Over the past 15 years, I have built my craft business (Curly Girly Crafts); specialising in teaching but also selling unique handcrafted jewellery and cards and doing craft parties for children and adults. I have sold my work in various shops and craft fairs but have taken a step back from that as several of the shops were not managed very well and I didn’t have the time to put into selling. The opportunity to have a collection at Thames Chase Forest Centre came up just at the time I had decided to put more items on my Etsy shop and try to build some awareness for what I make as well as what I teach, so now there are 2 places to buy handcrafted jewellery and gifts from me!
My ethos has always http://www.besttramadolonlinestore.com been to make as much as I can from scratch, I’m not one of these people who will take a beading class and then just make what I learnt in different colours or with slight variation where’s the originality in that? I like to make things hard for myself and therefore more unique. I make my own glass beads, I make my silver elements and I enamel my copper pieces. I also make felt from which I make items such as brooches, bags and decorations, and I paint with an iron and other heated tools to create my own cards and paintings.
If you want to take a look at my collection at Thames Chase Forest Centre – here are details of the venue.
My etsy shop: CurlyGirlyCraftsUK
Etsy shop has products!
In dramatic news….I have taken the week off and have tried to be strict with myself about getting my Etsy shop stocked up! You really don’t realise how long all the finishing products, weighing, measuring, writing descriptions, taking photos and then updating info can take but finally I have 10 handcrafted items online and will now be repeating the process http://www.honeytraveler.com/buy-deltasone/ with more items. I might take a little break to make some more glass beads first, or perhaps do a little enamelling.
Christmas is coming (14 Mondays left apparently) and I want to be at least a little organised this year for selling! Here’s the Etsy shop link by the way: CurlyGirlyCraftsUK
Summer adventures to creative adventures…
As our summer adventures draw to a close, it is time for me to start thinking about getting back into my workshop…it has been a while! I am hoping to work on my fish bead class (a student request) plus I still have several metal working tools to actually try out, to make my enamelling more unique. I’ve booked a week’s leave from the gardening project I work on to actually finish off lots of jewellery for my Etsy shop, plus I have several classes coming up in September. In other words my adventures with the children during the summer get swapped for creative adventures in my workshop during term time. If only I could do both at the same time!
Summer hols and Summer school
We’ve been so busy over the summer holidays; camping, crafting, visiting, exploring and playing that there has barely been time to craft. I have however squeezed in a few classes and now find myself preparing for this week’s summer school! Notes are printing as we speak and mandrel are drying in the workshop, is there time to squeeze in some bead sculpting before beadtime? Mmm I think it is a necessary therapy!
Flaming Flamework day
What lovely hot weather today…what lovely weather to be doing Flamework…mmm maybe not but who doesn’t love a bit of Flamework? I had a lovely day with all my students, passing on the secrets of making glass beads and despite the heat some fantastic beads were made, we melted almost as much as the glass.
This morning http://laparkan.com/buy-vardenafil/ Michelle’s birthday group joined me to make some stunning beads, mainly using blues, greens and purples.
In the afternoon Sue joined me; using her Christmas present voucher. That Teale blue was popular again, maybe it’s the sunshine making us pine for oceans of blue?
Fab work everyone!
Birthday presents!
Today I finally allowed myself to have a little time to play with some of the tools I got for my birthday. I’ve tried etching with acid, using my disc cuttern and hammering letters into metal. All great fun!
Silver clay pagan-themed!
Karen and Debbie visited me on Sunday for a Enamelling on Silver Clay class. They are both Pagans and wanted to used the jewellery session to make something really special celebrating this. They had very http://nygoodhealth.com specific design ideas. which we talked about and then tried out in play dough, finally we crafted them in silver and enamelled them. I think they both did a fantastic job.
Dates and Mini Summer school
So I have a had a busy day just doing admin, following up on craft enquiries, finalising dates with venues and organising my mini summer school. Looking forward to getting back in the studio to make! Here are the dates of the Mini Summer school and if you look on the external venue dates you’ll see more classes added here too.
M I N I S U M M E R S C H O O L 2 0 1 6
Fri 12th August – Making glass beads day
10 – 12pm -Flamework taster http://www.health-canada-pharmacy.com/amoxil.html session/recap – £35
1 – 4pm – Flamework – introduction to sculpted animals – make an owl, pig etc. £55
Essential that you’ve attended a beginners Flamework class to join this one.
Saturday 13th August – Feltmaking
10 – 3.30pm – Feltmaking day: needle, wet and an intro to nuno felting. £69
Sunday 14th August – Encaustic Art
10 – 3.30pm – Encaustic Art Day. Covering various techniques used to paint with molten wax: using irons, stylus and hot air techniques. £69
To book simply email me/facebook message and I’ll give you details.
Crafting at Firstsite
Tuesday, saw my first class being taught at the much discussed (if you live in Colchester anyway) Firstsite, a £ multi million Arts Centre for Colchester, currently featuring an Andy Warhol exhibition, amongst others. The venue is a fabulous space and just perfect for teaching. Pete, Kirstin and Rosie made some fabulous pieces from silver clay, which once fired is pure silver. We explored different ways to fire and each student worked on their own ideas for design, creating unique, fabulous pieces. Looking forward to teaching my next class at Firstsite on 21st June – Encaustic art this time!
Craft at FSC Flatford
6th- 8th May saw me teaching my first residential craft weekend at FSC Flatford Mill, during the weekend we explored the wonders of enamelling on copper – fusing glass to pre cut blanks and firing at temperatures of 750 degrees C and higher. Some wonderful items of jewellery were made.
On the second evening we looked at applying silver clay paste to a specially chosen leaf from Flatford Mill (no plants were harmed in the selection of the leaves), the paste was applied in several layers and then fired the next day once properly dry – it is a wonderfully effective way of recreating nature’s wonders into wearable art.
On the second day of the class we worked more with silver clay, creating our own moulds, applying texture, using cutters and generally just having a lovely time. Once fired the binder burns away and you are left with a pure silver pieces. Thank you Flatford Mill for the lovely food and accomodation (I had my own bathroom with clawfooted bath!) and thank you Theresa, Nina, Lorena and Valerie for being such a creative and friendly group of students. I hope to see you again at Flatford Mill next year.
