Taking Inspiration from Nature, by Caprilicious Jewellery

Hello folks, how are you. I'm glad you've come back to the blog today, just in time for me to tell you about an exciting new piece I've been making over the last week. We are coming to the end of summer, but my muse has taken me right back to spring and cherry blossom. 
It all started with a small packet of tiny mother of pearl flower beads that so look like cherry blossom that dropped through my letterbox - they are so pretty that I couldn't risk them falling deep into my stash and never coming back out again. I had to put them into a necklace straight away, well before a disappearing act occurred.
To remind me of exactly what I was after, I had to look for images of cherry blossom - some are pictures I've taken myself, and the others are from Pinterest. 

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And then I was ready to roll - kinda! 
Starting with a sheet of Lacey's Stiff Stuff and a Vintaj Art Nouveau brass lady from my stash, I dressed a necklace form I cut out, with a length of cream crushed velvet.
'Why cream?' I hear you think. 'Won't it get soiled easily? Why would anyone want to make a piece of dirty jewellery?' 
Well, all I'd say to doubters is once the piece is encrusted with beads, there won't be space for even a single molecule of dust. The velvet is cream because I think the beads will show their true colour on a light background rather than a dark one - only time will tell if I am right.

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Day 2

Let me introduce you to the best thing since sliced bread from my tray (lid!) - the yellow cake of beeswax you can see lurking around my beadwork. I run my thread over it before I begin, and it prevents knotting and fraying - I wish I'd discovered it before, it would have saved me a lot of time and distress.

I have yet to fill in all the white space with beads, and that should take me a few days. Cherry blossom grows on bare branches, so that spared me from having to devise a way of sewing leaves in. Each flower is a modified Peking knot which is an embroidery stitch, much like a French knot. I researched this for days, because I wanted to make  five to seven beaded flowers without having to stitch each bead in separately. That would have been so tedious, given the number of flowers I needed to put in.

We went along to the Temperance Art Gallery and Cafe to see how their art exhibition was coming along, and to have dinner on one of their Italian nights. It was on a Wednesday, and they were participating in the Eat Out to Help Out Scheme.  The place has a lovely bohemian ambience - I took a few pictures for the blog. Woodland Fantasy was displayed prominently in their window!

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