The seasons do seem to make a difference!

I just wanted to share something that I discovered the other day. I was just thinking that most of the custom healing necklaces that I am making at the moment seem to be containing similar stones and colours. When I thought about this I realised it also occurred when I made a lot before Christmas. Only they were different stones and colours.

Now you are probably wondering what I am talking about as you are thinking that it is probably a fashion thing. But it isn't!!!!

You see, I choose the stones and colours for the necklaces from the questionnaires that my clients fill in about their health. Different physical and psychological issues require different stones and colours. So you see, it is very interesting! The ailments needing attention in the winter all called for darker stones, bloodstone, smoky quartz etc. Lots of orange Carnelian. My summer necklaces all seem to need lighter stones, Blue Lace Agate, Citrine, Prehnite. I am finding alot of stomache, neck and shoulder problems at the moment.

Does anyone else find this fascinating or is it just me!!!???

I have added some examples below.

Winter necklaces


Summer Necklaces

I have had quite a few people asking about my creation service at the moment so I thought I would mention it on here.

I provide my clients with a brief questionnaire where they tell me about themselves and let me know any physical or psychological issues that they would like support with.

I then research the most beneficial healing stones for them and create their required jewellery. Necklace, Bracelet, Earings, Pendant Watch etc. Sometimes clients like to add a favourite talisman or pendant of their own to the design.

The jewellery is sent to the client with a colourful silk purse for storage and a personalized information booklet with photographs and comprehensive descriptions of the stones that make up the piece.

I am proud to say that my clients always fall in love with their jewellery and I often keep in touch with them to hear how they are getting on.

Prices and ordering information can be found on my website. View my website here

Business as usual

My custom healing necklaces seem to be fairly steady at the moment. I received a lovely email from the lady who received the one I made last week saying how much she loved it, so that made me smile. I have also just received the questionnaire back from a lady who ordered one yesterday so I will be delving into the world of beautiful healing minerals later on today to choose the most suitable.

I also had a little creative spurt yesterday and have a few more things to add to my website.

For a while now I have had the components to make some hair accessories and it was my friend Avril from Sprinkles Sparkles. She had a delivery of some fabulous ribbons yesterday to make lots of hair accessories herself so don't forget to check out her blog to see her creations.

So far I have created a Hair Clip and some decorated hair grips. They are wired with Olivine Swarovski Crystals, seed beads and Unakite Chips.

Unakite is a beautiful pink and green stone that is very beneficial for the hair. It helps to
maintain growth and condition.

I also had a mess about with some antique chain and made a simple, if unusual necklace encompassing a cross that I had lying around. I have some lovely silver lockets that may benefit from a similar type of chain.

Excuses, excuses and a fantasy garden!

Yes, I know, I have been very slack in writing my posts recently. I am keeping up with website and direct orders but everything else does seem to have gone by the by at the present. There are possible things in the pipeline here and other 'life' things get in the way. But I promise to try harder and try to post more reguarly as soon as I can.

On another note, alot of people have commented on the background that I have for my twitter profile and now on here. It is a favourite of mine, the 'fantasy garden'. So I thought that I would show you the whole picture and not just the sides which is all you usually get to see.

Folksy or Misi??? Not sure now.

When I first started twittering and started my blog, I signed up for both Misi and Folksy. I only listed two items on Folksy as I decided that I preferred the look and feel of Misi so would dedicate myself to doing more on there. Weirdly though I sold one of the two items on Folksy this morning and am still to have a sale on Misi! Did I choose the wrong site perhaps? Maybe I should list more on there. What about Etsy and Artfire, are they better contenders too?

Anyones thoughts on this would be greatfully appreciated.

The sale through Folksy today was a Hematite and Swarovski Crystal Bracelet.

I have a lovely blog award from Madam Salami. Yippee!

Well, now I know its all been worth it!

The lovely Madam Salami has been kind enough to send me 'A lovely Blog Award'. Isn't that fantastic!!! I have often seen them on other blogs and have been rather jealous, but now I have one of my very own.

