new bird pebble

A new robin pebble necklace that I've engraved. I need to take some better photos of this one and some of the others for that matter! The light wasn't great when I had my camera out but it has been so dull and grey here recently. Hope you're having a good weekend.

Memories of summer

I found this pebble I'd carved at the bottom of my pebble bowl. I'd completely forgotten about it. It took me right back to sitting on the bench in the sunshine next to the strawberry plants, choosing a blossom to carve. I engraved the pebble right there in the garden. It's hard to imagine sitting out there in just a t-shirt at the moment. We had more snow a couple of days ago and it's still lingering!

I've been meaning to do this necklace design for a while! Sometimes they go round and round in my head until I put them down on paper or engrave them. As always, click on the pictures for more details.

Thanks for all your suggestions for names for my mannequin so far. It's been great fun reading them all. Still 6 days to go if you haven't entered the giveaway yet. Good luck!

giveaway & my new mannequin

Hello, my name is ...?

I recently decided it would be a good idea to have someone to model my jewellery for me as taking a photo of myself wearing the necklaces has proved to be impossible! Unfortunately Mr P just isn't the right sort of model for the job (too much hair ;-)) so I came up with the idea of a mannequin and managed to get one from eBay.


Here she is just after she came to stay modelling my heart pebble (now sold).

I was just a bit too excited when she was delivered and couldn't wait to get her out of the box. I think this might be something to do with a long buried desire deep in my psyche from when I was a kid and all I wanted for my birthday was a Girl's World to put makeup on and style her hair like my friend had! Silly I know!

Well the poor love has been through an ordeal already (no I haven't been putting makeup on her!). I had to glue velcro to her head to keep her wig on and Mr P jumped out of his skin when he opened the bedroom door to find her looking at him :-D. But she's settling in now and has been trying lots of pebbles on.

All she needs is a name. Which is where I hope my dear readers will come in and help me. I thought to make it more fun I would do a giveaway.

All you have to do for the chance to win the ocean key pebble necklace shown in in the photos is to leave me a comment saying what you think her name should be. This lovely lightweight pebble was found by me whilst walking on the beach with my pup. I planned out a design in my sketchbook and then engraved it onto the pebble, strung it with grey cotton cord and finished with a pebble toggle. The necklace measures 20" (52cm).

I will pick a winner at random on Monday March 1st at midday. Ooh exciting!! I do hope you'll participate. The more the merrier!

tea for my valentine

I organised a surprise lunch for Mr P yesterday while he was out. I've never whizzed round the kitchen so fast (though I made some of it in advance to hide away in secret spots around the house) and I had fun making it look special, my mum lent me a gorgeous tea set to make it all perfect, I hung up some bunting, lots of heart shaped food. I'm not sure who got the most enjoyment out of it, me or Mr P.

Hope you had a good weekend, whatever you did, if you celebrated or not.

Say it with pebbles

♥ Happy Valentine's Day ♥

sunshine blog award

The wonderful Heartful Blogger has very very kindly given me The Sunshine Blog Award! I've put it in the sidebar. What a lovely award to win! Thank you!

The Sunshine Award is awarded to bloggers whose positivity and creativity inspires others in the blog world - it makes me very happy to think that I inspire someone with this website. I know this isn't really following the rules to the letter but I'm going to list 10 blogs who inspire me, some old favs and some new-to-me. Some of them have already received the award.

So here goes in no particular order:

1. The Hermitage This is such a poetic, authentic, deeply touching blog.
2. Leanne Wildermuth makes incredibly beautiful, detailed paintings of people's pets. I love seeing the work progress through different stages to the finished piece.
3. Driftwood is a fab blog written by Tess who often makes me laugh out loud.
4. Shadows and Clouds is a long time favourite, always inspiring with beautiful photos and thoughtful words.
5. Julie Whitmore Pottery is a lovely new-to-me blog showing fantastic creations and the ideas behind them.
6. third bird Fabulous design blog from a wonderful textile designer, lots of contemporary patterns and inspiring posts.
7. the life and times of sticks and bricks If you love furniture makeovers, seeing poor unloved pieces made new and reworked you will adore this blog.
8. Sweet Designs never ceases to amaze me with the jaw dropping dessert tables that she creates along with her team.
9. Missed Connections A project of fantastic illustrations based on messages left by strangers on missed connections websites. I really love this concept!
10. mimilove Another new-to-me blog with fresh inspiring artwork... a mix of watercolour painting and embroidery. Lovely!

Hope you enjoy the links ♥

little fox pebble and the inspiration behind it

Here's my new little pebble necklace, based on the sighting of the fox from my walk I wrote about in the last post (click on the photo for more details of the necklace).

I thought I'd show you the picture I took of the fox, although it's a bit blurry I was still so happy to get a photo of the little fellow. We were almost at the edge of the field when Mr P spotted him. I think he must have watched us all the way across, sat so silent and still. It really made my day ♥

weekend wandering

Pictures from our amble through the countryside.
The walk included:

• Friendly, inquisitive sheep much to Flossie's delight.
• Floss being a good girl and not chasing any sheep, which might have had something to do with her being on the lead but all the same!
• A glorious sighting of Mr Fox. I did get a photo but it was rather blurry although good enough to use as a reference for making a design.
• Happening upon an ENORMOUS tree and the discovery that it was hollow and big enough to hide inside. How old must it be?
• Floss falling through some ice, shallow but deep enough to give her a good shock. Now she stays away.
• Watching and listening as a gaggle of geese flew round and round the lake.
• A steep climb with a stunning view over the Cheshire plain and a beautiful sunset.

Ah I do love to play with my camera. I've become slightly obsessed with light I think.

Speaking of obsession I've been reading Twilight. I heard so much about it that I wanted to experience it for myself. Well I'm about halfway through I think, and this isn't going to win me any popularity contests, but I'm just not that enamoured by the characters and am finding it a little bit slow. It's aimed at a young age group (not that I've grown up yet!) so I'm not complaining. I joked with Mr P that the next DVD rental to pop through the letterbox would be Twilight because I hadn't finished the book and guess what... yep... I think I must have tempted fate. I've just watched it! And for the first time I have loved a film more than the book it's based on.

Good night all, I'm off to bed to dream of vampires.