The best laid

No, not eggs but plans.  The best laid plans of mice and men etc.  Well my excuse is that I'm not a mouse nor a man so I can break my own rules!!!

After Joanie's very kind gift I was prompted to put the beads away tidily.  Oh, did I say tidily?  Well I'm pretty good at tidying up but absolutely hopeless at keeping tidy so by now my bead stash was really untidy again.  This prompted another 'grand tidy up'!!!!

Having spent two afternoons (after my walk) on the floor in front of my tatting cupboard tidying up and sorting all my beads I realised that I certainly don't need anymore for a while.  Certainly not large 'feature' beads as I do have quite a few of those.  By that I mean ones like I used here and here.  I spoke firmly to BC3 and we reached an agreement that no more beads would be allowed in the house.

Well that lasted until yesterday when I went down to the open air market in town.  This week they had a charity stall and I really 'needed' to look on it 'just in case' there was anything that may be useful.  Now these charity stalls don't come round often and it's a VERY rare occasion when I find something that I can use so I thought it was safe to look.  

I found the top bracelet and was well chuffed and after buying other stuff I wandered home.  When I got back Nick reminded me I was supposed to get some meat from the 'meat man' so back I went and again was tempted back to the charity stall.  This time I found the necklace (second picture).  The third picture is of them both together.

Well now you know it wasn't safe to look AND BC3 was missing too!!!

A pair of earrings

I love earrings and I love making them to give away.  These will be off to their new owner today - IF I make it down the town, of course!!!

This is the pattern I used.  One of my favourites as it's got weight thanks to the beads and you can also play around with the beads too!!!  This time I actually stuck to the pattern!!!

Sometimes I make the side chains shorter and you can also do the same to the bottom long beaded picot too.  Lots of ideas to play with!!

Bob's yer uncle

Yawn, yawn, blah, blah!!!  I know you're bored with these beads but I'm not!!!  I know the Winsome pattern is fiddly but it doesn't worry me.  Actually I find a long necklace like this quite soothing to make.

Passes the time when I probably should be doing something less useful like concentrating on the rubbish on the telly!!!!!  So, there you have it - Bob's yer uncle - the final part of the trio.  

I suppose you want to see the set all together?  OK, here they are!

The rest of the goodies in the box.

OK, in the box from Joanie were other 'goodies' too.  I was intrigued when I first saw the needles (these are a different type of self threading needles which I've seen advertised but never found) and now I'll be able to 'test drive' them.  I ALWAYS sew in my ends as I go along and hope this will make life a lot easier.

Remember the hummingbird?  Why would I cut that up for beads when Joanie sent me all these wonderful Toho beads?  Can you see the two fans too?  I need those when I'm sitting in our 'office' as it gets rather stuffy in there.

The second picture down is bags of buttons.  I had to smile when I saw the note on the outer bag.  It says 'for Sally,if it makes it to her'!!!!  I posted it the following day so that I wouldn't lose it in the morass of this place we call home!!!

Finally the sewing kit.  I'll be taking that when I go on holiday in the future.  What a great idea.

Thank you so much, Joanie.  I'm a very happy tatter.

A box of goodies.

Now this (top picture) is what started my obsession with these solar 'inspired' toys.  When Sally and I first got into Joanie's car last year she had one EXACTLY like this on her dashboard.  That was it for me - love at first sight (please don't tell Nick!).  

Last Friday a box arrived at Chez Eborall which was full of surprises from Joanie.  I took the box into the 'office' (which is really a bedroom) to open it.  Nick was in the next room lying on the bed reading his paper.  He wondered what on earth was going on when there were hoots of laughter coming from me so I had to dash to him to show him my hula, hula girl!!!  She was the first thing I pulled out of the box and is very energetic too - tried to emulate her but failed dismally as my rather rotund belly wouldn't work properly!!!

Beneath is a hummingbird made entirely of beads.  I adore watching the hummers out of Joanie's window and this little red throated one is EXACTLY like those that visit her yard.  I had to smile at the little note on it saying that he wasn't to be demolished (I think the right terminology is 'bead extraction')!!!!!!  As IF I would do that to a hummingbird.

More box news soon - it doesn't end here!