My Need To Create

In a previous life, (before Amy) I worked for a Local Authority (A county council) and I worked in computers, my second love.

After having my gorgeous girl a year and a half ago I decided that I wanted to spend my time making pretty things and watching my baby grow into a little girl.  And even though the thought of losing regular income and earning my own wage seemed a little daunting, I was determined to live my life my way.

An ever growing part of my new life is to create, not just bridal accessories, which is something I've been doing for years, I find myself yearning for material so I can sew, Copic markers so I can draw, and teaching myself graphic design with photoshop.

I lead more of an creative life then I ever did, it's really satisfying.  Do I feel that I could be more creative - yes of course.  I see other people's work and wish that I had the imagination to create that, or stand in awe in the amount of work and time that has gone into making something, only for them to sell it for a price that wouldn't even earn them minimum wage.

Money is no longer a huge part of my life, as long as there's enough to cover the basics, then I'm happy.  I think spending time with those who you love, creating memories that you'll always treasure and being able to follow your true passions is far more beneficial then working to make money, just to spend it on silly things.

I have been know to crave the latest Macbook or Ipad and did make a rash decision to buy an ipad mini while on my family holiday last year.  Even I'm not able to resist the draw of a new toys.

The problem about spending your life creating, is that it isn't spent cleaning and with 2 children in the house, 3 cats and a wonderful hubby, my house can get very messy.

Currently I have a huge pile of duchess satin sitting on my dinning room table from my wedding dress that I took apart last night so I can reuse the material.

My work bench in my studio is covered in a recent attempt to make my own rhinestone appliqués and my head is filled with ideas that there just doesn't seem enough time to possibly create.

This morning I created this, its not the style of wedding garter I was planning on making, but I decided to work with the materials I had to hand and I wanted something more colourful than my usual style.

Art Deco Vintage Inspired Crystal Hair Slides

Over the years my crafting supplies have taken over  half of my bedroom which I share with my ever patient husband.  I have everything from paper to material, sterling silver jewellery findings to a huge selection of Swarovski crystals and pearls in so many shapes and colours. 

I also have an every growing supply of crystal diamante pieces and it's with these that I've been doing a lot of my current designing around, especially when I've been creating products for Wedding And Gems.  

A lot of the time I'll take a something that was created originally for a completely difference purpose and make a few modification so it can be created into something else.

Take these for example.

Those round diamantes motifs actually come in a pair.  Together they form a clasp but I don't particularly like the shape that this clasp creates when it's together so I choose to use them apart.  The designs pretty simple, a round circles of crystals with a square centre, normal everyday geometric shapes often seen in vintage art deco design.

I designed this originally as bridal accessories but I can't see any reason why they couldn't be used for other special occasions.  Because they are on matching hair slides they can be placed anywhere.

Vintage is huge in the wedding industry at the moment so if you're looking for more vintage style accessories, then check out what's in stock at Wedding And Gems.

Garters and Hairvines

So it's friday and almost everyday this week I've been hoping for the postman to bring me the lace I ordered from Etsy so I can start making bridal garters.  Yes there's absolutely no craft that I won't try.  I'm assuming it's not going to arrive today either which is a little disappointing but it's ok.  I've decided to turn my crafty urges into another direction.

A while ago I decided to cull a lot of my old products that I make for Wedding And Gems as I wasn't happy with the photo's.  This meant a lot of my own hairvines got the chop.  So since I can't make the bridal garters that I desperately want to try out, I'm going to extend my collection of hairvines.  I have a small collection at the moment, most of them quite short so they can highlight different sections of the hair, but I want to make longer ones.  My idea is to make them a length that can go around the entire head like a headband, with the option of tying them with a ribbon, for that pretty look.

I can't wait to get started, I just need to get the kids organised and sent to school :)

My Bridal Shoe Clips

Just a quickie this morning.  I wanted to show you the bridal shoe clips I've been making for Wedding And Gems.  They're really simple, as that tends to be my dominant style but I think they really take this shoe from something pretty and casual to something much more dressy.

Here's the picture.

The collection at Wedding And Gems is only small at the minute and they are mainly rhinestone crystal but I do have a gorgeous purple satin flower that I designed.  Here it is.

You can see the rest of the product line by checking out Wedding And Gems here - Bridal Shoe Clips

Physical and Digital Crafting

I'm a women with a very short attention span, I flit from one activity to another, often leaving something almost complete behind so I can move onto the next thing that caught my eye.  You like me?  Your minds wandering onto something else already?  Come back, I just want your attention for a little while.

Probably like you, things bore me quickly. So I'm not the type of person who's happy to learn just one type of craft such as jewellery making (see Wedding And Gems). I like to have my fingers in many pies, and yes I bake too ;).  So I also spend time making digital products.  I mainly make backgrounds to place on items in my Zazzle store.

Digital design is different from jewellery making in so many ways.  It's intangible, its very quick to edit, its never ending and as long as your got the software and hardware you can create for free.  My favourite benefit to my digital design obsession compared to my jewellery making frenzies is that I don't need to find space in my house to store my designs. Something my husband appreciates too.

The downside is that I can spend all day playing in photoshop and illustrator and have no physical things to hold in my hand at the end of the day.

Some days though, if I get around to uploading new designs to my Zazzle store I get to see what my digital designs look like on products, such as this kindle case.

Of course, I personalised it with my own initial but it's set up to allow zazzle customers to customised it and put their own initial or other text in it's place.

I can't decide whether I like the font that's used for the initial is called Guest Check and I think it makes the K seem disproportionate, but that could just be me!

I'm really proud of the brown flag with the faux stitching.  I taught myself how to do that yesterday and with a little trial and error, I was happy with the results.  Really I should set up a digital file so they colour can be changed quickly.

A Retro Wedding Favour

How cute is this bubble gum dispenser as a wedding favour?  This particular design would be great a retro themed wedding.

image from http://www.incasagifts.com/

How my facebook fans inspired a blog post

Sometimes I just post a wedding related photo on my Facebook page and ask the fans for their opinion.  This picture got quite a few responses and prompted me to think about how important colours can be at your wedding and how some chose to view colour from another perspective then just aesthetically.

This is the dress in question posted to my Facebook page - took a screen shot with some of the comments the fans left.

It prompted 2 thoughts, in which wedding venues would this colour not work and what psychological implications does the colour green have.

You can read the entire blog post over on the official Wedding and Gems Blog here.

If you want to influence future blog posts, products and her about special offers from bridal accessories come join me on Facebook here - Wedding And Gems on Facebook.