DIY crochet jewellery

Last month I started selling my wrap necklace kits at Heartlands. I was pleased to find that they were very popular! 

I'm now listing them in my Etsy shop. It's a slow process as each one is different, but it means every finished necklace is unique too.

I LOVE making these kits up - it means I get to sort through my thread and bead stash - for a reason. I like that.

The kits include a mini-skein of hand-dyed cotton perle thread, assorted coordinating beads, and instructions.

Just add a 2mm or 2.5mm hook, a little time, and get a great piece of jewellery as a result!

If you're looking for a particular colourway let me know, and I'll see if I can make up a custom kit just for you.

Necklace Giveaway!

Cat's Ceramics is having a free giveaway over at her blog - the prize is your choice of one of her gorgeous unique necklaces!

Go on over and get your entry in before 25th March!

Gift for Mum

It's Mother's Day here in the UK this Sunday, which is perfect timing for me to get the clip earrings done that my Mum mentioned she would like a while ago.

I made her some clip earrings a couple of years ago; she loves them and wears them regularly. Time to increase the selection!

I bought the earring backs very reasonably from ebay - clips as she doesn't have pierced ears, gold as she wears that more than silver, and nickel-free as I'm allergic to it and don't want to cause anything like that for my Mum!

Then was the fun part - browsing through my bead stash to find the perfect combinations, and making the earrings up.

I had the jewellery presentation box from a previous ebay purchase, and cut more slots in the foam lining to accommodate all the clips. 

It didn't take long at all, and I'm really pleased with the results. I'd better get it packed up and sent off to my Mum in time for Sunday now - hope she loves her gift!

How are you celebrating Mother's Day this year?

Front Page!

It's been a while but thanks to the efforts of the CraftBritannia team one of my silk crochet necklaces made it to Etsy's UK Front Page today!

It was part of this gorgeous treasury put together by the talented Imynda - who also creates and sells the most fabulous crocheted items herself!

I'm happy to say that views and hearts have gone skywards, which is A Very Good Thing. :)

Project reveal

OK, I'll let you see the finished item from the last peek-a-boo project...

It's a beaded crochet necklace - very soft and lightweight, with fabulous summer colours.

I love it so much I'm keeping it for myself for once!

THEAjewellery giveaway

I've been browsing round a few different Etsy teams recently, and happily found a great giveaway via the Craftcult team!

THEAjewellery is giving away some fabulous beads in return for a little linkage across the web - not much to ask for!

Details can be found on her blog.

There are so many beautiful items in her shop, that I can't begin to link to them all. 

However this gorgeous casual necklace is one of my current favourites.

Take a look and see which you love!

Crocheting the galaxy

I've been hooked on crochet this week - excuse the pun!

I decided to replenish my stock of Galaxy brooches ahead of the local craft fair I'm doing at Kingsley Village next month.

These sold well at the Christmas craft fairs I did; this time I chose more summery colour schemes.

I actually made 4 but youngest daughter has claimed one already!

Grabbed by the Galaxy

I seem to have craft fair fever. I have booked a couple of craft fairs in November and turned down a couple more - trying not to overdo it leading up to Christmas!

I am quite taken with my latest Galaxy crochet beaded brooch and have been making lots of different colourways of them.

I've worked on a backing card for them which is great for online sales. The next mission is to create the perfect box for the brooches to display and package them at the craft fairs!

Been buying!

My latest purchase from Etsy arrived today. Inside the brown envelope was this tempting little silver box...

... and inside that my lovely purchase.

It's a gorgeous pair of dichroic glass stud earrings from Vos Collection which is based in Spain.

The colour of these is amazing - sparkly rich blue with glints of purple and green at certain angles.

They are my new favourite - I've been wearing them all day. Check out the other Vos Collection designs!

Crochet Necklaces

I'm almost done making my entry for the CreateCrochet team wedding challenge, which is a crochet necklace.

I was pleased to discover tonight that one of my crochet necklaces already listed in my shop - Coast - is currently feaatured in two Etsy treasuries!

Bahama Blue

I've been feeling the need to crochet some more jewellery recently. Finally I got some time with enough daylight to pick out the beads and yarn that I wanted to use.

This necklace is crocheted with some gorgeous hand-dyed crochet cotton that I bought from fellow Etsy seller Snappish - her shop is Brea-Aly Threads. 

The colour graduations from blues to purples are really lovely, and the cotton is fine enough to make a delicate but strong item.

I added several lots of beads in co-ordinating colours and I love the finished look. 

You'll have to take a look at the listing to see the two fabulous big beads by the fastener close-up!

Chugging along

The moss stitch cardi is coming along - s l o w l y.

There are around 170 stitches per row at the moment as I'm doing the back and fronts all in one. Pro - no seaming. Con - only time for about 8 rows per knitting session!

I've also been taking photos of my jewellery at every possible moment when there aren't too many clouds around. That's not today then!

I made lots of items a few months back and didn't get around to photographing them.

Here is my latest Etsy listing - a cute pair of Little Princess earrings!

Winter weddings

Tada! Here's my latest addition to my Etsy shop - and it made me very happy to make them!

Not that I'm going to a winter wedding or even know any winter brides to give them to. I just really enjoyed making them.

The Sublime Angora Merino yarn is just that - sublime to touch. I adore this stitch pattern and they are a quick knit.

I spent quite a while handsewing on the 130 glass seed beads but, strangely enough for me, I enjoyed doing that too!

I even liked staging the photographs as I had remembered that I still have my own wedding outfit pieces. I found them out, fondly looked through them, and decided to use my veil as the background. Quite romantic I think!

Alison from AMIDesigns must have been thinking along the same lines as she has just listed this beautiful bracelet too.

Gorgeous!

Boo!

I have struggled to find an inexpensive but effective way to display my crochet necklaces for a while. I purchased some bust displays from ebay only to find they are tiny and not at all useful for my long necklaces.

During my Etsy wanders, I stumbled across Boo Jewellery and her blog, where there are several very useful tutorials. One of them is a tried and tested necklace display stand template has been developed and is freely available for all to use.

I first tried it on thick mounting card and found that it didn't work (the bottom flaps to stand it up broke off as the card was too thick to be flexible). Then I read the note about not needing thick card!

This time I've used a pack of A4 240gsm silver card - 99p for 4 sheets. I enlarged the template a little to get one stand instead of two from a sheet of A4, to accommodate the length of my crochet necklaces.


Here's the result in very little time - great! I'll be using these at the Local Crafts and Gift Market I'm doing in Falmouth on Halloween.


Thanks Boo for sharing your experience and template - I can recommend it.