A busy November...

OK, how did it get so busy all of a sudden. There I was, in post-holiday glow, enjoying slowly getting back in to things and then BAM all of a sudden I have so much on, bespoke orders and pieces to rejuvinate into something else and am surrounded by gems, pearls and all things gorgeous. (Of course, I cope admirably with being surrounded by all the pretties!)

I haven't forgotten about the Italian diaries - I just haven't had time to refine them, but I'll get there eventually :)

The show at Muswellbrook was great fun. It was a manageable drive over there (even if we got home after midnight) there were many other stall holders with different items and the organisers were lovely. A few ladies were thrilled with some new jewels for summer and I think I will be warmly welcomed back in that district.

The "Balabudgee" garden weekend was extraordinary - sublime weather, a garden that all at once made me feel inspired and depressed (inspired because it looks achievable... and depressed because I just know that I won't do it!!), and such genial hosts. It was busy with people both days and lots of lovely ladies got to take home quite a bit of new jewellery with them!

I had planned to attend TAS last weekend (The Armidale School's Spring Fair) but unfortunately one of my girls came down with high temps and a headache the evening before and it just wasn't possible to leave her with someone else the next day when she felt like that. Hubby was off at the NSW Aerobatic Championships in Temora so couldn't be on dad duty. But that's what happens I guess. On a high note, hearty congratulations to my hubby who is now the NSW Aerobatic Champion! Woohoo :D

I have a busy show schedule for November - the Dunedoo Central School is holding its ladies shopping night on Friday, 11 November from 5-8pm. Enquiries to the school. The Tamworth Christmas Fair is on Saturday, 19th November at Tamworth Racecourse from 9.30am-4pm and then I have my annual summer show in Coolah on the 25th November.

The last couple of years I have held my show at the local dance studio, but have been offered to hold it the air-conditioned comfort of Noni B's Giftware this year - given the heat we've experienced in past years, I'm looking forward to a comfortable temperature this year! I will have a special preview the day before (24th November) for clients and will be sending invitations out to people in the Coolah area - if you're outside the district and would like to come, do let me know and I will pop off an invite to you!

I am trying to get to the website this week to update with some new stock - a few technical things are holding me back that will hopefully be resolved soon!

Today's photo is of a stunning pair of amethyst and mixed gemstone (blue topaz, pink topaz and peridot) earrings.

Till next :)
Annette

A trip to Norfolk Falls

The twin's birthday has been and gone. Reaching the momentous age of 10, they're now into double digits and asking for things like having their ears pierced! For this landmark birthday they wanted to go somewhere and do something that they had never done before.

Hubby came up with the idea of going to our local national park - Coolah Tops - specifically to Norfolk Falls. The girls were thrilled with the idea of seeing a waterfall in real life and bounced around for days in a state of excitement.

The day dawned clear and bright and we ventured down the road then up the hill, and continued up and up... and up. We arrived at the parking/rest area and while hubby proceeded to light the barbie (bbq), I headed off to the top of the Falls with the kids.



It was only about a 600m but that distance included 500 stairs! Of course, going down wasn't too hard :) We took off our shoes and paddled in the shallow stream that a few scant feet away fell 120 metres straight down!



This direction looks safer!



Eventually we had to haul ourselves away and climbed up those 500 stairs whereupon I gratefully sank onto a picnic bench!

After lunch we ALL ventured forth again, down the 500 stairs, had another paddle in the stream and then went cross-country down a very steep hill to the base of the waterfall.

Although we live on a farm, the countryside is really very gentle and we only have a few small rocks worthy of clambering over in a couple of distant paddocks. I wondered how the children would take such a challenging walk but they loved it. They scrambled down the slope, following what appeared to be bits of trails now and again, climbing over fallen trees, past small orchid like wildflowers and using clumps of native grass as handholds.

The waterfall was magnificent and the pool at the base of the waterfall looked inviting. There was a constant cool flow of air (from the falling water) but we were still ready for a quick swim. There were some shallowly submerged sharp rocks making it a bit tricky to negotiate, but we managed and boy, was that water COLD!



Can you see hubby and one daughter here close to the spray from the falls?



The walk back up that slope might have only taken 20 minutes but I can honestly say I felt like falling down when we reached the top. My legs were shaking and my breathing was more like gasping for oxygen. Of course I'm totally out of condition - too much sitting down creating jewellery last year methinks! Another paddle in the creek and then up the 500 stairs... again!