Here it is

Now, here is the next step for my lovely award. Rules, rules, always rules.

1. Accept the award, post it on your blog together with the name of the person who has granted the award, and his or her blog link.

2. Pass the award to 15 other blogs that love and/or have newly discovered.

3. Remember to contact the bloggers to let them know they have been chosen for this award.

4. Use the One Lovely Blog award picture from my blog, on your blog to let everyone know that you have one lovely Blog!

Well now, 15 blogs awaiting their own lovely blog award. Let me see....

Hopefully the links all work to these. Fingers crossed.
Charms of Light
Wisdom Path Art
Wyndwitch - The Electric Knit Witch
Murano Silver
My Funny Bunny Handmade
Open Mouth Insert Fork
niftyknits
Kitty Wrinkle
Beadypool
Butterfly Sparkle Designs
Fuzzy Dragons
Llamas,Cats and Crafts
Sew Scrumpious
Puddytatpurr
KS Jewellery

My word, that took ages. Enjoy folks and thanks again for my award, I am really proud of it.

Fruit in my garden

Our garden isn't large but it does have some lovely trees and plants in it. I think at some point a very keen gardener lived here and spent alot of time in it. I went a wandering with my camera and small boy and took some pictures of various fruits and flowers. Wait until you see the size of our blackberries when they come out! I've never seen such large ones!

Apples and Plums

Raspberries and Pears

Our hydrangea is exceptionally beautiful this year. It is usually all pink but this year has blue and purple flowers too.

Small boy is fascinated by all of the fruit on the trees. Our little plum tree has excelled itself this year. Two years ago it look completely dead, we trimmed it and it produced two plums. Last year it grew five. This year it has about fifty. It is only small and it is all plums. Lovely, juicy red ones. Can't wait. Our pear tree always produces hundreds of pears, we usually offer them to friends and neighbours as there are so many. The apples are lovely but get alot of bugs

July Giveaway - 3 chances this month!!

I always feel bad for the people that don't win on the giveaways so this month I am offering THREE things!

The items are these three beautiful gemstone rings. They are all different sizes so it will be pot luck as to which finger to wear them on. They also look wonderful on chains as a pendant.

They are crafted from Carnelian, Turquoise and Hematite.



Here are the properties of the gemstones:

Carnelian - SiO2+(Fe,O,OH)
In the middle ages, Carnelian was assigned a blood-staunching and anger-calming effect. The Egyptians also used it as a protective stone for the dead.
Mentally - Courage, Emotionally lifting, energizing.
Physically - works with: Organs. Stimulating the absorption of vitamins, nutrients and minerals in the small intestine. Alleviates rheumatism, arthritis and stimulates the metabolism.
Chakra - Base, Sacral.

Turquoise - CuAl6[(OH)2/PO4]4.4H2O+Fe
According to tradition, turquoise was thought to warn the wearer about the threat of danger.
Mentally - friendship, loyalty, self-realization, mood swings, inner calm, romantic love.
Physically - panic attacks, eyes, viral infections, rheumatism, stomach, cramp, pain, sore throat.
Chakra: Throat, Third Eye.

Hematite - Fe2O3+Mg,Ti+(Al,Cr,Mn,Si,H2O)
Used in Ancient Egypt and Mesopotamia as a healing stone. In the Middle Ages hematite was call ‘Bloodstone’
Mentally - Survival, will power, vitality.
Physically - works with: Circulation. Stimulates the absorption of iron in the small intestine and the formation of red blood corpuscles, improving oxygen supply to the body and stabilizing health.
Chakra: Earth, Base.

So, as usual, follow my blog, leave a comment and specify which of the rings you would like to win. This should hopefully increase your chances of winning your preferred style as the entrants will be split over the three rings. It would be appreciated if you could also link to the giveaway from your blogs. The winners will be drawn on 31st July.

Many thanks and good luck.

And the winner of my June Giveaway is........

My lovely friend Avril at Sprinkles Sparkles.

