Sweet Sunflower Smile, by Caprilicious

Hello folks, how are you? I haven't been able to keep up with my regular weekly blog posts for a while now, and I apologise for that. I've taken on extra responsibilities at the day job and am working harder than ever before - however, making jewellery brings me so much peace and joy that I try to do as much as I can, when I can. I've also begun to make more complex pieces, the making and engineering of which can be quite tricky and requires meticulous planning. I don't want to end up just stringing beads together - while that is instantly satisfying, I love a challenge - making my own beads, bead embroidery, and creating something totally different is the Caprilicious way and I intend to stick to it. When I string beads together, I want the focal piece to be something that came from my imagination, not someone elses design. This isn't always possible, of course, and I get lazy too - but I do try, I do!

Over the last couple of weeks, I've been making a hand woven sunflower - the petals are made from little Czech seed beads that surround a dark crystal centre, there are little green sepals at the back and the whole piece was finished and ready at the back end of last week. All of this week was spent watching tutorials on how to make leaves - I finally found one that suited my requirements and made a pair of Russian leaves in a stitch called diagonal peyote - learning and perfecting a new technique gives me so much joy, but equally takes a lot of time, with much muttering and swearing - all the minor irritations of the day fade away in comparison to a little leaf that just doesn't want to sit right because of a stupid error I made with the number of beads, and I have to undo the whole thing and start again.

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Sweet Sunflower Smile

I attached the sunflower to a five strand choker with tiny invisible stitches, close to the neck, just slightly off centre, and the leaves were attached to the next strand under the sunflower, so that when worn, the whole thing looks like it was made together. 

This one has been a lot of hard work, lots of new learning, and lots of fun. I hope it brings a smile to the wearer too! 

That's me for this week, folks.​ I'm going to spend the rest of the day cutting up the mangled remains of the 'failed leaves' I made and salvage the beads - those emerald green hex cut beads are so pretty, I wouldn't want to lose any more of them - some of them have already disappeared into the no-man's land that is the settee, and even more into the forever hell that is the floor, only to resurface when hubby decides to walk barefoot to bring up something from the kitchen! 

I will give it a rest for another week, I think - I have plenty to do at the day job, what with the junior doctor's strike looming tomorrow. 
Take care, and I'll be back shortly,
Until then
​xx