Needless to say, I hardly moved the next day as my body recovered. A few days of normality and then yesterday, we picked up Meri's new kitten. Isn't he cute!? He'll be keeping us on our toes for a few days yet, I'm sure :D



Till next :)
Annette

Getting into the Christmas Spirit!

Well, it's here. December! No ignoring it now - I'm getting into the Christmas spirit! No, the tree isn't up, and no the letter to friends and cards haven't been written, nor is the shopping finished. But it's been hard to resist the Christmas music, tinsel and glitter, red dresses and imagining fun filled parties and gifts.

If you want to get into the spirit of the season too, do pop over to this picture post on Bush Belles - and have your sound up so you can look at the wonderful pictures along with perfect music. It's so uplifting - guaranteed to make you smile!

Working with the red Christmas theme, I spent quite a bit of time yesterday photographing - trying out different sets, angles and jewels for a December front page photo for my site. I'm really happy with the shot I eventually chose - what do you think?



And then I made a bright red necklace (top) - I've had so much interest in red bamboo coral the last few months that I keep selling out of them, so thought I'd better have one to hand - this one is bamboo coral and sterling silver.

My open day last Friday in Coolah was fantastic and there are going to be lots of little white boxes with violet ribbons under the trees around here this year!

Since the weekend though, all it has done has rained. Has it been raining where you are? We've had well over 7 inches so far and today the sun is struggling to put in appearance. The highway has been cut by floodwaters in numerous places although we can still make it into our local town (much to the children's disappointment since they've still had to go to school)!

We had temporary waterfalls as the water ran down the hill and over the top of the retaining wall near the pool - the ag drains just couldn't cope with the quantity of water that fell in a storm that lasted about an hour.

Our dam is so full it is overflowing and the road near the gate is a few inches under water with water streaming out our front gate. Our sandy drive has washed away and left rocks in its place and I'm positive the cattle are happy the farm is on high ground!

I was planning on attending the Mudgee Art Vine Christmas Art Fair this Saturday - hopefully the flooding will subside so I can actually make it in there!

Till next :)
Annette

Jewellery news dominated by diamonds ... and an engagement ring!

And the last week of November rolls around.... *sigh*. At least I've started my christmas shopping. All this week's efforts have been online purchases - such a great way to do it ... and no sore feet ;)!

I had a wonderful time at last weekend's Christmas Fair in Tamworth. It was such a great group of exhibitors too - there was a lovely vibe to the whole day! Many customers sought me out from last year's event - I just love to hear how their enjoying their previous purchases.

I have my open day in Coolah this Friday and then next week my last show for the year in Mudgee at the Art Vine Artisans Christmas Market. I'm looking forward to a bit of a break from shows, but there will be plenty to keep me busy after that on the family front!

There have been a few things happening in the jewellery world the past week.

We have the world's most expensive pink diamond: The extremely rare 24.78 carat flawless pink diamond smashed the price record for most expensive diamond (and piece of jewelry) sold at auction (Sotheby's), where Laurence Graff paid the princely sum of $46.16 million and has already named it The Graff Pink. (He already owns the diamond with the previous title of most expensive diamond sold at auction, for which he paid $24.3 million - and all this from a lad who came from the streets of London and left school at age 14!)

Speaking of princes: Prince William announced he would marry his long term girlfriend Kate Middleton next summer. In a touching gesture, her engagement ring is the sapphire and diamond ring that Princess Diana wore. A little old-fashioned some may say, but its still a ring to be reckoned with - the sapphire is 18 carats of top quality stone with 14 nice diamonds around it and has a current value of approximately $500,000.

Rare emerald: A rare 9.27carat square cut emerald from from the legendary mine of Muzo, Colombia, brought a price of $835,682 at the recent Christie's sale. Gemmologists claim its vibrant hue class it amongst the world's best.

If you like to fossick for gems: Perhaps try your luck at the Crater of Diamonds State Park in Arkansas. A fellow last weekend had a bit of a fossick and ended up going home with a 2.44ct brown diamond. Definitely worth the $7 entry fee!

The legendary Hope diamond : The Hope diamond has had a new, modern setting designed for it by Harry Winston Inc., to celebrate its 50th anniversary of being donated by Harry Winston to the Smithsonian. Set into a necklet with 340 baguette diamonds, that took 8 months for jewellers to create, it will only be in the setting for a short time before returning to its original Cartier setting.