Congratulations you win the lovely Malachite and Swarovski Crystal Bracelet. Please let me have your address and the length you would prefer in case I need to alter it and I will whip it into the post for you.

Everyone else, don't get disheartened, I will start another giveaway in a day or so. Watch out for it and get your comments in.

By the way, I thought I would show off something new I made last friday. My wrists are still suffering from it, but it's so gorgeous and I'm very proud of it.

It is made using the Byzantine Chain Maille weave and consists of hundreds of tiny rings (made by myself!) all connected together. Isn't it gorgeous?!?!?!? When my wrists recover I am going to make some lovely therapeutic copper ones, although this one is silver plated copper so is still really good for you. :-)

I don't often blow my own trumpet but I was very proud of this!

Craft Corner - neat at last!

I'm exhausted, and very achy but it was worth it!!!! My little corner is now organised.

My workstation exists in a corner of my kitchen, this is partly because it enables me to make jewellery while I make dinner and also because the four of us live in a very small bungalow. It is rather cluttered too, a fact that annoys lovely husband a great deal. Luckily we don't have too many outbursts about it, I think because he has had to put up with me for a long time now. If he lived alone he would probably have a bed, a reclining chair, a very large tv and his playstation! Whereas I have a bit of a problem throwing things away (I may need it, you never know!). It actually does annoy me but by then it is a huge problem to sort out so just gets left a bit longer!


Anyway, I have been struggling on in a disorganised manner with my desk being used as a dumping ground by everyone. I couldn't concentrate and my books kept falling over so I woke up yesterday and decided to do something about it. After dropping the bigger one at school, small boy and I went over to our local Argos and collected two small shelving units. On our return we then set about putting them together. This wasn't going too well until I braved the shed and went through lovely husbands tool box (shhhh!) There I found a ratchet screwdriver, what a wonderful thing, now I know his secret to fast flatpack building! Small boy was a great help, a little on the bossy side but he did well. We soon had both shelving units together.


Then came the part that always seems to happen. I began to clear my desk top and drawers so that I could place the new shelves on top and get organized. Where did all of this stuff come from, it kept piling up, falling over, piling up some more. That's when I hit the 'wish I hadn't started this' point! Even small boy had deserted me and gone off to watch tv in the lounge. But I soldiered on and finally managed to get everything put back and sorted. It looked fantastic!! I was so pleased. I sent a picture message to lovely husband to show him my handiwork. He sent a text reply saying ' looks nice!' 'NICE' He now regrets that remark!! He did admit on his return home that the pictures really don't do it justice and it is as wonderful as I first thought. Wonderful man.

So now, I have a lovely area which hopefully won't get cluttered again. An aching back and aching wrists and am exhausted from a terrible nights sleep but it was worth it.

Here is my corner.

What do you think?

Peanut Butter Cake and a Har Hoo!!

Fathers Day seemed to go off without a hitch yesterday, the boys even fell asleep so that lovely husband could watch the Grand Prix. I seemed to spend most of the day cooking and washing up. By mid afternoon I realised that there wasn't a desert!! This would not do so decided to whip up some kind of cake. Now this was always going to be somewhat of a disaster as the electric oven in this house seems incapable of cooking a decent cake!!! I previously had a gas oven that made my cakes come out huge but not this one!! Alas, they are all somewhat flat and alot don't rise at all. But this did not deter me and the cake was made. Lovely husband wanted a bit of flavour so I decided to experiment and added a few large desert spoons of Peanut Butter to the mixture. It came out surpringly well, a little flat but not bad. I did overdo the buttercream though, with hindsight I would have left the top plain.

On Saturday, I also made another toy for small boy. He appears to have become quite fond of one of the Har Hoos from his favourite program, In the Night Garden. They seem to be large balloon like creatures that don't actually do anything but he liked one in particular. All seemed to be going well until I lost concentration and attached some of the petal like things the wrong way round. Lovely husband said he wouldn't notice but he did!!! Straight away. Not doing well am I, a tractor that should have had moveable wheels and a har hoo with the colours the wrong way round. Will I never learn!!!!