Sherri

Sherri & The Roses

 

Sorry I haven’t posted anything since the showcase. I had a creative spurt last month and made several designs then posted them all, I didn’t have any inspiration to make anything else.

 

 

I have been busy though. We have a huge front yard at our house and I recently became interested in caring for it. I’m a city girl, I don’t do dirt or bugs but we have 12 rose bushes in the front yard and I am trying to nurture them. Some have aphids, most of them have a fungal infection which turns their leaves brown but when they bloom they are lovely. There are several different types of roses and in many colors; orange, red, several shades of pink and one call a “peace” rose which changes color as it blossoms.

This one smells like Turkish Delight

I started a few months ago, in the winter I cut back all the brown dead looking parts; Neil said they should be pruned by 30% every year but he hasn’t done it in years. This year I did it. Now that they looked like they wanted to flower I’ve gone out every day and watered them. We don’t have a hose or a spout outside so I carry a gallon jug back and forth to water the bushes. I figure it is good exercise and besides it will make them pretty. Neil doesn’t want me doing all this work but I don’t really have anything else to do.

The Peace Rose

Aside from that I’ve just been trying to be a good wife, learning about natural cleaning products (I've become obsessed with vinegar) and trying to keep the house clean and make yummy food like pizza (which I think I finally cracked) and trying new recipes that we can both enjoy. This week I made North African Cous Cous, Neil even liked it and he’s a picky eater. Last week I made chocolate pudding and Sunday I made butterscotch pudding, Neil didn’t like the chocolate and refused to try the butterscotch. More for me!

This Sunday is Mother’s Day in America and my Godmother’s birthday is a few days later, and since I now have clip on earrings I decided to send her a pair. I had in my mind the pair I was going to send her but when I went to get them apparently they didn’t exist. I have the long pair (Birthday Earrings) and the pair on the chain but I thought they may be too long so I  made this pair especially for her.

Each earring has two garnets and one faux pearl bead. The findings are all silver plated.

 

Hopefully I’ll be inspired to make more earrings soon.

£5.00 including UK shipping, $9.30 including US shipping.
PS. I took these pictures on Monday and the bushes shown have bloomed more since then.

 

A Treat for Myself

I had hoped that the fair on Saturday would be a great debut for this pair that I made for myself. I made them a few weeks ago and I’ve been wearing them out but I hadn’t posted them yet. Initially I didn’t even know if I would post these because I really made them for myself.

For Christmas I made a small wish list; three items. Leather Gloves, a DNA test (so I can find out my family history and if I have any genetic disorders) and couple’s jewelry (necklace or ring). When I gave my list to Neil he said he couldn’t buy me any of them; he couldn’t get to a department store (he was sick around Christmas), he had to order the jewelry well in advance to get it by Christmas and he WOULD NOT get me the DNA test; he doesn’t want to know if I’m genetically predisposed to any diseases. So I had to make another wish list. I don’t remember what the other things were on it but one was a tablet and that’s what I got. For my birthday Neil was feeling a little better so we went to a store and we found some leather gloves. But still no couple’s jewelry.

Then one night it hit me; I may not be able to make a necklace (although I can try), but I can make myself a pair of earrings. And since I had some garnets anyway I’d just have to get Neil’s birthstone. So I sent away for some topaz (yellow) beads. I didn’t get exactly what I wanted; unfortunately they didn’t have smooth beads like my garnets. But fortunately I I realized I had some larger faceted beads that must be knock off topaz.

So one Sunday (I wrote about that day here) I made my earrings. Boy was it tough! The small faceted garnet beads are so small the holes will not accommodate my headpins. So I had to thread them with a smaller gauge wire which unfortunately is silver and not gold like the rest of the findings. But that was the only way I would get these threaded.

The earrings feature 6mm smooth garnet beads, 4mm faceted garnet beads, 6mm faceted topaz beads (plastic) and 4mm faceted glass topaz beads. Most of the findings are gold-plated, but as mentioned above the 4mm garnets are threaded by silver-plated wire. All the beads hang from an eyepin and look like a bunch of grapes hanging from my ears. The earrings hang about an inch and a third from the ear.

I must admit when I looked at couple’s jewelry at Christmas I realized that our birthstones look very nice together. How can you go wrong with red and gold? While these are mine and Neil’s birthstones I will make the same (or similar) earrings for anyone who like them. You can let me know your preferred stones and I’ll let you know how much they’ll cost. My supplier is pretty reasonable and delivers next day if the order is placed by midday.

Finally, after a lot of thought I’ve decided to stop using gold-plated findings. While I prefer gold to silver in jewelry I do not think that gold plated findings age well. I find that after a year the findings start to turn. Earrings made of silver plated findings do not turn or at least not as fast as I’ve noticed the gold turning. I want the best for my customers! I don’t want anyone buying one of my items then stops wearing them after a year because they’ve turned. I know the earrings are reasonably priced (I do that on purpose) but I want you to love for as long as possible.

As shown £6.00 including UK shipping or $10.20 including US shipping.
Special order price TBD

Clusters

I hope you all enjoyed your Valentine’s Day!

These are the last of the garnet earrings I made at the end of last year. I love these as well. I had a similar pair at home that were all pearls. But I think the contrast of garnet and pearl is cute.

 

Again these are smaller than the first few I posted at the beginning of January. They are just over an inch long so they would even be cute for a little girl. Each Cluster features 3 - 6mm garnet beads and 3 - 6mm pearls. All the metals and findings are silver plated.