The other piece of jewellery news is more of an oddity, really. I saw the headline of 'world's largest pearl' and when I investigated further, found they were referring to a six ton ball of blue-green fluorite from Mongolia. As it glows in the dark it is referred to as a 'luminous pearl' On sale for an estimated 88,000,000 GBP if you want a five foot high night light?

In honour of all the lovely gems in this week's news I thought I'd better post a special piece - and this one surely is! Made with top quality amethyst and citrine and 14ct gold, I just love it!

Till next week :)
Cheers
Annette

Christmas wishes

Oh my ... I can't believe its been almost three weeks since I posted here! It is rather indicative of my life of late though!

Things have been go, go, go, with many commitments for the children - an end of year dance concert and rehearsals, the end of year presentation at school, my son finishing primary school and being enrolled at the local high school - and it culminates this week with a piano recital that somehow I am organising as well!

Naturally things have been busy on the jewellery front (many panicked husbands have been calling me!) with orders left, right and centre. My Coolah show went extremely well and thankfully while hot, it wasn't 45 degrees C plus like my last outing!

I have my final show for the year this Sunday in Tamworth at the monthly Peel Street Handmade Market. I'll be there with the talented Kasia Tatar, a lady who has a great future in jewellery in front of her (I carry a few of her lovely items on my site). As she doesn't have her own site, I will have to tell her all about Ethikl - a new Australian artisan marketplace that I read about on Your Cheeky Monkey.

It's hard to believe that Christmas is barely a week away now! I certainly haven't had time to do any great treks to town for Christmas shopping, so thank goodness for online shopping ... providing they all arrive in time of course! If you're located Stateside and you're still looking for little somethings to add to your gifts, do check out the Vintage Soap Shoppe on Etsy. Angela makes the most delicious looking old-world soaps that I'm sure anyone would appreciate.

Of course, for Christmas around here I think we'd all love about 6 inches of rain - that would make us all feel better and the cows would certainly appreciate the grass! We seem to have slipped straight back into drought, which is both worrying and depressing. Any rain we have had over the last couple of months has been immediately followed by a few days of hot winds and the ground just dries up instantly. Australia - the wide, brown land indeed!

Well, since I can't make it rain and nothing I do seems to entice it, I will just ignore it as much as I can and look at my pretty gems and pearls. The torsade photographed above has lashings of pink pearls, lavender pearls, rock crystal quartz, amethyst and apatite. Far better than looking at dry, brown paddocks!

As I probably won't post again before Christmas, I wish you all the very best of the festive season and hope that Santa brings a special gift, just for you! (Just like he has for this Aussie stockman!)



Cheers
Annette :)

Busy as expected a month before Christmas

It's been another busy week - as expected for this time of the year! I watched my children appear in their school play, had my show in Tamworth in 45+ degree (C) heat, did a morning's baking, celebrated my 20th wedding anniversary, loaded lots of new stock onto the website, almost caught up on my outstanding 'to do' list (we won't talk about the current to do list!!) and have even found some time to entertain a guest visiting from the USA and, amazingly, to make some jewellery! Gosh, I sound like a powerhouse LOL.

But, we all know that I'm just another mother - getting stressed, worrying over my children's schooling and activities, ignoring the fact that Christmas is just around the corner and going gray during the whole process (darn dye never lasts long enough!!)

That's the good thing about being creative, you switch off from the mundane and lose yourself in the creativity! Of course, the school bus eventually brings the children home, or the phone rings, or the computer beeps and tells me there is another message .... and life is suddenly back to normal.

Nevertheless, I keep hiding out in the studio and eventually something gets done. The pretty blue earrings photographed above are from a recent creative burst. Very chic, they are made with royal blue lapis lazuli topped with a small blue sapphire. I'd wear them, would you!?

Next week is my annual show in Coolah so I'm trying to find the time to make just a few more things before hand. Glutton for punishment, eh!?

'Till next
Annette :)

Courage and Success

In my wanderings around the blogosphere, I found the following quote on Donna-Marie Coggin's blog:
“The difference between a successful man and a failure, is not one’s better abilities or ideas, but the courage one has to act on them”
-Maxwell Maltz

Then I ran into this post on Lori Anderson's blog that epitomises one boy's courage.

