Tuesday, 29 September 2009
new dreads.. and some necklaces ;)
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I had new dreads installed yesterday, YAY!! This is Sweet Dreams mixed with Lavender and I LOVE them! I was not too sure about the colours at first. I'm not a huge pastel girl (prefer brights) but I had some inspiration..
Yes, that's right.. I decided to install these dreads specifically to match my cupcake button jewellery by Collette at Noodlefish. Call me crazy, but could YOU pass up the opportunity?! I'm really in love with the new dreads though so it all turned out wonderful in the end :).jpg)
I bleached my hair out first then coloured all but the roots a nice, baby pink. I REALLY like the effect of the apricot roots with the pink hair and multi-coloured pastel dreads. SO cute! You can almost see the necklace in the pictures too. I'm wearing the cupcake button necklace and a pendant by Mel of Poor Robin too. This is the way I usually wear these two necklaces. I hide the cord of the pendant under the button necklace. I love it :)
Speaking of necklaces, these are some necklaces I made for the Avalon Faery Ball which is this Saturday, October 3. I was invited to exhibit some of my work by the lovely Leigh of Magick Minx. I will be attending the event as well so if you're there, do grab me and say hello if you see me about! I have a full day of beadmaking ahead of me so I'm gonna get to it. I have TONS of new ideas I'm dying to try!
Hope you all have a great day :)
Love,
keiara
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Tuesday, 22 September 2009
Confetti Twist Lentils on Etsy!
I've just listed these gorgeous Confetti Twist Lentils on Etsy! Hope you'll have a look..JPG)
They're quite yummy.. mmm. This is one of my favourite color combinations and I love the shape of these straight sided lentils. Add in the beautiful Rose Quartz (that's the name of the glass.. and quite apt!) spacers and it's heavenly :)
Have a great Tuesday!
Love,
keiara
www.bykeiara.co.uk
www.bykeiara.etsy.com
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Monday, 21 September 2009
keiara's keepers: Noodlefish
Hi everyone and happy Monday! I had so much fun with the cupcake giveaway this weekend. Stay tuned next month for a Halloween giveaway! OooOOoOOh! And now on to business. Beautiful button business, that is ;) The jewellery sets here are all made by the one, the only, the wonderfully talented, super sweet and fabulous Collette of Noodlefish. I love this chick. BIG time! First up is this awesomely funky black and polka dot set. I had an idea. I emailed Collette with the idea. Collette made jewellery. And all was fantastically right with the world 'cause DAMN! See what she does? She drives me to curse! My eyes nearly popped out of my head when I saw what she came up with here. I LOOOOVES it! I originally ordered just the necklace.. but can you blame me for asking for a matching bracelet? C'mon, you know you wouldn't have been able to resist either ;)
Next up is no surprise.. it's cuppycake madness! Again, I say 'cupcakes' and she creates this yummilicious treat! And have I mentioned Collette's an absolute DREAM to work with? I tell her what I have in mind, she sources the buttons, creates the layout and sends me pics. I am free to alter the design if I so choose. And, while we're talking about that, a note on the subject: anytime I want to tweak something, she does it happily.. and then I have her change it right back and she doesn't hate me forever and ever. Bonus! Anyway, so after I've chosen the final layout, she then creates the jewellery and I'm an extremely happy bunny.
Did I mention I collect her sets in holiday themes too?! For St. Patrick's Day she made me a FAB green set (which I lovelovelove) and this Halloween set is just as awesome! Again, Collette specifically sourced these jack-o-lantern buttons just for me (aww, she's the sweetest) and created this fun set. The pictures don't show exactly how awesome it is but, trust me, it is The Awesomest! While I was at it I also ordered a set for Kaia for a Halloween gift (and a cupcake set for a Christmas gift.. Kaia loves Collette's jewellery too!)Everything arrives well-packaged and in the cutest wrapping. All of the jewellery is very comfortable to wear and I get TONS of compliments on it!
So just to summarise: Noodlefish = awesome. Collette = wonderfully talented, patient girl.
Got it?
What are you waiting for? Go check her out! I'm sure you're gonna love her stuff just as much as I do!
Have a great week everyone :)
Love,
keiara
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Sunday, 20 September 2009
Cupcake Giveaway - WINNER!
The winner of the National Cupcake Week's cupcake pendant giveaway has been drawn and the winner is..
SARAH W!!
Congratulations, Sarah!
Everyone else, stay tuned for next month's giveaway.. a Halloween-inspired bead! OoOOooOOh!
Love,
keiara
Friday, 18 September 2009
Cupcake Giveaway!!
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Did you know this week is National Cupcake Week?! Well, apparently it is! In honour of this, I'm going to be giving away one of the cupcakes pictured above! If you don't create your own jewellery, I'll be happy to turn the cupcake into a pendant for you! These are my mega-sized cupcakes and stand around 22mm tall. How do you enter? Just sign up to my mailing list!Go to www.bykeiara.co.uk and you'll see the mailing list application on the left. That's it! On Sunday I will choose a winner at random. Pretty easy, huh?
Happy Friday, happy National Cupcake Week and I hope you have a great weekend!
