Aurorae

The Northern Lights (Aurora Borealis) must be something to behold, huh? Imagine seeing the night sky before you transformed into this beautiful mirage of colours.

I love the colour gradient here - the hues of pink/blue/purple all blending into each other. How ethereal.

What am I trying to get at, anyway? Once upon a time in Hong Kong (nooo, not a grandma story again?!), I bought a pair of teardrop earrings because the colour gradient in them reminded me of the Northern Lights. ALAS, I lost one of them. The remaining one was too pretty to go to waste, so I converted it into a pendant, and voila!

 A pretty aurorae pendant adorned with a chain of little pink, blue and purple crystals. Pardon the weird look of the necklace in this picture. I am super terrible with my photoshopping skills - can't quite photoshop a pure white background properly (I don't do any touchups to the actual necklace, just the background).

The pendant up-close. How very lovely.

This is the first ever necklace I've created! Pretty happy with the outcome, can't wait to create more. :D

Status: Not Available

Materials: Pink, Blue and Purple Round Faceted Chinese Crystals, Aurorae Teardrop Pendant

For Linda

Short post ahoy! 

That's good, since I have the tendency to ramble on incessantly anyway. 

A simple pair of earrings I made for my friend and colleague, Linda, in elegant silver and classic black:

 Tried using bead caps for the first time. Tricksy little things, they are. It's so hard to make eyepin loops when they're getting in the way. Then when they're not tight enough, the bead caps move around. Should I stick them to the pearls? Would that be overkill? Ahhh I'm such a noob. T___T

I love the jet black round faceted chinese crystal. The facets are so pronounced. Can't wait to make more stuff with 'em.

Item Code & Name: 007 Glitz

Price: RM8.00

Status: Available for remakes

Materials:  Silver Faux Pearls, Jet Black Round Faceted Chinese Crystals, Daisy Beadcaps

Good night, world! ♥

For Mummy

I absolutely adore wholesale bead shopping. Could literally spend the entire day poring through the contents of online bead shops and actual bead shops. So I kinda went nuts last weekend:

So pretty so pretty so pretty aaaaaaah! *___*

Ahem. Anyway... armed with my stash of pearls and crystals and tools and various findings, I proceeded with my very first project -- to use some of the amethyst beads from mummy's previously broken bracelet to make a new one for her! As I was mixing and matching colours, I particularly loved the way the light silver, dark gray and bright purple pearls looked together. Matched 8mm pearls with the smaller amethyst beads and voila! There you have it, easy as pie.

 It's a shame that the purple of the bracelet isn't more obvious - for some reason, the colours aren't as vibrant on camera. In reality, the amethyst beads are a murky purple, and every 3rd pearl is a brilliant, shiny purple.

If you squint, you can see my camera reflected in each pearl. Heh.

Now mummy has a classy, glamorous bracelet to go with her dinner outfits, and her beads have been put to good use. I love recycling old jewelry like that. Fun and productive. :D

Status: Not Available

Materials: Purple, Silver and Dark Gray Faux Pearl Beads, Amethyst Beads, Made with Love Charm and Heart Clasp

Snow Sprites

Woot woot we've come to the last of the jewelry that I made in The Shorea! 

I really adore this one - friend had a collection of paper flowers, and I really wanted to use them. Came up with this cute little design that almost makes the flowers look like little skirts for the "snow people" the white and mint-blue pearls are supposed to represent.

Funfact: the alternative name to these earrings was gonna be "Crossdressing Snowmen". Heehee. I'm the only one who finds myself amusing, I know. o.o

Ah I love this shot. The flowers are so pretty! Delicate, though - hopefully the paper flowers will last, for I will surely mourn when my snow sprites lose their little flower skirts.

Next up - the pearl and amethyst bracelet I made for mummy with beads I bought from my very first bead shopping experience! :D :D :D

Status: Not Available

Materials: Mint-Blue and White Faux Pearl Beads, Mint-Blue Paper Flowers

Bubbly Baubles!

My friend had a stash of these bright little baubles in assorted colours, which I fell in love with at first sight. I simply had to use them to form some sort of dangly earring, and here's the final product:

Fun fact: Under the warm lamplight in The Shorea, I initially thought that the bead on top (the green one) was pale blue. So the initial colour palette was supposed to be pinkish/purply/blue - twas quite the surprise to wake up in the morning to find that it was green instead. :p Nevertheless, I quite like the resulting colour combo, which is unconventional and quirky, much like the beads themselves.

In other news, I went bead-shopping with my Shorea retreat girlfriends on Saturday. Braved the scary roads of KL and the horrendously hot sun, and damn was it worth it. I wanted to buy everything. Obviously had to exercise a little self-control, but yay! Now I have supplies and can make and post more new stuff! These are exciting times. 

Status: Not Available

Materials: Pale Green, Pink, Fuchsia and Purple Stone Beads

Birdy

I have a love-hate relationship with birds. On one-hand, I love what they represent - freedom and flying without bounds - and I love their sweet little trills and pretty feathers. On the other hand, waaaaay too many close encounters / near encounters of the poop-falling-from-the-sky kind. Spent my trip to Alcatraz in San Fran shielding my head with a hoodie and flinching when birds flew overhead (which was ALL the time).