And it put me in the mind of success. Sometimes you have to stick to what you believe will work, with your passion and your ideals. It isn't always easy and it isn't that straightforward, but success, when it comes, is just so, well, satisfying!

Our local community held a music festival last weekend - the yearly jazz festival, whilst enjoyed by those who went, was a big drain on the community resources - there were never enough people to help organise, set up, pull down and access was rather tortuous through the national park. But the scenery was gorgeous!

So after last year's festival the committee decided to go biannual and this year run a low-key music event close to town to encourage more townspeople to attend. A lot of people didn't approve and some people said they wouldn't be going.

The day dawned clear and bright, the sun was shining - but it wasn't too hot and all was in readiness. The clouds came over - threatening but nothing too drastic and all continued on as scheduled. People turned up in droves.

Then mid-way through the evening the heavens opened - the stage got wet and dangerous and there was even a black-out. Oh no!!! However, the headline act, in true professional style, just pulled out some smaller equipment from their vehicle, set up in a shed and kept playing. And everyone had a marvellous time (even if they were a little damp!) The town is now full of praise for the event, the organisers are thrilled and for their courage at pursuing their goal, are smelling that sweet, sweet smell of success!

The picture for today is a bright and fresh gemstone bracelet of rock crystal quartz, carnelian, garnet, freshwater pearls, and citrine.

Coolah open day

My open day(s) in Coolah went really well - the weather was fairly uncomfortable - it was boiling hot on the Thursday with storms in the afternoon and Friday was pleasant to start with, then hot and humid then storms with HAIL! But, many turned out despite the weather and I had a great time all in all.

I was in town on Thursday this week and some people asked if I was open again that day...

Anyway, here is a pic of my 'shopfront' for the two days - looks pretty doesn't it!



I'm in wind down mode at the moment - I even went Christmas shopping today. Mind you I have bought quite a bit on line, with more to go. And I had better get organised as it is only three weeks to Christmas - eek!

I have to spruce up the house this week and get it ready for the decorations :) Oh yes, I'm getting very much in the 'mood'. Mind you this is regardless of the heat we are currently experiencing. It was high 30s today (celsius) - and what was it - two weeks ago we were huddling around the fire!

I really have to do my Christmas cards soon too. I've already received an indecent number of them. Really, some people are SO organised! If you're running late (like me!) do check out Macaroni & Glue - Kelly has some beaut cards - very different from the run of the mill cards you get at this time of the year. She is also running specials for another week, so hop along and grab a unique bargain!

I haven't had time to load new stock onto the site - but the ring above will be one of them put up soon. Made with peridot (one of my all time favourite stones) and 12ct goldfill. Do you like it?

Some of my favourite blogs

I can't believe it's already Friday! Just like Christmas is creeping up on me, so the weeks are flying by.

I was warmly received in Tamworth last weekend and there was a lot of interest in my work. A number of ladies have asked me to come back to the next handcrafted market, so I hope that I will be able to return for the last market of this year on the 21st December.

I am in the midst of packing to go to a private showing in Orange. And then next week on Thursday and Friday I have my open day in Coolah. It will be held at the Dream Dance Academy - Thursday is a special preview for existing clients from 11.30 to 2.30pm with some champers and nibblies :) Friday will be open to all from 10am to 6pm.

As well as preparing for these two shows, sending out orders, preparing flyers for the open day etc. I even managed to get some new pieces made! Creating really is the best part of my job and its even better when you don't have to push yourself but it just flows. I was lucky enough that the flow went beautifully and I have some new pieces to show for it. If they don't sell this weekend I will be sure to put them on the site next week!

I also received an award from my good blog-friend Michelle of Michabella Creations. Michelle and I met on the great little site, Skwiggazine, and we seem to hang out on some other sites too as we keep bumping into each other!

Anyway, Michelle, very kindly, awarded me with this:



Here are the rules:
1. Put the logo on your blog
2. Add a link to the person who awarded you
3. Nominate other blogs for this award
4. Add links to those blogs
5. Leave a message for your nominees on their blogs
6. Give a reason why you consider their blogs cool

Now I'm not going to leave meme notifications for these blogs as I just admire them and want to share them with you!

Here are my Cool Blog Picks:

Bent Objects - this blogger creates the most amazing critters and scenes using not much more than wire!

Collective Creatives - This is a group blog that I participate in and some very talented artists and artisans talk about various facets of their work and the challenges they are confronted with.

Lights Camera ... History - This blog is about period dramas - new films, tv shows and actor/actress profiles.

