Short Sharp & Shiny

Well this blog has been short lived! I obviously haven't updated in a little while now, and in that time have made a website which is up here but even that I havn't updated since the day I made it. Very sad! I hope to update more and more though and change the website a lot over the next few months due to my new babies! I've got two businesses just waiting to be started: firstly there is my jewellery which will be under the name of Smooshed which I'll be still selling in Harvest Corner but also on Etsy, plus as funds become available (fingers crossed for a nice tax refund!), I'll be importing beads from overseas and selling them on ebay under the name of Speedy Beads.

With Love By Sarah will still continue as my photography side of things - I'm very honoured and excited to have won the People's Choice part of the YP Photographic Competition, and also have been invited to be part of the SALA Exhibition in Harvest Corner during August, so its all happening! I can put in a maximum number of 3 prints, so I'll be using my prize money from the photographic competition to have some prints made up of my photos and I'll be all set for SALA.

Tonight I'm cruising some free font websites, searching for something that vaguely resembles what I've had printed on my Smooshed business cards. I've found that font, but can only find a copy that costs $50 so I'm being stingy and looking for a free version :)

For any readers I might have out there, please bear with me while I go through this transition period over the next few weeks. I won't have forgotten about my blog, its just a matter of finding the time :)

Crafty Women's Group - Meeting #1

Today we had our first little crafty women's group meeting. It was a such a nice afternoon! I got so much more done that I anticipated - 8 bracelets in total. Not bad considering when the night before, I'd tried to bead a bit to at least have some orders worked out and could barely come up with anything. I think what I do is quite simple looking, but I like it :) I'm dying to get some chain so I can do sort of dangly charm style bracelets. I think I'll make more items that I can come up with names for, so my creations aren't individually named... yet.

I like this mixture of silver and pink. I'd had those beads for a little while and got them from Spotlight. Actually I'd seen my sister in law use them to make wine glass charms out of and I just loved them because they have this swirly detail on them. My favourite shape without a doubt is a star, so I love little star charms and star beads. I thought these added a little something extra to break the pattern up.

More work with the swirly beads. I love these vibrant red and blue beads so much and the clear crystal beads were a nice accompaniment.

I just got these beautiful dark red beads in the mail and was dying to use them. I think they have a kind of vintage feel about them - such a deep and lustrous colour. I think I definitely want to stock up on some more of these babies! The rhinestone spaces went perfectly with them too.

This was quite an unexpected combo and it turned out surprisingly well! I love the pastel green swirly beads (they actually have a chocolate swirl in them, but I chose more of the green ones to use this time rather than the more chocolate ones). Add them to some sparkly rhinestones, some bright green swirly beads, and teensy cats eye stars, and voila! I actually really love this and might not sell it just yet... :)

Not sure if I'll put this one up for sale, simply because I'm just not happy with it. I wanted to use the star bead as a feature, and I am quite fond of crackle beads, but I don't like the longer plain black ones. They look cheap.

I love the zebra look of this bracelet. The black and white stripey beads were newly acquired, and it was nice to use them straight away with the clear crackle beads, and the black bicones.

This is the same design as one of the bracelets above, but I used my ladybird beads. This felt great because I've had these beads for a little while and just couldn't quite match them with anything. I'm totally loving the rhinestone spacers too - will need to get a stash of those!

Another attempt at using these pretty star feature beads - teamed up with some gorgeous royal blue cloisonne beads. I'm not 100% sure of this combo, so will mull over it for a while I think. May need to buy beads that will match the cloisonnes a bit better (any excuse!).

A New Beginning

Its with some sadness that I farewell my Zephyr Photography blog. I've posted so many things on there that mean a lot to me. However, I am very excited about my new brand which gives me freedom to blog about more than just my photos. Belynda and I are looking at joining Harvest Corner and getting them to sell some prints for us, and also I'd like to finally put some jewellery in there - especially considering some of the stuff they have at the moment is a year or more old!

On Sunday we are holding our first meeting of the crafty women's club and I can't wait! It should be good fun, and it'll definitely be great to see everyone relax and be creative together.