Hi everyone!

My lovely friend, Laura, over at Delightfully Delirious posted a handmade pay it forward for 2011 and seeing as how a) I LOVE her stuff and b) I LOVE pay it forwards, I decided to jump in on this! So, here are the rules, nabbed from Laura:

I promise to send something handmade to the first five people who comment on this post. But if you enter you must post this too, and offer something handmade to another five people that comment on your blog.

The rules are that it must be something handmade or homemade by you and it has to be sent to five other people during 2011, so we all have plenty of time :D!

If you'd like to join in the fun, then be among the first five to post a comment and something handmade or homemade will be coming your way at some point this year.

**Please only join in if you intend to pay it forward.. that's the whole point!**

Ready, set, GO!

Have a great week :)

Love,
keiara

www.bykeiara.co.uk
www.bykeiara.etsy.com
www.artfire.com/users/bykeiara

Hi everyone!!!

I just got back from spending a few weeks in Denmark for the holidays. Above is a picture of me and my wonderful boy, Stefan, out in the snow :) There was a snow storm right before we arrived so there was TONS of snow and it was absolutely gorgeous. Being a native Floridian, I'd never seen anything like it and had to run outside every so often just to look at the beautiful winter wonderland.

Here is Stefan with his mother, Anette, and niece, Caroline. Anette is extremely artistic and we had a wonderful time talking about our creative endeavours. Caroline is just about the cutest baby ever and she's so sweet and happy. She's an absolute joy!

Hi everyone!

Things around these parts have been a bit emotional and hectic. My grandmother passed away last week. It's very difficult to be so far away from home at a time like this. Interestingly, I woke up that morning feeling very out of sorts. I couldn't quite put my finger on what was wrong. I decided, as you do, to visit Canterbury Cathedral. While I was there, I wrote out a prayer for my grandmother (as well as for my sister and her unborn daughter and a friend who recently passed) which is then placed on the altar during mass the following morning. I asked that god watch over her and keep her in his arms as her health has been failing for some time now. (Some of you will remember I took an emergency trip to Florida during the spring to spend some time with her.) A few minutes after returning home, my sister called to tell me that Gramma had passed in the night. I believe it was her spirit that moved me to make the trip and I am so glad that I did it. I'm sure she'll always know how much I love her.

I felt inspired to create a series of beads in Gramma's memory. She was always very supportive of my art and always asked how the beads were going :) She would tell me how proud she was of me and she was so excited when my beads and artist profile appeared in Bead Magazine (I took a copy with me to Florida and we read it together). So I created the above series which I entitled Granlee Gardens and I am so pleased with how they turned out. I think she really would have loved them.

There are two things I do when I can't sit still with my own thoughts: make beads and bake. I've been doing lots of baking this past week! The above shot is of my Chocolate Chip Cookie Brownies from Bakerella's site. I iced mine with chocolate fudge icing and WOW are these awesome! The brownie is gorgeous and chewy while the cookie is more like a standard chocolate chip cookie. It has wonderful textures and they are so ridiculously easy to make that it's almost embarrassing!

Next up are Jelly Donut Muffins. I made these from a fantastic USA compilation cookbook that contains loads of wonderful American recipes. The downside, of course, is that it's also full of ingredients that I can't get in this country. I've been looking into importing certain things and, failing that, making some components from scratch. Did you know you can make homemade Cool Whip? Yeah, I didn't either! Anyway, back to the muffins! These were very, very tasty but not really worth the extra effort of putting the jam INSIDE the muffins, if you ask me. They bake up light and fluffy with a gorgeous, slightly crispy top. Next time I'll make the muffins and just serve them with jam, though ;)

Hi everyone! Happy Friday :) I have a new tree series to announce! On Tuesday I had a lovely student and I created a tree focal for her demo (I demo a focal for students who come for a full day lesson: kitty, cupcake or tree) that I absolutely loved. I loved it so much that I decided to create an entire series :) These are the first four in the series called Crystal Trees. From left: Alexandrite, Peridot, Aquamarine and Pale Amethyst. I love how the transparent base lets the light through and adds a bit of sunshine to the overall look. They are elegant yet sparkling with colour!

I will be offering these trees for sale in my lampwork Etsy shop and also in my lampwork website shop.

Any weekend plans? I'm looking forward to going to breakfast at a place that my in-laws have been raving about and following that with Wolfman!! Ooooh yes! I can't wait to see it :) The trailer looks quite good and, although I'm not a huge fan of Benicio del Toro (ugh), he REALLY looks the part, doesn't he? I mean, I'm totally believing that he transforms into a werewolf and causes terror and mayhem. Just look at his face! It also stars one of my all-time favourite actors, Anthony Hopkins (does anyone NOT love that man?) and Emily Blunt who is apparently quite the actress (I've not seen her in anything yet). Have you seen it? What did you think?

I'm off to do some exciting custom work. Hopefully I'll have pictures of the finished pieces to show you on Monday! Have a great weekend :)

Love,
keiara

Hi everyone! I was getting a bit excited yesterday about the snow falling. Little did I know I'd wake up to the most amazing winter wonderland! I'm a native Floridian and I didn't grow up with snow. Before I moved to England, I only witnessed snow actually falling once when I was on a school trip to New York (and, even then, it was only the teeniest bit). I've never seen snow like this before! I find it all so magical and beautiful. I squealed like a kid on Christmas when I saw how much snow had fallen during the night. Of course then I quickly grabbed my camera (and coat) and went outdoors to take a few pictures.

The dogs seem to really love the snow.. even though they can barely navigate through it! They jumped around like mad things and you could just tell they were having the time of their little lives :) It was incredibly sweet.

And here is a view of my street. The drifts came all the way up to the front door (and at the back door, you could only *just* get the door open!!) It's beautiful, fine snow and it's more like powdered sugar (icing sugar) than snow. I love it! I keep peeking out the window to see if it's still snowing.. and it is!! The only real downside is my head is absolutely killing me and I don't see how I can possibly get my Valentine's dreads installed in time :'( Ah well! I'll console myself with the blanket of white outside ;)

Have a great day!

Love,
keiara

www.bykeiara.co.uk
www.bykeiara.etsy.com

Hi guys! Thought I'd share better pictures of the new dreads :) Naomi came over last Friday and installed these new wool dreads and I LOVE them! The colour is called Fruit Coulis and it's bright pink, purple, light pink and peach all mixed together. Gotta love my silly expression too ;)

After a rather disappointing day, Steve and I went to see the new GI Joe film in Ashford. WOW! I've heard lots of negative buzz about this film but we both REALLY loved it. The action sequences were great, the special effects were awesome and the CGI was really well done. It has lots of imagination which is something usually quite lacking in action films. Plus it gives you snippets of some of the characters' histories. I wasn't hugely thrilled with some of the casting choices (except for Christopher Eccleston whom I've missed terribly since he left Doctor Who *cry*) Eccleston wasn't on screen nearly enough for my tastes! But anyway, the film was awesome and I definitely recommend it.

Off to make more beads for the show! What are you guys up to today?

Have a great day!

Love,
keiara

Hiya guys! I had a custom order for some mini ghost kitties earring pair. What do you think? I'm very pleased with how they turned out! It's soooo much harder to do the detail on these little guys but I think they look great :) I hope my lovely customer likes them!