Margie and Me - The River Sea - #24

As you probably already know Marcie's Margie and Me Challenge has kicked off for 2011.

For the first challenge of the year I chose

The River Sea - #24

The different shades of green and the hidden browns and coppers really appealed to me as they are colours I often incorporate in my designs.

Here is my creation.

I created this bracelet using Melinda Barta's "Sparkly Wheels" pattern which featured in a 

previous issue of Beadwork.

I have used size 15/0 seed beads, 3mm fire polished Czech beads as well as some drop beads.

These wheels are so fun, quick and easy to make that I already have a shopping cart full of more 3mm beads so I can make some more!

You could easily make this bracelet in a day!

The biggest problem I had was deciding what beads to use!

Be sure to check out everyone else's creations on Marcie's blog, La Bella Joya.

♥

Visions of Winter

As most of you may already  know I am an Artbeads Design Partner.

The theme for this month is

Winter

When people think of Winter, visions of snow and snowflakes most likely come to mind.

Having never seen snow I could not imagine a white Winter.

Winter here in Queensland, Australia, is full of sunny days, a splash of rain but definitely no snow!

It's hard to be thinking about Winter in the middle of Summer but let's give it a go!

So... how can I best portray a typical Queensland Winter?

I decided to look to nature for the answer.

During Winter we have some of the most glorious flowers gracing us with their presence, preparing us for the beauty of Spring that is just around the corner.

Eucalyptus Iron Bark Gum Blossom

Wattle

Lavender

Ginger varieties

What great inspiration!

♥

A big day for all

My little man started school today. 

He has been so excited about starting school for the past 6 months or so but this morning he was nearly beside himself knowing today was the day.

I'm so pleased that Alan and I both took the day off so that we could take him to school and then pick him up in the afternoon without having to rush to and from work.

Here is my gorgeous little man before heading to school this morning.

He looked so smart in his uniform and his adorable little school shoes.

I was one very proud mummy and Alan admitted that he too got a little teary. 

I think the nicest thing was that Spencer was so proud to be wearing his uniform and so happy to be going to school.

It's hard to believe my little man is now at school. A new adventure for him and a new chapter in our lives.

As you can see, Spencer was a lot calmer than I was and of course had to sneak in a goofy smile and a thumbs up in at least one of the photos!

Arriving at school was overwhelming. So many parents and children... it's a whole new world to us!

Spencer discovered within minutes of arriving at his classroom that being at school involves lots of new things to remember...

Like remembering where to put your bag.

It was a very emotional day but I am proud to share that I managed to hold it together with my eyes only watering once...no tears!

As all the children were sitting on the mat in their classroom the teacher asked them all to turn around to mummy & daddy, wave goodbye and then blow us a kiss.

He looked so adorable with his big beautiful smile, waving at us with such confidence. It then hit me that my little man is growing up and I was so proud of him. 

With the rest of the day to ourselves Alan and I then went out for breakfast and enjoyed some child free shopping treating ourselves to some new clothes!

The rest of the day sped us by and before we knew it, the time had come for us to pick up our big boy.

It was wonderful to see his smiling face again. He was already acting all grown up showing us where things belong in his classroom and behaving like he had been at school for months knowing how to do everything!

When we asked him how his day was he enthusiastically said "SUPER"!!! telling us he had ''soooo much fun''!

Time to head home but not before stopping into McDonalds for a sundae as a special after school treat.

Whilst we were shopping we decided to surprise him with a new Lego kit. He has had his eye on the new Lego Ninja series so we bought him one of the tiny kits and he was so excited when we gave it to him.

He got out of his uniform, put on some comfy shorts and his slippers (as one does when they come from school in the middle of Summer!) and played because apparently now he is at school he can 

"do whatever he likes"!

Ahhhh kids!

What would our lives be without them?

♥

January seems to be the month of giveaways

What a wonderful way to kick on into 2011 with lots of fantastic giveaways and here is yet another.

Lori of Pretty Things has this awesome set of metal stamps up for grabs. 

I don't know how long I have wanted to give metal stamping a go. I have admired the work of artists such as Lori and Lorelei for quite some time now.

How awesome would it be to be able to stamp your own pendants, earrings... whatever... I reckon I'd be stamping everything including the kitchen sink... of course it would say "sink" or "fill me" or something sensible!

Be sure to drop into Lori's blog and check out this awesome giveaway.

Fingers crossed I win... and if not then let's hope you win!

♥

Want to win a pendant?

