Pinking up...

 I've been making lots of brooch beads and they're almost ready for mounting onto boards and having their portraits done - I've tried for lots of colour in this batch.

They're great to wear on jackets and coats - my problem is that I always have to rat through my wardrobe every time I want to wear one - I tend to leave them on my coats - it's one way of storing them I guess.

                                                                                                              

I love lemons.  I love the taste of them in almost anything - someone called themselves a lemophile a while ago, and that really resonated with me!

                                                                                                                

I've tried to grow lemon trees at every house we've ever lived in and I'm sure I've left some amazing future specimens scattered around the country. 

Something eats all the new growth on our trees here and we think we may have tracked down the culprits - WETAS!!!  The largest insect in the world apparently!

I'm trying to discourage them my putting crushed eggshells around the trees - that's a lot of eggs!
Does anybody have any better ideas?  We never see them - I think they come and feed at night - they take the most enormous bites.

In the meantime I went and bought a lovely lot of lemons at the market last week and have tried preserving them for the first time.  I want to use them in tagines - they're apparently only slightly lemony in flavour - salty/sweet.

They're sliced almost through in quarters then packed with rock salt and into a jar then covered in lemon juice.  This took around 20 lemons!!

I used a recipe from Made in Morocco by Julie Le Clerc

A sumptuous recipe book full of the most amazing photography

I think this is my favourite photo - "Petits Taxis"

After I had begun this method I found another recipe by Annabel Langbein's Free Range Cook which I wished I had used - it used only a few lemons and seemed much less messy...

She slices 2 lemons into 6ths completely then freezes the slices on a tray, then packs the frozen segments into a clean jar, adds 2 heaped teaspoons of salt, the juice of a lemon (to cover the segments), adds a bay leaf and covers it all with oil.
Ready in a week, but will improve over several months, and once opened, keep them in the fridge.
How easy is that?

Maybe next time?
                                                                                                               

What do you think of the new pink background?

I've been looking for something a bit more colourful for ages, and pink seems a nice colour - feminine, heart chakra energy and all that.

                                                                                                          
Speaking of heart chakra colours, I've been wearing quite a lot of green lately and thought I'd show you these beads I made years and years ago that I still wear and love...I call them Cherry Blossoms these days.

We Are All Weird!

This is the cover of a book I've just read.  Yes, that's a pretty individual look alright!

It's called We are all Weird: The Myth of Mass and the End of Compliance by Seth Godin .

His premise is that the world has changed from the mass compliance of the 20th century, where we found safety and acceptance in complying with the norm, where mass marketing was efficient and cost effective, and a few very large companies became even larger - the larger they became, the more influence they had on our everyday way of life.

He says that the introduction of the internet and our easy, instant access to information about everything from sky diving clubs in Mongolia to Star Trekkies groups in Amsterdam has made us all able to express ourselves in new and unique ways, which means the demise of the mass market and "normal" societies are becoming a thing of the past.

It's a little book - I'm sure a faster reader with an a day to spend could gobble it up - and an interesting read.  It's well written and interestingly laid out to accentuate his points.

And I think he may be right - we all want to express our own individuality, and certainly in New Zealand, I think that we feel free to do that.  It makes me wonder about other oppressed populations and to appreciate the gift of freedom that we have here.

 I have been changing things around in the workroom this week, putting my bead stash on display for sale - it's always been available but I haven't had the place to show it off till now.  If there's anything you need in the way of Swarovski Crystals or sterling silver beads and findings, please just ask - I'm happy to sell bits and pieces for your own projects and I love hearing about your creative juice!

While I was going through everything I came across some beautiful Swarovski Light Sapphire 8mm bicones that are just begging to be made up into something - I've been enjoying tossing around some ideas.

 I have also just got in some Swarovski Rondelles for a project I'm planning with pearls - they're pretty gorgeous, and I'm thinking that I might need to get a range of sizes in these.  They're silver plated and nickel free, so should be nice to wear.

Have a wonderful weekend, and if you need a little treat and a pick-me-up, sit with this clip of galadarling talking about her Radical Self Love Project on TED.

New Books and the big draw

One of the preparations I love to make for a trip is making sure that I have some nice books to read. Here's my little stash...I think it will last me for a bit longer than three weeks!
We leave here on Wednesday for Christchurch - weather permitting. This snow storm is putting the trip in some doubt - Oh! I do love the joys of traveling in winter! I wonder how the Christchurch Craft Show will be in this weather? Perhaps it will all have blown over by opening day on Friday - I do hope so!
Ironically, we are having beautiful days here in Golden Bay - the sun is high and warm, but the wind is cold.
And the winner of the Blog Giveaway is....drumroll, please...

Carol Soutter-Earle! Congratulations, Carol, I will be in touch!

Feather Gift

Because I sit on my backside to work for most of the day I need to take lots of exercise, and lately my friend who lives nearby and I have been walking on the beach at dawn every morning.

It’s been lovely to see the lengthening of the days this way and we’ve really noticed recently that the mornings are much lighter. When we leave at 6.30 am the hills are just picked out by the first of the dawn light, but by the time we get home 45 minutes later it’s full daylight.

It’s a great way to see the day in, and we’re really energized when we get home.

As we were coming home this morning I almost stepped on a beautiful and perfect feather – I love to receive feathers from nature – I always feel as though they are a blessing.


In the book The Secret Language of Signs by Denise Linn feathers are said to be the connection between man and the supreme being, symbolizing the flight to spirit and to the heavens above. Maybe it’s that something is soft or “as light as a feather” or maybe I have “a feather in my cap”? Whatever it is, I love it and am grateful.

Now I need to see if I can discover what type of bird it came from – it’s such an unusual shape and colour.