London Daily Photo - See London in a different light - a different look at the non stop city.

Luann Udell - This is the story behind the artist. Lots of great advice for anyone in the art/craft field.

Three Channels - Elizabeth is a mum of three whom she homeschools. One of her sons is gifted and gives her life an interesting twist or two!

Unearthed Tees - This is a great little blog with a geologic/rockhound twist.

Jane Austen Festival - For lovers of the author, downunder. Experience regency life at the yearly festival.

I'm Living Proof that God has a Sense of Humor - The hectic life of a mom with 2 sets of twins!

Christa Taylor - Fashion smarts, hints and tips.

Bronte Blog - All things Bronte!

Todays pic is a beaut necklace done this week and one that I could actually keep for myself with VERY LITTLE prompting! Lovely big nuggets of turquoise (stablised), separated by little droplets of almost pure silver and a wonderful slightly oxidised silver bead as a feature on the side. Yum! I would of course love to use completely natural turquoise, but until I win the lottery will just have to be content with natural turquoise that has been treated *sigh*. It is pretty, isn't it!?

Have a great day!

Coolah Spring Garden Festival and a tagging game

Well the Coolah Spring Garden Festival was wonderful! I was at the delightful "Pilca Butta" garden and my hosts Ian and Liz were wonderfully accommodating and helpful. Both days were bright and sunny (the second day got a little too warm!), the garden was in full bloom and really couldn't have looked better, and all in attendance had a marvellous time. Here is a pic of my set up on part of the homestead verandah:



I had beautiful old-fashioned lilac and snowball bushes right near my display - can you see them? Here was my view from my 'perch':





Don't you wish you were there!!!!?

Now last week I mentioned I was tagged and given an award :) Firstly, thank you to Commotion from the Ocean of Life for this award!



Now how special is that!!! I love reading this blog - always something different to read about! Thank you so much - I guess that will make me comment some more ;)

Then Olivia from Piktorize tagged me. Do check out Olivia's blog - she has a photo of the week which is often amazing and she honoured me with featuring my ring photo from last week too!

Now the tagging game rules: Share 7 things your readers may not know about you and tag 7 others to do the same thing, then include a link in your blog back to the person who tagged you.

OK, 7 things...(having done this a couple of months ago, this isn't so easy....)

1. My favourite pets have been golden haired dogs. The first one, when I was a little girl, was an Irish Terrier called 'Goldie' and the second, as an adult was a labrador x red cattle dog called 'Sunny'. Yeah I know, original names, lol.

2. We have a very bad record with keeping cats. We're up to number 5 in about three years. Mostly they just disappear one day although the last one we think met with a snake :(

3. I HATE snakes. Like REALLY HATE. They make me squirm and scream.

4. I hate spiders. Not as much as snakes but then again, they're not as big!

5. My Dad took me out of school at the end of year 6 and we travelled around Australia for a few months. They were going to make me repeat since I was too young to go to High School, so he thought travel would be better than doing the same work twice. Go Dad!!!

6. I travelled around Europe for 8 months in Year 7 with my schoolwork never quite catching up with me! When it did though, all I did was WORK! The trip prior to that was fun though and I saw a lot of the world from the window of a Bedford van!

7. A young man tried to buy me in Morocco for a camel, a donkey and something else I can't remember. I was 13 and the perfect age for a bride (!). My father kept reminding me for a number of years that he turned down a camel that would have been worth a fortune!

OK, this time I'm going to tag my Skwiggazine friends:

1. Designing Hilary

2. Tulip's Talking

3. Michabella Creations

4. Inspired Designs by Teresa

5. Daydream Art Studio

6. Cherished Dreams

7. Who Says 8 Is Enough?

Speaking of number 2 above, check out the pics from Lily's fishing trip and sequential sunrise shots.

Ooops, almost forgot about the pic at the top of the page. Don't you just love the sparkle and the impact of the black onyx and the red jade. Yum! Definitely a statement piece.

I made this one after a client had asked me to make an asymmetric necklace of red white and black (by the way I don't do asymmetric easily, so it was a real challenge!). The strength of the contrasting colours encouraged me to make this necklace - all the sparkle you would need for a night out, don't you think!?

New website and a cocktail ring

I did it. I'm live!!! My new website that is LOL. I almost hyperventilated when I turned it on, but I did it!!! I'd love to hear what you think - go to Annette Piper Dip. Gem. Handcrafted Jewellery and check it out. (Hopefully I haven't made too many mistakes on it!)