Jana of Helmitarha is having a giveaway to celebrate 100 followers on her gorgeous blog, 

Stories of the Secret Garden.

I've been a fan of Jana's for a little while now. 

Her bead work is perfection. 

She has a sense of style that is reflected in her beautiful pieces. 

She collects thimbles.

Loves visiting flea markets.

and.....

I consider her my friend!

Be sure to visit her beautiful blog showcasing her gorgeous bead work and be sure to tell her I said hello.

But be warned... I want to win that gorgeous pendant too!

♥

Challenges...get creative and keep the mind busy!

Well due to the floods here in Queensland I have been off work since Tuesday of last week. I thought having the extra time at home would be a great time to do some beading to take my mind off things. 

Well it wasn't...I have spent the last 5 days glued to my laptop checking out Facebook for flood updates as well as other sites.

I decided I need to start focusing on other things and realised that there are a few beading challenges taking place that I haven't even thought about yet.

Margie and Me Challenge

Marcie at La Bella Joya has kicked off the first Margie and Me Challenge for 2011 with not one but two colour palettes to choose from!

The River Sea - #24

And a colour palette chosen by Marcie.

Village  Corner

It's a photo of a little medicine shop in Dolores Hidalgo in Mexico, which she visited 5 years ago.

I am not sure which palette I am going to choose yet but as the pieces are to be shared on 29 January I better get a move on!

Bead Soup Blog Party

I am excitedly taking part in this party again this year, with 2010 being my first year.

An enormous 210 people are taking part this year so poor Lori of Pretty Things has had the mammoth task of pairing everyone up!

I have just found out that I have been paired up with Liz Deluca of Creative Arty Facts, a fellow Australian who is a very talented lampwork artist. I am excited to see what she sends me and between you and me... I am secretly hoping that one of her gorgeous beads is included!

♥

As I mentioned I haven't been beading much over the last week or two but here is a pair of earrings I finished recently which I hadn't shared with you.

They are from Marcia DeCoster's book, Beaded Opulence, and are the Medici Drop earrings.

Unfortunately I could not get my hands on some drops which were drilled horizontally but I think they still look pretty nice and I have worn them a few times already and they still sit beautifully.

I absolutely adore her book so am currently working on another piece.

This one is the Gabriella pendant. I have to admit I have struggled with this one at times. 

The pendant is actually a lot smaller than it appears in the image in the book and actually measures around 2.8 inches long by about 1 inch wide.

I don't think I thought through my colourway very well as the bronze seed beads I have used aren't really in contrast to the tigers eye beads but I think with a big chunk of tigers eye hanging off the bottom and strung on some contrasting beads mixed with tigers eye is shouldn't look too shabby!

Lastly check out this gorgeous bracelet I bought from Marcie of La Bella Joya.

I had my eye on this beauty ever since she made it and recently when she had a sale in her Etsy store I decided to treat myself!

Thanks Marcie!

♥

Flood update

I just thought I'd let you all know that we are safe and dry during these devastating and incredibly unbelievable floods here in Queensland, Australia.

I left work early on Tuesday morning and have not returned since. The main motorway, Centenary Highway, on which we travel to work is completely flooded. 

This is a 4 lane motorway - the major motorway into the city leaving thousands of people in the western suburbs stranded. 

You can see the set of street lights that shine over the four lanes of traffic... but where is the road?

We only drove over this bridge on Tuesday on the way home saying there is no way that this bridge would go under as it sits around 20 or 30 feet above the river. 

This gives you an idea as to how high the bridge sits above the river itself.

This is what the Centenary Highway and the bridge normally look like...

This is the same bridge less than 24 hours after we drove across it on the way home on Tuesday morning...

You can see the section of road that leads down to the bridge in both photos...now it's just one big river.

Now there is no sign of the bridge...

The city itself is a disaster zone so we have no reason for getting into the city other than to go to work.

My only other option of getting to work is by train. 

You can see the park I walk through daily from the train station at the bottom of the hill.
The walk from the station to my work is about 5 minutes ...thankfully the hospital I work in is at the top of another hill.

When I walked through this area on Tuesday morning the backyard of the white house on the corner had water in it which was about a foot deep. This shot was taken on Wednesday morning!

Keep in mind that it has not rained here much since Tuesday evening so most of this water has flowed in from the Brisbane River, not from a sudden down pour of rain.

 I am still finding it hard to believe that this is all happening. Even though Brisbane experienced a flood back in 1974, which I obviously did not experience, to see a city of this size flooded in this way is just ...well I can't even fathom it. 