 

While this may be the last pair in this line I may produce more garnet earrings in the future. I wanted to start off the year showing you all some really nice styles. Now I have to get working on my March idea, fingers crossed I can actually do it.

 

£7.00 including UK shipping or $9.75 including US shipping
Don't forget you can get any of the earrings in kidney wires or clips (clips are an additional cost)

Garnet Queens

Sorry this post is so late, I've had a busy few days. On Monday Neil and I were busy in London; I had errands to run ad Neil had an appointment. Yesterday I was cooking two lasagnas; one for us and one for a church function today. Then last night we went to the movies. We saw Trainspotting 2, which was very good although I admit I didn't always understand what they were saying. So I didn't get around to writing the blog until this morning and I didn't feel like getting out of bed.

I couldn't think of a name for these gorgeous girls but the Chambala beads looks a bit like a disco ball so I thought Disco Queen - Dancing Queen - Garnet Queen. I love this pair! While I do like all of the earrings I've made these are my favorites so far for this year. I wore them out the on Monday and while running an errand I realized I’d lost one. I was so upset! I wore them to show them off and get a nice picture in them.  To make things worse I didn't think I had enough of the expensive Chambala beads left to make another pair. Later in the day the missing earring fell out of my sweater. What luck!

 

This design is similar to the earrings I made for the wedding line last year; instead of using pearls I used garnets – and there’s no Swarovski crystal on the end. All of the beads are smaller than the wedding earrings so the earrings themselves are smaller, hanging just over an 1.25 inches from the ear. But they are just as classy.

 

It’s February now so if you’re an Aquarian or Pisces and you’d like these in Amethyst just let me know. I can make these with any birthstone however the price will change because the birthstones vary in cost.

 

And there’s still one pair left of the Love Heart earrings so if you’re interested send me an email, tweet or fb message to be sure you can have them in time for the day.

 

Garnet Queens £7.00 including shipping to the UK, $8.85 including shipping to the US.

Love Hearts £5.00 including UK shipping or $7.50 including US shipping

Grace

 Garnet Grace

 

I try to wear a pair of earrings every time I go out. That way if someone says “I love your earrings!” I can say ‘Thank you, I made them and I sell them if you’d like a pair.’ This is the pair I wore this week, and good thing I did. A friend of mine inquired into a bead the color of her mother’s birthstone. She thought it was a ruby but after we spoke she realized it was garnet. Good thing I was wearing these!

 

I love this little pair. They are quite small compared to the ones I released in the past two weeks. These are barely an inch long. They are a similar style to some of the wedding earrings I released last year. They feature two 6mm garnet beads and one 6mm pearl bead separated by crystal rondelle spacers. All of the findings are silver plated.

 

Remember if your birthstone isn’t garnet I can do the same designs in any of the birthstones featured on this list.

£7.00 including UK shipping, $9.75 US including shipping

Birthday Earrings

Birthday beauties - Garnets & Pearls

 

 

Did you get my picture on Monday? That was from my birthday, we did pretty much nothing in the morning. In the afternoon we went for coffee at our favorite cafe and then we spontaneously went to dinner at a great seafood restaurant nearby.

 

I wanted to wear one of the new pairs of earrings I made so I chose these. I picked this pair to wear for my birthday because they have pearls in addition to the garnets. I love this pair because they remind me of a necklace my mother has.  When I made them Neil said they were too long but you can be the judge of that. They aren't as long as the ones I posted last week.

 

 

These feature two garnet beads and one pearl strung together with gold plated pins. They are a little over 2 inches long.

After our nice dinner we came home and I took down the Christmas tree and ornaments. Apparently it's bad luck to leave Christmas decorations up after the 6th. At home I leave them up until I feel like taking them down or until the tree starts to die which can be as late as February. It didn't affect my luck any, in some ways I'd say my luck was better then.

 

Anyway I hope you like my birthday earrings as much as I do. They were a lot of fun to wear.

 

 

£7.00 including shipping to the UK. $8.85 including shipping to the US.

Happy New Year!!!

 

 Happy New Year from all of us at the Dangling Journey! We hope you had a great Christmas and wish you a dazzling 2017.

I admit I didn’t give any previews for what’s coming up this year, but honestly I made several pairs of earrings before Christmas. I’m only going to release them one at a time though so I don’t run out of things to present. I also got lots of new supplies to make earrings with, so the journey continues.

I had two thoughts for this month; one was to try something different. Fortunately my birthday is this month (Friday to be precise) and a lot of other people I know have birthdays this month as well so I started thinking about birthstones. I looked at my supplier’s website and found Garnets reasonably priced, I can’t say the same for other birthstones though.

The second idea came to me while I was trying to go to sleep one night. I drew it on my phone. Unfortunately once I made them I deleted the drawing.

 

I think it looks rather pretty, even elegant. It features two 6mm garnet beads and one 6mm Chambala bead all hanging from a silver plated chain. The total length of the earring is 3 inches.

 

Any of the garnet earrings can be made in most birthstones. Here’s the complicated part – there are at least four different classifications of birthstones. I can get most from my supplier but there are a few (Diamond, Ruby, Emerald and Sapphire) that they do not supply or what they supply is actually glass and not rock or mineral. I have provided a chart and crossed out any that I cannot (or will not) supply. Only the best for my customers! No imitation stones here! Also some stones may be more expensive than garnet so if you order another stone I will quote you a price specific for your earrings before purchasing so there is no mix up. Colors: Jasper (leopard skin) Topaz (yellow/orange)

 

 

£8.00 including shipping to the UK. $9.85 including shipping to the US.