Love,
keiara
www.bykeiara.co.uk
www.bykeiara.etsy.com
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Thursday, 17 September 2009
Confetti Twist yumminess :)
I absolutely LOVE these beads! I call them Confetti Twist and they are created on a transparent base with gorgeous pastel frit. I then heat them up and twist the center which creates the pretty swirl in the middle. I liked the beads so much that I turned them into a bracelet for myself ;)
I know I've shown the bracelet oodles of times before but, hey, I really like it! I threw the beads together, wired up one of my bunny bobble heads for the dangle and, voila, it's an Easter bracelet! Now, out of all the many (MANY) bracelets I own, this is the one that receives the most compliments. Yes, really. Something about it really intrigues people and so I decided I would experiment with this combination in a lentil shape.
And these are the result. What do you think? I think I love them even more!! I especially like the look of the pale pink spacers with the lovely frittiness (hey, NOW it's a word!) of the lentils. Is good, no? When the sun shines through the lentils they sparkle like magic. Yum!Off to raid my frit collection and see what else I can come up with! Have a great day :)
Love,
keiara
Wednesday, 16 September 2009
keiara's keepers: Joey's Dream Garden
I'll give you a minute to drink in the beauty of these bracelets. Go ahead, I'll wait...Picked your jaw up? Wiped the drool off your chin? Ok then! This gorgeous pink butterfly cuff bracelet was created by the ridiculously talented Joey of Joey's Dream Garden. Joey is currently my personal hero. I bought the pink bracelet ages ago and loved it SO much that I immediately asked Joey to custom make me a purple and black one in a similar design.
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This is the phenomenal beauty I was greeted with this morning! Oh how I wish pictures could possibly do these bracelets justice. They have so much detail, embellishments and the craftsmanship is outstanding. The purple one is actually lined with beautiful purple velvet but it simply will NOT let me photograph it.. lol. Every inch is covered in lovely stitching, beads, sequins, rhinestones, buttons.. there's SO much to look at!.jpg)
Oh and I have mentioned they're also incredibly comfy to wear?? They secure with a loop of ribbon around one of the buttons which are placed in intervals to guarantee the perfect fit. The butterfly wings are stiffened with plastic sewn inside so they stand up beautifully. The undersides of the wings are embellished too! Joey, thank you SO much! You really outdid yourself and I am so very, very happy with both of the bracelets. *SMOOCH*
Go show Joey some love, it's REALLY well-deserved!
Have a great day :)
Love,
keiara
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Monday, 14 September 2009
Queen of Procrastination
Well, I'm officially setting aside my crown. Normally I am totally the Queen of Procrastination (and cupcakes, yes!) but I'm actually get TONS done for my upcoming show. Yes, I'm going to continue to plug the show until you're sick of hearing about it. Why not turn up in person to tell me how disappointed you are in my tireless self-promotion?! Anyway, so I decided I had better make some 'grown-up beads' in addition to all my whimsical yumminess. This set is one of my absolute favourites. Rosatta Trails is made with my very favourite glass in the world (called, of all things, rosatta.. ha!) and has trails (man I'm so creative w/these names!) of silvered ivory in what I call my Pollock style (gold star if that means something to you). I'm currently frowning at my overuse of the parentheses above but I'm just gonna go with it so.. MOVING ON!.jpg)
This is Galaxy Trails and I loooove the mirror effect of the silver glass I used for the trails. It has a beautiful sheen to it with a touch of iridescence. Each set is comprised of 5 big 20mm straight-sided lentils (ooh, technical talk!) and a pair of small rounds. I have in mind that these will make fabulous bracelet and earring sets but, of course, they could be used for plenty of different jewellery projects..jpg)
And here is a group shot of some of the lentil sets to date. From left: Simply Frosted Lavender Lentil Set, Frosted Rosatta Trails Lentil Set, Simply Frosted Aqua Lentil Set, Frosted River Trails Lentil Set and Simply Frosted Rosatta Lentil Set. My naming conventions seem a tad overly descriptive, huh? Hey, at least I know exactly what they are if someone asks about them! LOL :) I could never name my beads some of the lovely, abstract things I see other people using. I wouldn't be able to remember what I'd name which set and it would just lead to mucho confusion. I'm confused enough as it is!! ;)So what did you get up to over the weekend? I had a GREAT weekend! On Saturday I had a lovely student who was an absolute pleasure to teach. The night was capped off with watching an awful B horror film starring Vinnie Jones (YUM!). Luckily I love awful B horror films so this was a good thing :) Sunday I took my dreads out (*cry*) so this week will be lots of hair washing in preparation for installing new dreads next week (I hope). Steve and I went to see District 9 which was.. interesting. It didn't quite 'do it' for me but I enjoyed elements of the film. It's definitely worth a watch. We settled in for the evening with pizza and watched the pilot for a new show called The Vampire Diaries. This looks somewhat promising! I'm always on the lookout for new, interesting television shows as I play them on my computer whilst I torch. This show appears to be a cross between Twilight and Dracula (in both mythos and general plot) with a dash of Smallville as far as the casting. I'm hoping this show won't be one of the ones that I really love.. which inevitably means a very short run :( Moonlight, Firefly, Eleventh Hour.. why must they cancel these shows?! Don't they know I LOVE them?! So sad.