You normally see this kind of flooding in smaller country towns where creeks or rivers have burst...not capital cities!

So far the death toll is sitting at 12 with this expected to rise as emergency services are able to access areas as the water clears.

My thoughts goes out to all those people who have lost loved ones, lost their homes or at threat of losing their home.

Thank you to all my wonderful blogging friends from around the world who have showed their concern here and who have also contacted me via Facebook.

♥

Flooding in Queensland, Australia

Do you remember me a few weeks ago complaining about the rain in my post Rain? What Rain! 

Well it is still raining and things are getting pretty serious here in Queensland now. 

It started raining on Saturday 18th December 2010. Since then we have had two days in which it did not rain - one day was overcast and one day was sunny and unbearably hot.

Today flash floods hit Brisbane which is where I am located. Up until now the floods have been in the Rockhampton and Toowoomba area with Toowoomba being hit very badly with 72 people missing and 9 people confirmed dead. Nearly the entire town has been evacuated. 

Here is an arial shot taken a few days ago... it is now much worse. Yep... the murky brown patches are water!

I had to leave work early today as the only two highways which lead into the suburb where we live were in danger. One was closed and there was talk of the other flooding. Thankfully I got home safely and without any dramas but at this stage I am not sure if I will be going to work tomorrow as some of the train lines are down as well as the roads.

The Brisbane River is now starting to peak in several areas with parts of the city being evacuated today. The river winds through Brisbane for many miles as you can see by image below which is just a section of the river.

Here are some photos taken today (not by me) of the ferry terminal located about 5 minutes from where I work.

This afternoon when I got home from work we called into the local shopping centre to pick up a few things for dinner. To our surprise so were hundreds of other people. Half of the shopping centre was closed as staff had either left early to get home safely or hadn't been able to get to work.

There was very little milk, no bread whatsoever, no eggs and the shelf of flour was nearly empty, assuming people were planning on baking their own bread.

People were stocking up on everything they could buy. The frozen vegetable section was nearly empty and people were buying bottled water by the case load.

Our local dam, which recently due to drought was down to around 24% capacity is now sitting at 190% capacity with the fear that it is going to rise in the next 24 hours. Apparently it can reach 200% before they start to panic.

It is all a little scary in this part of the world at the moment. The rain never stops. It might ease off... but it never stops.

My thoughts go out to those in areas which have been affected by water. I cannot comprehend what you are experiencing. My sister lost her home in the 2007 Newcastle floods which helps me understand what you must be going through to a small degree...pure devastation.

Surely it will stop soon?

♥

2010...creatively speaking

I was flicking through the hundreds of photos I have saved on my laptop thinking it was time I burn them to a CD and save them on our other computer. 

In doing this I decided it might be a good idea to organise my beading photos into years so I can look back and see what pieces I made for each year.

So here is a recap of what I got up to in 2010.

~~~

2010 started with teaching my beautiful nieces to bead in the first few days of January

Resulting in these beautiful earrings

I adore St Petersburg so I decided to make a few bracelets

Of course beading wouldn't be beading (at least for me) without a few beaded cabochons

and because I love working with cabs I made a few glass fused ones in my microwave kiln!

I excitedly took part in my very first Bead Soup Blog Party hosted by Lori of Pretty Things

I was jumping up and down with excitement and pride when I became an Artbeads Design Partner as part of their Blogging Program...the only Australian to be taking part at that time!

Designing pieces for  

Spring

Summer

and Fall

I took part in the "Margie and Me" challenge hosted by the wonderfully talented Marcie of LaBellaJoya

I discovered a wonderful group of beaders who have called themselves the Bead Mavens and entered their "Ice Queen Challenge"

as well as the Fashion Colorworks Beading Contest hosted by Zoya 

I took part in Erin's Challenge of Color blog hop with our colour palettes chosen from paint chips!

I won the Most Unusual Category for my entry into the Beaded Passion contest for my piece, Fingal Frolics, below

and I was honored to be interviewed by Beads Perles

...if you missed the interview please click HERE.

But the biggest highlight of 2010 for me from a beading perspective was to win the 

Wonderfully Whimsical category 

in the Use the Muse competition

with my Treasures of the North Sea piece

Sometimes I feel I'm not being as creative as I could, spending time worrying about what I am not achieving rather than focusing on what I have achieved. You might recall me speaking about this in a previous post, "I think that switch has just been flicked".

So it has been wonderful looking back on the pieces I created in 2010.

Here's to another year full of beads, creativity, inspiration, colour and challenges!

♥