Note to self: You don't always have to start of these posts with random ridiculous accounts of your everyday life. Also for the umpteenth time, your subject matter probably doesn't do anything for the ~ambience of this blog. Also, what does this have to do with anything?

Yes, birds! I may avoid birds like plague in real life, but I do adore birds in print and motif and trinkets. They make for such pretty blouses and quirky t-shirts and now, earrings! Another pair made at The Shorea - this is the first pair I worked on on that fateful night.

 There's a little swirl on one side of the bird, and wings on the other, as you can see above. They're so cute! I also love the bright brilliant blue of that first round faceted chinese crystal.

Status: Not Available

Materials: Blue and Clear Faceted Chinese Crystals, Black Faux Pearls, Bird Bead.

How do people who sell jewelry on a regular basis think of cool, quirky names for all of their designs? Surely they must run out of ideas. In an awesome display of lack of creativity, I have named this creation "Birdy". Which brings me to the end of the post, and I shall end with a song by Birdy, who is an amazingly talented young singer with such a smooth, wistful tone of voice and a knack for singing lovely emo songs that tug at your heartstrings. Here she is with "The District Sleeps Alone Tonight". Apt, for this late hour.

 Good night, world.

Yuki no Hana 雪の花

Confession: I'm not a big fan of winter. It's cold and dark and everything is miserable. I do, however, love snow! And I say I love snow in the way people who live in tropical countries love snow - in that abstract, whimsical, everything is so beautiful when white way - not the "we are snowed in and have to shovel our way out of our driveway and deal with all the sludge after it melts" way.  

"Yuki no Hana" means "snow flower", which is such a pretty name, and also what I've named my favourite pair of earrings from the ones we made in The Shorea.

 I love the shiny silver snowflake charms, paired with light blue round faceted chinese crystals, silver-white chinese crystal doughnuts and swarovski crystal bicones.

I love this colour theme. Might just make an accompanying bracelet and necklace if the inspiration strikes.

Item Code & Name: 002 Yuki no Hana

Price: RM8.00

Status: Available for remakes

Materials: Sapphire Round Faceted Chinese Crystals, Clear Swarovski Bicones, Silver-Clear Chinese Crystal Doughnuts, Snowflake Charms

And now I'll end with one of my favourite Japanese songs of all time - Nakashima Mika's Yuki no Hana:

*melts*

Wisteria

Let me tell you a grandma story.

Once upon a time, when I was studying in the land down under, my housemate Esther had a knack for hand-making knick knacks. One of the things she'd like to do was make earrings, and I, much like fish are attracted to shiny things, was intrigued. Went for an earring-making class, even. Created nooby monstrosities that probably should not see the light of day. And much like a fish with short-term memory, I promptly forgot about it (though I continued to be attracted to shiny little things (dainty little trinkets, if you will)). 

Anyway (See I told you it was a grandma story).

Flash forward many years later (I weep at how many years it's been), me and a bunch of girlfriends decided to go on a relaxing weekend retreat to The Shorea, which is a middle-of-nowhere, commune-with-nature kinda resort. One of my friends, Elaine, is well-stocked in pretty beads and various charms and earring findings, and well-learned in the art of jewelry making. So we spent our night fumbling with pliers, squinting at beads in lamplight (I believe The Shorea believes in romantic ambience), dodging many a moth and wasp, creating earrings and bracelets, and it was SO MUCH FUN! (Eek I think caps do not go with the ~ambience of this blog...)

Was there a point to this story? Getting there, I promise!

I'm itching to make more things. I'm constantly looking online at pretty beads and charms. It is so deeply entrenched in my subconscious that I had a few dreams about it. So this idea was born - make some dainty little trinkets, blog about it, and hopefully some people will see them, and think them pretty enough to want to own them. Not gonna sell at high prices, just enough to fund this latest obsession wholesome hobby.

Ok verbal diarrhea over! (The word diarrhea probably also interferes with the ~ambience of this blog)

 Here I am to share my first bracelet creation, which I have pretentiously named "Wisteria".

 

 Why Wisteria, you ask? For the lone purple flower charm on this silver chain, and for the general pink-purple hues of this piece. According to ehow.com: "The flower can symbolize creative expansion and spontaneity, though it also reminds us of what happens when we leave those qualities unchecked." So that's kinda symbolic for this little adventure I'm embarking on, while also serving as a reminder not to venture so deep that I completely live in the land of swarovski bicones and czech fire polished glass beads and flower cabochons and silver filigrees aaaaaaaaahhhhhhhhh. I'm not obsessed, you're obsessed!

I especially love the "made with love" charm, though those words could also be substituted with "made with fat thumbs and clumsy fingers". Ok girl, be dainty and cute, not brash and pun-tastic, please!

That's all for now. <3

Status: Not Available

Exciting New Venture (and Adventure)!

Who knows if this will amount to anything - all I know is, now this little venture feels like an exciting little adventure, and hopefully from it will spring -

dainty

little

trinkets

that will make you as happy as making them makes me!