I'm Arfired Up

Well I've finally taken the plunge, after months of dilly dallying, weeks of faffing around, and days of stalling I've finally got my Artfire store up and running. I found the whole exercise quite confusing and frustrating to the point of almost sending Artfire an email and begging them to please make the whole thing more baby boomer friendly, don't they know we bb's aren't tech savvy and we have trouble retaining any kind of computer info. Crumbs.....I have enough trouble with this here blog for goodness sake.

Anyway to your left you will see an Artfire logo and under that is a link to my store (I hope). I've named my humble little store Back Pocket Designs. Why that particular name? Well you might ask!

Family and friends who know me well and know how much I loathe and detest Australian Rules Football will get a kick out of this (oh I just did a pun!). Really the only bad thing about winter is football and the only good thing about summer is no football as far as I'm concerned. Anyway towards the end of last winter when I was thinking about an online store I was brainstorming with Brighita and trying to think of a name for a store, she was watching the football at the time (yes even my sweet angel has gone to the dark side) and wasn't really interested and was only half heartedly contributing to the conversation and in the background I could here the nasally, twangy commentators calling the game and I heard the phrase 'back pocket'. It's some part of the football oval, don't ask me, is there a front pocket or a side pocket as well? Who knows! Well it just had a ring to it, it flowed well and didn't sound complicated or cutesy or mamby pamby. So Back Pocket Designs came into being.

In the right hand column are photos of a couple of pieces I have in my store and if you click on the photo it will take you to the store as well (I hope). I haven't listed many pieces just yet as I'm still finding my way around, but hopefully in the coming weeks I'll list a few of my wallpaper designs as well.

So if you're bored and looking for something to do pop over to my store and browse around.

I've Drawn the Winner

....and the winner is ta da..... Jana. Decide which piece you would like Jana and email me with the details and I'll post it off ASAP.
Thanks to the other lovely ladies who posted a comment, it's always great to get feedback.

Giveaway Reminder and New Earrings

Just a reminder about my giveaway, still a few days left to post a comment.

Some new earring designs which I'm really loving. Grungeboard painted with a metallic blue, embossed and highlighted with a white metallic wax and copper findings. The beads on the end are copper with a black speckle, they don't show up very well in the photo. Possibly because my shadow was in the way.I'm keeping these. Grungeboard painted with metallic champange, embossed and highlighted with brown stazon ink. Little bicone pearls with a very slight pink tinge to them.
These are the mother of all earrings. Fun, funky, bold and dramatic. Grungeboard painted metallic black, embossed and highlighted with silver rub n buff.
I'm going to make another pair with a slightly narrower and shorter strip and try some different colour combos.
I've just been to the doctor for a blood test. One of those glucose tests where you have to drink really sweet fizzy stuff and then wait at the lab for 2 Hours and have more blood taken. I new I had to wait but I thought I could wander off to the shops and browse around and look at stuff and kill a bit of time. But no....I had to sit there for the whole 2 hours twiddling my thumbs. But after she took the last test she said I had to go home and not do anything all day......really? so I can't do laundry or vacuum or dust or do the grocery shopping, or wash the car. Noooooo! she said. Well, I'll just have to sit at my desk and play all day. Yes! she said. Whoohoo I said.

Sunday's Child

And the child that is born on the Sabbath day is bonny and blithe and good and gay.
Are you all exhaling a big sigh of relief that this is the last day? I am. Hard going posting every day.These last two necklaces are still in production. Kinda, sorta, maybe.
Just trying to tweak the closures a bit for a better and surer clasp.
You know how it goes. They look so much better than the photos.
The one below is my favourite.
Gorgeous latte coloured lacy material with a pearly sheen to it.
It will look good with this winter's colours. I've noticed lots of shades of grey in the stores.
So now for a giveaway. In honour of my mammoth week long posting I thought I'd say thanks for stopping by. But you have to work a little bit. Don't worry, I won't ask you to be a follower, but your more than welcome. I like to think people follow because they enjoy my blog and not for the lure of bright sparkly things.
Leave a comment telling me what day you were born on and if you could have dinner with one person in the world who would it be.
Winner get's to choose any piece of jewelry from any post between Monday and Saturday, (Sunday's not included as I'm still tweaking).
I'll put the names in hat next Sunday and draw out a name. (Don't think there's any need for Random.org).

Saturday's Child

Saturday's Child works hard for a living.I think most of us work hard for a living, unless we're one of the lucky ones with a job that we love passionately and live to work. I'm afraid my job is a means to an end. More beads!!!!!! Although I do enjoy my job. It's varied and no two jobs are the same and I get to work with a bunch of great ladies and meet some wonderful and interesting people from all walks of life.
Something I've learnt from my job though, is we all work hard just to buy more stuff! Too much stuff really. Some of the homes I go into, whether it's to pack or unpack are bursting at the seams with goods and chattles and they always ask (sheepishly) if this is the most we've ever seen. Mind you I'm just as guilty as everyone else. We just like possessions don't we, whether it's so many clothes they won't fit in the closet, or owning every conceivable kitchen appliance known to man, or a million little figurines that have been collected over the years or so many toys they could open a store.....don't get me started on the toy thing.

