Monday, 21 February 2011

Handmade Monday

Ooooh this is our first go at joining in with Wendy at 1st Unique Crafts Handmade Monday.  Thank you Wendy for organising this.  You can visit her blog and also enter her blog giveaway here -  http://www.1stuniquegifts.co.uk/blog

Well it was a bit of a busy weekend, I attended a chainmaille workshop on Saturday and then a trade fair at the NEC sniffing out suppliers for most of yesterday.

I'll post a quick pic of my first ever chainmaille attempt here this evening....

.... oooh and here it is, I hope you weren't expecting too much - it's my very first attempt.  It's a basic 6 in 1 pattern.  Thank you all so much for your comments - I'm hoping to get a lot more practice in to perfect this pattern plus others before adding a chainmaille workshop to our schedule late Spring.



New New New!

We've been shopping again and had our first delivery of new beads last Friday.  Here's a few pictures of those we've uploaded onto the website already.

Large cubed agate - at 15mm these are larger than our standard agate beads and are more uniform in shape

We've also got our 10mm glass pearls and Chinese crystals in Jade/Teal green, our popular 2 holed acrylic roses in honeysuckle and due to popular demand those lovely rose toggle clasps.



All these beads have been already uploaded onto the website at http://www.beadelicious-beads.co.uk/ and we've got more to follow soon

Monday, 14 February 2011

Always the Romantic

Happy Valentines Day everyone! Here at Beadelicious we'd like to share a little Valentines love by giving away one of these gorgeous wired heart beads with every web order we receive between now and Friday.



I have to say that I had no problem leaving the house this morning as there was no pile of cards blocking my door :o)  To be honest Mr Crook and I agreed a few years back not to partake in the squished restaurants, with their Valentines set menus and expensive wine lists or with roses charged at triple the price just for the day, only to be sold off half price the next.  I know it sounds miserable, but it's not really - honest! Instead we clear the evening of any other arrangements and plan and prepare a lovely slap up meal together.  Tonight Mr Crook is making french onion soup followed by my attempt at roast duck with sweet potato rosti.  We've got a bottle of bubbly left over from Christmas in the fridge awaiting our return and we might even push the boat out and get the 'posh crockery' out.  I think Mr C may draw the line at candles though. 

I hope you all have nice plans for this evening whether that be a treat to yourself or a yummy meal with a someone nice.

Thursday, 10 February 2011

Stylish Blogger Award

Wow, I’ve only been blogging  for a month and the lovely Becky at http://ballderdashandbunting.blogspot.com/ has awarded me the Stylish Blogger Award.  Thank you so much Becky, I feel quite honoured.

I was a bit unsure of how this worked but having mooched around at other winners sites it’s straightforward and a great way for bloggers to help each other out with a little promotion .  It’s also a lovely way to while away a few spare minutes discovering and reading some lovely blogs so please take a few minutes to check out my list of award winners below.
So here’s how it works....
Step 1 – Make a post linking back to the person who gave you the award so please go and visit Becky’s blog listed above – it really is a lovely read
Step 2 - Share 7 random things about yourself
Step 3 – Award 15 recently discovered bloggers with this award
Step 4 – Contact these bloggers and tell them they’ve won the award
So here goes – 7 random facts about me

I’m a bit of a whirlwind – I can’t sit still for 5 minutes and am always writing list after list to help me remember all the things I have on the go at any one time – and I still have a brain like a sieve!  My mum says I have lists for my lists and she could be right
I don’t watch soaps – just never seem to have the time although I am a closet Archers fan as I can listen to that as I sort and count beads.  SSSHHH...  just don’t tell anyone.

I’m a homebird.   I love travel and have been to some wonderful places around the world but home will always be where my chap Mr Crook and lovely friends and family are in Sunny Nuneaton.  I just can’t get through a day without chatting and gossiping to at least one of them.

I LOVE Cadbury’s Cream Eggs.  I do sometimes wonder how many I could eat in one sitting but daren’t try it as I’m not 100% sure i’d ever be able to stop -  I just can’t get enough of them

I’m terrified of spiders.  I have been known to sleep on the sofa for 2 nights after a particularly vile specimen was lost in my bedroom during a not so careful removal operation by my dad.

Mr Crook and I have two chickens, Bluebell and Tallulah who provide us with lots of entertainment and lay us lovely big eggs for our weekend breakfasts together.

One day I am determined to own a VW Camper van – it might take a while (and quite a few more bead sales) but I am determined one day Mr Crook and I will rock up to our fave campsite down in Devon with our very own Camper

Well that’s all about me, now for the fabulous blogs I’d like to award....

Monday, 7 February 2011

Bulkington Bead Soiree

Thank you again to all those that came along to our Bead Soiree last Saturday at Bulkington Village Centre.  We had a great day and a big thank you to Mum for the lovely cup cakes she made for us to enjoy with our cuppa's.

And here's some of your lovely creations.


The two necklaces either side at the bottom are Shirley and Linda's from this months 'Wonderfully Wire Necklace' Project Idea.  If you weren't able to join us at Bulkington we'll be repeating this Project Idea at Sheepy Magna on Friday 25th February and at Nuneaton Heritage Centre on Saturday 26th February.




Friday, 4 February 2011

Funky Friday February Fun

After the success of our Dragonfly bookmark project sheet at last months Bead Soirees I thought I'd share the instructions on the blog as it's an ideal project for beginners and pretty enough for all you seasoned beaders.

What you Will Need
1 x bookmark finding
7 x hard headpins
1 x dragonfly wings
2 x 4mm bicone or oval beads
9 x 6mm bicone or oval beads
1 x 6mm round bead
4mm jump ring

I've used Swarovski crystals in the picture but you can just as easily substitute these with fire polished Czech glass beads


Take the head pin and thread onto it thread 2 x 4mm bicone beads, 2 x bicone 6mm beads, the dragonfly wings and a further 6mm round bead to create its head.

Create a simple loop at the top by bending the remainder of the headpin to a right angle then using your round nose pliers curl it back over itself into a loop in the centre
Next we make the chain to connect the dragonfly to the bookmark. Trim the 'pin head' off 6 headpins


Make a simple loop onto each of the headpins and add a 6mm bead onto each of the headpins
Make a simple loop on the other end of each headpin and before closing link them all together to create a chain
Link the dragonfly onto one end of your beaded chain and to the other open a 4mm jump ring and attach the beaded chain and the jump ring before closing it.

Thursday, 3 February 2011

Up With The Birds

Promised to get up and take Mr Crook into work this morning for 6am as it also got me up so I coud finish off some bits and bobs for tomorrows Bead Soiree at Bulkington Village Centre.  I've just finished putting together the Project Idea Sheet and we'll be making this, the Wonderfully Wired Necklace.  Come and join us from 10:00 - 14:00 at Bulkington Village Centre to have a go.

Bead Soiree Creations

A huge THANK YOU to everyone who attended our Bead Soirees at Sheepy Magna and the Heritage Centre in Nuneaton last weekend.  The lovely Helen Bowen has added some pictures to our Facebook page of jewels she has made by adapting our project sheets into these gorgeous earrings and we thought they were so good they needed a mention here on the blog too.  The project sheets are designed as a base idea to help fuel creativity and Helen has certainly taken them to the next level with these fab earrings.  Each of last weeks project sheets are all available on our website http://www.beadelicious-beads.co.uk/ under the 'Little Inspirations' page

Dragonfly earrings adpated from our Dragonfly Bookmark Project Idea

Cluster Earrings adapted from our Dotty Cluster Necklace Project Idea