Enough babbling from me. Any plans for the week? I'm off to lunch with my fellow American ex-pat friend Jen tomorrow (who has just returned from a trip to Bermuda.. cool!). Plan for the rest of the week: BEADS! Oh, by the way, what do you think of my 'grown-up beads'? Didn't think I had it in me, didja? ;)
Have a great week!
Love,
keiara
www.bykeiara.co.uk
www.bykeiara.etsy.com
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Monday, 7 September 2009
Monday kitties :)
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New bracelet kitties!! Whatcha think? I giggled the whole time I was creating these little cuties :) I've had so many requests for bracelet kitties and this is the first full set I've created. I enjoyed playing with the different looks and giving them all different coloured eyes.. heehee :) Keep an eye out for lots more of these to come!
And more Christmas beads today! I'm feeling very Christmassy and it makes me happy :) All these have already sold (can you believe it??) but I'm taking orders on more so feel free to contact me if you'd like a set or two :)How was your weekend? I had a lovely weekend. On Saturday Steve and I drove up to Margate and went to the Shell Grotto which I thought was really cool. We also drove through Ramsgate which was very pretty. Ultimately we ended up in Folkestone town centre and I bought some cupcake socks (SO cute!) for myself and Kaia, some interesting bits to create bead displays and had some lunch at a cafe. We stopped by the grocery store on the way home to grab some strawberries which we turned into homemade ice cream for Steve's dad, Kevin. Kevin and Kaia share the same birthday! I baked a big batch of pumpkin muffins (one of Kevin's favourites of mine!) and then we settled in for the evening. It was a looooooong day! Sunday we went to the in-laws' for Kevin's birthday gathering. We brought along the muffins and ice cream (and some of my homemade cream cheese frosting that they all go nuts for) and had a really nice time. Everyone was there and at the end of the day we took some great group photos.
I really love this shot (I'm so hard to spot, huh?!). In this photo is Steve's entire immediate family including parents, grandparents, siblings and nieces and nephews.. also some cousins, spouses and partners.. and, in Sonya's arms (standing up 4th from left in red) the cutest Yorkshire Terrier doggie ever.. Millie :) They have the biggest family I've ever met! There's at least another 50 or so aunts, uncles and cousins not pictured here!!! I always wanted to be part of a big family and I certainly got my wish :)
It was also Kaia's birthday yesterday so I am officially the mother of a 14 year old now! I can hardly believe it! She had a wonderful day and really loved all the gifts I sent her. I made her one of my zombie kitties and turned it into a pendant plus made matching earrings. I also sent her some kitties from theothermousie which she went crazy over! I wish I could have been there and I can't wait to see pictures from her party :) I will be sure to share them.
Hope you all have a wonderful week! I'm off to melt some glass ;)
Love,
keiara
Thursday, 3 September 2009
Christmas already?!
Yes, in the land of keiara, it's time to start making Christmas and winter beads! I love holiday beads SO much as it gives me an excuse to go overboard with the whimsical stuff ;) First up is a set from last year that I loved so much I had to make another! Christmas Friends includes a snowlady adorned with holly, Santa with his hat, Rudolph sporting his red nose, a pretty angel with a glittering goldstone halo and a snowman in a top hat! Cute! I love their little smiling faces. I really MUST make myself a set of these for a bracelet this year. I said I was going to last year but.. well.. yeah, I procrastinated until it was too late. I ended up wearing my strawberry jewellery set just because it was red!! BAD keiara :(.jpg)
Next up is Snowfamily Set. This set is super cute and has lots of designing possibilities. I'm thinking of turning it into a necklace. It would make a GREAT addition to a winter wardrobe. These two sets have inspired me to create some new Christmas/winter sets this year too. Watch this space for lots more festive cheer soon!Hope you're all having a great week. I can't believe it's nearly the weekend already! These short weeks (bank holiday on Monday in UK) really fly past. Any plans for the weekend? It's Kaia's birthday on Sunday. My baby girl is going to be 14! Can you believe it?! I certainly can't. I always thought my mother was crazy when she'd say, "It seems like only yesterday you were a baby in my arms." Now I know how she feels! It really DOES seem like it wasn't that long ago at all that Kaia was the cutest baby in all of history (hey, she was!) and decorating the kitchen with peanut butter and flour. (Yeah, that really happened.) I hope you'll join me in sending a warm birthday wish to Kaia. Ready? Close your eyes and think, 'Happy Birthday, Kaia!' Thanks! I know she appreciates it :)
Off to melt more glass.. and emit a wistful sigh every now and then. My baby's growing up!
Love,
keiara
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About Me
- by keiara - lampwork beads
- Folkestone, Kent, United Kingdom
- Hi! My name is keiara and I'm a native Floridian currently living in Folkestone, England. I am a hot glass and jewellery artist and I'm passionate about what I do! I love to 'talk shop' so feel free to contact me. Thanks for stopping by!