After every job I always promise myself when I get home I'm going to start culling. Be ruthless, get rid of anything that hasn't been used for two years. Set up a culling station, 3 cartons, 1 for charity, 1 for the tip, and one I'm not certain about. Streamline, pare down, cleanse.......but I just don't seem to get around to it, plus the fact I'm usually so tuckered out when I get home it takes me all my energy just to cook dinner. Maybe next week.
I'm a bit late with today's Post. The day just got away from me.
And this afternoon I was experimenting with a new design that I've saved for last. Tune in tomorrow and there may be a giveaway........just because.

Friday's Child

Friday's child is loving and giving. What a lovely day to be born.
A lot to live up to though.
Both of my children were born on a Friday. One at the very beginning of the day and one at the very end of the day and I have to say they are both very loving and giving.
Black glass beads wired together.
Lots of little charms and dark blue potato pearls all wire wrapped.
Silver base metal clasp.

Thursday Child

Thursday's child has far to go..........to work.
So she better get a hurry on or Joanie will yell at her for being late.....and she's never late, so she can't give Joanie the satisfaction of gloating all day while they're at work.

Bracelet.
Three strands of base metal silver chain.
Cloudy quartz 14mm faceted beads
Large glass faceted bead.
Silver bead and spacers.
Handmade silver clasp and jump rings.

Wednesday's Child

Wednesday's child is full of woe. When we were small and our mum used to say this poem to us, I was always glad I wasn't born on a Wednesday. Silly really, it's just a poem.Woe is me because I'm rushing off to work in 30 minutes.
So this is a very short post.
Woefully short!
Cloudy quartz.
Several beads on this that I don't know what they are......woeful.
Gun metal grey flower connectors.
Butterfly charm.
Freshwater pearls.
Two different types of silver base metal chain.
All in shades of light blue and grey.

Tuesdays's Child

Tuesday's child is full of grace.
Well she's just going to grow old gracefully.She's gracefully accepted the fact that she will never be able to buy clothes from the Myers Miss Shop, or Portmans, or Witchery, or Kookai.
She will accept the fact that she's resigned to Cameo Loretta (they have lovely cardigans!!!!!) and......gawd......Millers (at least their size 14 is an actual size 14) with grace and dignity.
At least she can jazz it up a bit with some cool jools.
Copper embossed links.
14mm Resin Shell lentils.
Not sure what the others are as they came from Bali with no description.
Copper coloured spacers.

Monday's Child

Monday's child is fair of face. It's the start of a new week and she's fairly certain she will have a productive one.
And hopeful it will be a fairly mild one weather wise.
And it's fair to say life is good.

Cloudy quartz round beads.
Silver Bali beads and spacers.
Silver base metal flower clasp.
Choker Style.

Just to be fair.......tune in for Tuesday's child.

We're Having A Heat Wave

I've been awake since 4.00 am and it's now 3.00 pm and I don't think I'm making much sense. Last night was out hottest night for 40 years. Yesterday was 37c and today is going to be 39c (just quietly, it feels about 45c at the moment) and the overnight temperature didn't go below 28.8c. I'm so sick of the heat.

So in the wee small hours of the morning because the heat had woken me up so early and I couldn't think of anything to do, I took photos. The light wasn't very good because at 4.00 am it's still dark you know, in case you were wondering, for all those people who sleep the sleep of the dead and wake refreshed at 7.00 am and ready for the day.
Antique silver connector thingys, clear faceted glass bicones and smoky brown faceted glass bicones wire wrapped and acrylic clear flowers. Matching earrings with small crackle glass beads. Don't usually make matching earrings and necklace and don't really know what possessed me to. It's the heat I tell you!!!!! It's turned me into a walking blob of boob sweat and sauteed my brain.
Anyway I quite like the necklace, it has a vintagey feel to it.
In case you hadn't realised............I dislike the heat......intensely.

Earrings Galore

Well I just did a stupid thing. Decided to try the other blog editor thingy which I didn't even know I had and all sorts of problems occurred . Every time I tried to write something it would become bold and underlined as if it was a link to something. I've had this problem for awhile but was able to overcome it by uploading my photos, saving them, going back to my dashboard then clicking edit post and everything would be alright. But even that would't work. I have a feeling this problem started when I changed from IE to Firefox quite awhile ago, so now I've gone back to IE and I still have the same problem but can overcome it by saving the photos and then going back to edit. Has anyone else encountered this problem? If so how do you correct it.

Anyway all I've been doing this week is making earrings. Lots of earrings! This is just a small sample.

I've been practising making earring wires.......

......and wire wrapping.
These are my favourites, very simple, just white coral beads and antique silver earring wires and bead caps.
Now I feel like I've got a bit of jewellry cred. Bought a bench block and have been bashing away at wire and texturing some brass washers. You can see the earrings I made with the washers on the right in the top photo.
Now I think I'll cruise on over to the blog help centre and see if someone can fix the stupid problem for me.