Vive la France!

Today is my boss/friend Kelly's birthday. Lucky girl, her husband has taken her to Paris to celebrate the occasion! How I loved Paris when I was there earlier this year, I'm sure they will both have a wonderful time.

I made a bracelet to commemorate the day and the trip for her:

I am really enjoying making charm bracelets - many thanks to Dwyn Tomlinson of Beadfx for showing me how she makes hers. This one has a birthday cake and a fleur de lis, as well as a couple of charms I made this past summer during a week long PMC class taught by Kate McKinnon in a small village called Durfort in the south of France (will post more about that adventure at a later date!) and of course, lots of red, white and blue beads to represent the French colours.

Wire Wrap Class #2

Another good wire wrapping class tonight. We made a bracelet and a ring. Not exactly my choice as far as bead selection and design, it's a little too masculine for my taste but I'm guessing it has something to do with the fact that we have a male teacher. But that's just a theory, I could be wrong! :)

One of the women in the class, Karen, made this little guy as part of her homework to practice what we learned from last week - isn't he cute? His name is Pete.

We have two weeks until the next class, I'm hoping to get a little practice time in myself between now and then. Maybe make a friend for Pete.

Wrapping with wire just seems like play to me, it's fun to just get going and see where you end up. Stay tuned for future posts - we'll see what I can come up with!

Another fun day at Beadfx

I helped my friend Stephanie (The Dixon Chick) teach a wire crochet class at Beadfx this afternoon. This is the 2nd class I've helped out with. The classes are so popular, they get a whole bunch of people signing up and Stephanie needs an extra pair of hands to be available to show people what to do. There are more classes scheduled over the next 2 months, so if you're interested in learning a really good and easy method of making a very interesting necklace, you might want to check it out.

I must also point out that the Beadfx sale ends tonight at midnight (isn't online shopping wonderful? the hours are so convenient) and as far as I'm concerned, it's just as well, since I've been to the store 4 times since the sale started and I've come away with purchases on at least 3 of the those occasions (managed to restrain myself once, but it was not easy!!).

On another note, a friend/work colleague is celebrating her birthday today, so here's wishing many happy returns to Lesia. Here's a photo of the bracelet I made for her:

A Successful Shopping Excursion

Home from the antique show and feeling quite weary but very pleased with my various purchases. Had a great time in Moffatt with Barb and Wayne, many thanks to them for taking me out to dinner last night at the Mohawk race track. Didn't win any money on the horses but had a lot of fun trying!

Saw a lot of wonderful things at the antique show. Brought a few of them home, left a few behind that I might regret but there's always next year! Here's a picture of Barb (in the red vest) perusing the offerings. I love the juxtaposition of the saddle beside the fur coat just tossed carelessly in the plastic container. I'll bet both items were greatly treasured by their original owners, who would be quite surprised to see them where they were today. Wonder if either item found a new home today?

My friend Kate says there's always a black panther at a flea market but we could only find a tiger. Every market we went to in France had owls for sale, and this one was no exception!

Flamboro Antique Show

As the warm weather begins to fade at this time of year, it means the end of the summer outdoor antique shows in Ontario. For some strange reason, people aren't so keen to wander around a field looking at antiques when there's snow on the ground - hmm, go figure! Tomorrow is the last one of the season and my friend Barb and I are headed out to look for treasures. We try to go at least once a year and usually twice, in the spring and fall. It's usually too hot in the actual summer months to spend hours walking about, but the spring and fall sessions have their drawbacks too, usually as it relates to rain and/or cold. But we've learned to dress warmly so we can stay as long as we want. We're hoping the kettle corn vendor will be there to provide us with a tasty snack to fuel us for our expedition. Since it's the last market of the year, we're also hoping to find some end-of-the-year bargains. I'm focused on finding some vintage beads that I might be able to fashion into something new. But you just never know what is going to catch your eye. You might go with an idea to look for a certain something and come home with something completely different that you didn't know you needed or wanted until you laid eyes on it. That's part of the fun of a flea market treasure hunt. :)

Hello, October!

My friend Sharon had this wonderful quote in The Psychic Cottage blog yesterday:

"There is something in October sets the gypsy blood astir,
We must rise and follow her,
When from every hill of flame,
she calls and calls each vagabond by name.” (William) Bliss Carman

Yes, it's that time of the year again. The night of the Great Pumpkin's visit approaches...

There's Lots to Learn!

One of the great things about living in a city the size of Toronto is that there are lots of opportunities to take classes about any number of things related to jewellery making and/or beading. Whether it's at weekly course at one of the local colleges (George Brown, Sheridan, OCA), a weekend class at one of the bead stores, a session at the Toronto Bead Society's techniques nights (which take place in December and April) - http://www.torontobeadsociety.org/web/index.php - or a couple of hours here and there at a trade show (such as Bead Oasis, which comes to town twice a year, or the CreativFestival - http://www.csnf.com/, which is coming up just after Thanksgiving), there is lots to learn about a variety of methods and materials and a lot of great teachers willing to show you how to do whatever it is you are interested in. The hard part is picking which class to take, there are only so many hours in a day!!

At the moment, I am taking two courses. One is a 3 week course in wire working and wrapping being offered by Beadfx and being taught by a man named Robert Burton. Here's a picture of what we did in the first class:

We put a cage around a stone and we made a pendant. Now it may not look like much judging by the finished product, but I wouldn't have been able to do it before the class and it was a lot of fun and not very hard, once you got the hang of it. Robert was very patient with all of us and happy to show us what to do as many times as we needed.

The second class I'm taking is a night school course offered by the Toronto District School Board called "Bead Crazy". My sister and I did the beginner course in the spring, so now we've graduated to the intermediate level. Our teacher's name is Katherine and she's just as excited to be teaching as we all are to be taking the class, so it's a lot of fun. Last night was the first of 10 weeks and we made a sweet little necklace out of double wrapped loops and bicone crystals:

I'm looking forward to the coming weeks, to see what we create in upcoming classes. The possibilities are endless!