. The slice of agate has a central aperture, and I filled it with 'cactus flowers' in luminous pinks and reds, having surrounded the agate with colourful abstract bead embroidery. This one was hung on a torque necklace for the sake of simplicity - I wanted the pendant to be the focus of attention.

I hope you like these designs, folks. They certainy aren't for the faint hearted. However, if you can muster up the courage to wear one, I promise you you will stand tall, look people in the eye and be assertive with ease - it works like magic! There's a lot of research that has gone into the way women dress and how they are treated in the workplace and among their peers - and I can tell you, wearing the pendant equivalent of a power suit gets you a place at the big girls table. 

That's me for this week, people. Have a fabulous weekend and I'll catch you next Friday, same time, same place.
​ Until then
xx

Hello people, how are you all this week? September is halfway done and it will soon be autumn - just now the sun is shining and it's still warm enough to go out without a wrap. Pumpkin chai latte is apparently the drink of the season - although I imagine it's just an evocative title - bringing a waft of cinnamon, log fires, wood smoke and damp leaves to our imaginations - pumpkins actually taste of nothing - at least nothing especially nice.

I found an extremely pretty lucky charm on one of my vendors websites and thought it was too sweet to pass up and this week I put it into a simple necklace. The pendant is so busy that I felt the necklace warranted a certain degree of simplicity. Inlaid with malachite, turquoise and abalone and a number of tiny micro-pave set stones, it has protection against the evil eye at its centre and is liberally sprinkled with a sun, moon, stars, a horseshoe, Hamsa, a dove of peace, four-leaf clover, and a Kawai kitty, among others - by the law of averages, one of them should be at work at any given time and serve the wearer well.

There is now a palpable, gut wrenching need to try to inch back towards the way we were - to wear nice clothes, jewellery, go out to dinner, the theatre, anywhere where there are groups of people and have some fun, to feel alive. With this in mind, I made a pair of earrings that signify fun and nights out. They are made with antiqued silver wire and tiny faceted ruby beads with a teardrop of lapis lazuli dangling from a pair of blue studs set in silver. I made them so that the dangle can be slipped off and hung on any other pair of studs.

I would say that they looked like holly berries except they are the wrong shade of red - however, they are very pretty, though I say so myself - and I hope you'll agree.

Here's a look at the final flowers in my garden - I threw a couple of packets of seeds into the flower bed and got these poppies and Love in a Mist to cheer us up while the rest of the garden yellows and moves towards autumn. There are loads of buds, so the flowers should bloom for a while yet.

That's me for now folks, have a wonderful week and I'll catch you next Friday, same time, same place.
Until then
​xx

Hello folks, how are you doing today? I'm very excited today as I have a finished piece to show off - it was commissioned by a lady in Bangalore and I thought I should finish it early although I'm only hoping to go there in February. 
It started off with beautiful handmade glass poppy beads that came from Rostovskaya Oblast in Russia, and resin roses and evolved into a beautiful piece of jewellery that I am pretty proud of. I used the blue beads in 'Rhapsody in Blue', which you can see on the website if you follow the link. These pieces are difficult to make, because they take so long - painstakingly sewing the beads on one by one with thread that seems to have a mind of its own, doing its best to thwart me at every turn by getting itself tangled with the beads already sewn on, or knotting itself in spite of a load of beeswax being rubbed onto it. However, the result is so 'WOW!' that it's worth all the effort, in my opinion.

The lady wanted it narrower that the other one's I've made previously and I have complied with her request - I just hope she likes it. It's always an anticlimactic moment when a large piece of jewellery is finally finished and photographed - there's a slight depression and a feeling of apprehension that I may never get another idea again - a 'now what?' feeling. It usually passes after a couple of days when I spy something lurking in my stash or something arrives in the post, so I don't think I should be worried - however, bad habits are hard to break.

It has always been my mission to make beautiful objects with just a few elements. I try to use just a few expensive items in any single piece, in an effort to make jewellery that appeals to everyone who likes to wear a statement, and to keep costs low so that I can pass it on to the people who like my jewellery. I guess it's more challenging than when there is a spread of precious metal, expensive cabochons and faceted stones to pick from, but I prefer to take a couple of simple bits and bobs and create something intricate using as much skill as I can muster up and then some.
It gives me so much happiness when a piece is finished and someone actually likes it enough to pick it off my shelves. I don't tend to take on commissions unless they are for people who pick up my pieces regularly - it is a joy to create for them as I know there is pleasure on both sides of the equation.

That's me for now folks. Have a wonderful week and I'll catch you next Friday, same time, same place. 
Until then
xx

Hello people, hope all's been well with you this week. I've had a few days off from the day job and will only go to work this weekend.  As I've said before, we were meant to be in Crete, but ended up spending a few days in London instead. Fortunately for us, the weather held and although it was cloudy and noticeably cooler, it didn't rain at all. 
We went to 'Leopoldstadt', the new play by Tom Stoppard. We were required to carry proof of our vaccinations and the queues were long to get in, but once we sat down, we enjoyed it thoroughly. I don't know what it is about theatres in the UK but the seats are exceedingly uncomfortable - the floors slope forward to give people a good view of the stage, but they forgot to level the seats up, so I kept feeling that I would end up in a heap on the floor - except that there was no space between my knees and the seat in front, so I was wedged against an elderly gentlemans backside for most of the show although I kept heaving myself back into position like a sack of potatoes. In spite of this, we had a good time and enjoyed the thoughtfully written play.

I always wanted to sit in a box at the theatre, but apparently they only have a partial view of the stage, so I contented myself with getting pictures of the box seats. By the time the play was fiinshed it was late, and we went for a stroll around Leicester Square and fetched up in a Shisha bar - we thought we'd try something we hadn't done before so we went in, feeling like naughty children. In actual fact, there was nothing naughty about the Shisha (except perhaps the price, which I thought was extortionate) - we smoked vanilla flavoured tobacco, turning over the hot coals in the bowl from time to time with a pair of tongs.

People watching is our favourite pastime when we go on holiday, and we did some on this holiday as well. However, watching the girls queue up to go into bars and clubs in Leicester Square made me feel ever so ancient, not to mention overdressed!

We took the ferry from Westminster Pier to Greenwich the next day, but a large demonstration outside the Houses of Parliament slowed us down and we only got to Greenwich around 2.30 pm - that meant we had only a short while to walk around before we had to get the last boat back. We've decided to go back the next time we are in London. Here are some pictures from the ferry trip and Greenwich.

Back in the centre of London, we had DimSum in Chinatown and went to bed by 11pm which is extremely rare for the two of us, as we are generally night owls.

Once  home in Warwickshire and unpacked, I've had 4 days to do as much or as little as I would like - late nights binge-watching movies, long swims, barbecues, lie-ins every morning until the cat despaired of ever getting us out of bed to serve him his breakfast. I continued with the piece of jewellery I started last week and am pleased to say that the beading is now done. I should be able to complete it next week.

That's me for now, folks. Have a wonderful week and I'll catch you next Friday, same time, same place.
Until then
xx