It has been a bit of scramble with taking new photographs or re-editing good older pics, writing descriptions and loading stock onto the site, along with doing shows, having the children on holidays and making orders and new stock. Yes, I feel a little in a whirl!

Now begins the slow process of building my rank up in the search engines and getting 'noticed' all over again. *sigh*. Maybe I should ask Designing Hilary for some tips - she recently had a wrist slap by google for being naughty for repeat content and as a result her page rank plummeted ... but I see it is making a return to the higher numbers. Good girl!

I have the Coolah Spring Gardens Festival this weekend and will be at the Pilca Butta homestead on both days if you happen to be wandering around the vicinity! I really must get organised for that. I note I have been tagged AND received an award too - I will post on those next time (never enough hours in the day!!!).

After MANY requests for rings, I took the plunge a few months ago and started with delicate little gem rings which have been really well received. Then the requests escalated to not just 'rings' but to 'cocktail rings'. OK. I took up the challenge and have a made a couple to see how they're received. One is pictured above and I just love the amethyst focal stone which is surrounded with more amethyst - light and dark for gleam, sparkle and interest, all put together with argentinium sterling silver. The rings are very comfortable and sit snugly along your finger yet still make quite a statement.

Till next!

Back from vacation

Well, I am relaxed, recharged and raring to go!!! What a wonderful holiday we had ... the weather was gorgeous, lovely warm sunshine and a couple of days light rain (but not cold) in the middle of our holiday to relieve that monotonous sunshine ;) The children had a wonderful time and spent their time darting between the house, the beach, the house, the playground, the house, the beach.... you get the idea, I'm sure!

I was also very productive and managed to make lots of beautiful jewellery inspired by the beach, the rather tropical feel and the warm, lazy days. Even though I spent some days 'working', being able to do so in comfort and still hearing the waves crash on the beach was very special.



It was marvellous to see our house again (once a year really isn't enough) and even though we have been there a few years running now, the number of kangaroos that hop around your yard, the street and even the beach is a bit amazing. We had a rather large male almost come into our garage and you can routinely get within a foot or so of them before they shy away. Of course, getting that close isn't really recommended as they are wild creatures, so its better to sit back and just watch! Although I had heard of them being on the beach, this was the first time I had seen it as this picture shows a couple of them that had been nibbling the grass on the dune in front of the beach! I can't understand why they don't promote Woodgate Beach a little more to our overseas guests who would love to see the 'roos hopping around the little town.

I am just about to start my spring show season - nothing like jumping right back into the thick of it! This weekend (13-14 September) I am off to Quirindi Show on both Saturday and Sunday and will be located in Pavillion 2, so if you are planning on attending the show, please drop by and say hello! The following weekend (20-21 Sept) is Merriwa Show and I get to catch up with all my lovely clients from that district. Luckily there are school holidays in between those two and my next 2 day event at the Coolah Spring Garden Festival on 18-19 October.

I was working on my website just before going on holidays and fingers crossed I may even get to work on it a little next week as well. I can't wait to unveil it all to you and am still so thrilled to have found the wonderful Emma of Morris Bear who created it for me. As I mentioned before I have looked and looked and looked for web designers and really had trouble finding anyone that could do what I was after at an affordable price! Well, I was pretty chuffed to see that there is another Aussie woman doing web design templates (not specifically e-commerce) at very reasonable prices - Jenni Markham Designs. She also creates the cutest stationery! Well worth a look if you are in the market for something like this.



The piece I've picked for today's pic is beautiful teal coloured, highly faceted jade (treated of course) which is incredibly sparkly. Would you believe the lovely sterling balls in between actually calm the sparkle down to a managable level? It's summery, shiny and sparkly - everything you need to wear against your skin or summer fashions.

It's great to be back although I'm still a bit behind on responding to comments... but I'll get there!!!

Cheers!

Sunstone and first spring show for 2007 a success

Well, I'm back! I had a wonderful time in Nyngan - the View Club ladies were so very welcoming!! A big thank you to Di who organised for me to come out there and to Ruth for billeting me out for the night :)

I went with fellow Coolah resident, Eleanor Cook, the NSW Rural Woman of the Year who was speaking to these groups about herself and how she got to be voted as the NSW Rural Woman of the Year. It was fascinating to hear her story as one of 12 children (11 girls and 1 boy) in suburban Sydney, her life in PR and marketing, and her move to the country. As part of her new community she saw the town with the fresh eyes of a non-local and saw there was a need to revive the town which, over a period of many years, she worked so tirelessly on. The current town of Coolah, also recently voted as "community of the year" really has a new view on its existence and is determined to survive regardless of the closure of a large employer a few years ago and the rather devastating drought from which most of us are still recovering. It is wonderful to see the difference that one person can make - we tend to take these people for granted, but they work very hard to improve the lot of the majority, which they really should be recognised for! Eleanor's message to the ladies of Nyngan was to work out a plan - find what everyone agreed was important to improve, then work on it - keep the big picture, but work on the project in small bites - and as these projects are successful, celebrate your achievement with the community to keep them motivated and involved. By the time Eleanor had finished her talk, there were lots of motivated ladies, some of who needed new jewellery ;) - the feedback on my spring collection was dazzling! Thank you ladies!!

Speaking of dazzling I wanted to share a pic of this beautiful sunstone necklace that has gone to a new home with one of the Nyngan ladies - it was only made a couple of weeks ago as were a few of the pieces I sold this week - so I won't get the opportunity to share it again I less I post it here!

The necklace is made of large, smooth nuggets of sunstone - a plagioclase feldspar which has shiny flecks of orange-red suspended within the stone which catch the light as it moves and give a beautiful, understated flash. Of average hardness (6-6.5) it is usually transluscent and one of the most well known sources of sunstone is Oregon in the USA. When I was looking at designing this piece I was in a conundrum - it's such a unique colour that other stones and pearls didn't enhance either the sunstone or themselves so what? I tried silver with it - but it drained the colour. I tried gold but it was too 'brassy' looking. Then I had tried silver and gold together and hey presto - just enough and not too much.

Metaphysically sunstone instills good nature, restores a good view on life and allows the real self to shine through. Traditionally it is linked to luck and good fortune.

No wonder I like it! Do you?

Spring Show Schedule

News on the show front for your diary:

5 August - Nyngan View Club, Workers Club, Nyngan, NSW.

I met some lovely ladies from Nyngan when I was exhibiting at the International Women's Day Luncheon in Dubbo back in February. They kindly invited me out and I am pleased to say I will be showing the ladies of the View Club my jewels! I will be going there with fellow Coolah dweller, Eleanor Cook, who is the current NSW Rural Woman of the Year. So Eleanor will be there to give them lots to think about and I will soothe those thoughts with pretty things ;).

9 August - Private showing, Coolah, NSW.

One of my best clients, Julie Williams, is hosting a private showing for her friends and it should be a great afternoon. I am really looking forward to it!

15 August - Merriwa Show, Showgrounds, Merriwa, NSW.

I will be exhibiting at the Merriwa Show this year. Unfortunately it clashes with the local fair at Coolah where I normally hold a childrens jewellery making stall, but my husband is stepping up to the fray and will be doing this for me (after a few lessons of course!) This will enable me to attend the Show in Merriwa and catch up with all my clients from that area who I haven't seen in almost a year.

28 August - Binnia Street, Coolah.

This is the official opening of the refurbished shire hall in Coolah which now houses a modern library, a community internet portal and a gym. Festivities are being planned and part of those include a street festival and fair. So I will be there with a small display.

19 October to 21 October - Craftfest, Ogishi Craft Centre, Lovedale, (Hunter Valley) NSW.

12 artisans will be presenting their work in a gallery atmosphere for 2 days - the same weekend as the Opera in the Vineyards. Exhibitors will be Alison Green - silkscreened fabrics, Kay Faulkener - handwoven textiles, Lance Hennessy -ceramic sculptures, Robin Phillips - silver, gold and enamel jewellery, Mark Jones - leather bags, Lynne Taylor - collaged fabric garments, Setsuko Ogishi - blown glass (I believe all of the above were exhibitors at the Lovedale Limited Edition Expo I did last year), Laraine Clements - scented items and clothing, Barbara Stephenson - slumped glass, Nicky Coady - studio pottery, Robyn McGain - quilts.

Pics: Middle: At Jazz at the Tops, Coolah, 2007; Bottom: At International Women's Day Luncheon, Dubbo, 2007; Top: At Lovedale Limited Edition Expo, Hunter Valley 2006