A very special purchase ...

It's been a long time since my last post (too long to remember actually), well, summer passed and the kids are back at school and finally I shall be able to catch up on some much needed blogging. In the coming days I also want to share with you more posts of special events from the summer, like: meeting the EST girls, our summer holiday through europe, my etsyversary and also my current packing up of the house and moving back to NZ (which btw is 5 weeks tomorrow .. and counting) ..

But first, a beautiful package arrived in the mail today. I first came across TanyaMac in the Europeanstreetteam on etsy around about a year ago. Recently I spied some gorgeous new listings in her shop that really made me JUMP! So, I convo'd her and asked her if she could do a little custom order for me .. and here's what she made. I shall be taking these treasures with me back to New Zealand to adorn our new home there. A set for 'autumn' and a set for 'summer' but I think they are so beautiful they'll be adorning my home throughout the entire year. What do you reckon?

'Autumn'

'Summer'

Pricing holders

For the past few weeks and certainly like super crazy this weekend (I have afterall been child free these past few days) i've been gearing up like crazy for the Maastricht craft fair in Holland. The fair isn't until the 16th August but the kids and I are packing up the car next weekend (9th to be precise) and heading off on our little road trip (well, ok it's not so small it's a 2100km trip) .. My dear friend Mitsy a.k.a Artmind recently posted a tutorial on her blog (she's a tutorial MASTER) that was all about making memo clip holders and kind of orientated towards 'price tags' .. now, this was something I really wanted to try as I hadn't yet organised a thing for my pricing options for the fair.

I did end up modifying it a little bit based on the materials that I already had here at home. Instead of using the loo rolls I decided to make use of some colorful silicone cupcakes I had had sitting around (I can bake a cake and biscuits but i'm seriously crap at baking cupcakes) .. matching paint, some meat skewers and some mini clips .. and here is my effort:

I HIGHLY recommend that if you don't already follow Artmind's blog .. you should be .. it's always updated with super interesting posts, tutorials and amazing things.

http://artmind-etcetera.blogspot.com/

Thanks Mitsy .. you are the BEST girl!

The Garden Shed / Wild Woman Jewelry

Through the wonderful treasury hunting world on Etsy, I met and became friends with Karon from Wild Woman Jewelry .. Karon has been such a supportive friend for me and it was with anticipated pleasure that I was awaiting for her to open her new shop thegardenshed . I follow (when time permits lol) Karon's blog and was always so impressed by her beautiful photography she has on her blog wildwomanjewelry.blogspot.com/ and was suitably happy when she announced that she would be opening a shop with photography in it! Karon has a keen eye for color, you'll see this in both of her shops.

Here are some selections of her work:

emergence

reach

innocence

If you have the time please visit both of Karon's shops, she has so many beautiful creations that are sure to be wonderful gifts for yourself, your family and your friends.

I am thrilled to have bought 2 of her prints .. they will be framed and hung on my walls proudly once I arrive back in NZ.

Nanouke's bracelet

Looky looky!! I feel thoroughly spoiled .. this is the bracelet Ana a.k.a nanouke made for me and gave to me on sunday at our meeting .. isn't it just absolutely divine?!!! I LOVE it .. beautiful greens, bronzes and natural colors combined in this one stunning bracelet.

See her shop for more beautiful knitted wire creations! Thanks a million sweet Ana :)

Super Happy sunday 12th July - meeting Nanouke!

This past sunday (12th July) I had the enormous pleasure of meeting up with fellow Etsyian, Ana a.k.a Nanouke .. for those of you that have 'met' her virtually she is exactly as how she appears on Etsy, fun, lovely, caring, gorgeous and so terribly funny!

I left home around 10am (meant to be away earlier but overslept) and headed off in the direction of Lisbon .. 2 hours later I arrived in Ana's home town of Torres de Vedras and oops, accidently took the north exit instead of the south exit but never mind .. she came to my rescue!

We headed off to a café to sit and have a little chat. Mitsy a.k.a ArtMind had posted to me a little pressie to give Ana (I so keep wanting to call her Nanouke .. and the poor darling did get me calling her that throughout our day together). Here is Ana opening her surprise from Mitsy at the café where we sat and chatted for a while:

We got into Ana's car and headed off to the beach area of Santa Cruz .. to have a beautiful wander around this gorgeous seaside village (which by the way is one of Ana's favourite beaches)

It was an absolutely pleasantly warm to hot day .. enough to be hot but there were little cooler breezes around to cool you down a little.

We decided to walk down to this rock shown here in the water (it has a giant hole in it)

Here's Ana showing us her beautiful brooch from Mitsy and also you can see the hole in the rock behind her .. and the just beautiful beach area of Santa Cruz.

Ah huh .. we managed to ask this dear older woman to take our photo together .. after 4 or 5 attempts she managed to take this photo of us without chopping our heads off :)

The hole in the rock, rock. You see, i was thoroughly fortunate to be with Ana on this day as she was able to give me a geology lesson and tell me about how these rock formations (and hills to the side) are around 40 million years old and instead of being slanted as they are now they used to lie flat ... she's really brainy about all this!!!

This is a delightful little church that we saw in our wandering through the village of Santa Cruz.

We spent around 7.5 hours together .. chatting, chatting, laughing and chatting and laughing some more. I had the BEST day with Ana .. it was so wonderful to have this opportunity to meet her.

Ana knitted me the most beautiful bracelet .. I haven't taken the photo's of it yet (shame on me) but when I do I shall be sharing this with you as well .. it's extremely elegant and beautiful! Thank you so much Ana.

Towards the end of the day we sat up on a little hill overlooking the sea and watched the beginnings of the sun set ... we talked about so many wonderful things .. ha ha especially etsy (which is most likely no great surprise to you all) .. but not just that, about our lives, our families, our friends .. all of it perfectly natural and special. In so many ways it was like meeting up with an old friend even though this was our first meeting.

A big and enormous hug Ana, thanks so much for making my sunday one of the highlights of my 7 years here in Portugal .. I hope that we'll do this again before too long.

Just one more thing to add. The portuguese people are a truly lovely and caring 'race' of people, Ana is no exception to this but she has that something extra, extra warmth and zest.

Hugs and beijinhos, Kerrin xox

I heart Laura Slocum - etsyprojectembrace

As we walk through this life we, unfortunately, will come into contact with cancer, be it through our own experiences or through a loved one, family or friend. While this in itself is a hurdle to overcome we can build on this, gain strength and support from others and maybe along the way.

The community of treasuries within Etsy is quite amazing .. as a treasury hunter myself I have had great fortune to meet and make friends with incredible people the world over. Here we all are, creating these collections, hoping to give the coveted front page prize to others, going through and clickety clacking, commenting on each others treasuries and unbeknowing to many .. creating real friendships along the way.

Laura Slocum aka lauraslocumpainted (one of her 3 shops on etsy) whom I 'know' through these treasuries on Etsy is currently undergoing chemotherapy treatment in her dealings with stage 3 ovarian cancer. I have seen the support and caring she has and is receiving through her close personal friends within our Etsy community. Kim aka slinkymalinkicat and Amy aka ThePeachTree have organised an amazing project called Etsyprojectembrace .. to create awareness and to raise money in the research of cancer.

This is a message that laura wrote regarding her experience:

I believe that you must play the hand you’re dealt. Six weeks ago, I was diagnosed with stage 3 Ovarian Cancer. My mom died from the same. I am a huge believer in eating right, exercising, and getting regular checkups. I’ve done all those things, yet, I have cancer. WOW. That’s a life-changing situation, for sure. I just turned 46 …. (a very very young 46!) Strangely, I feel blessed. Most everyday of these 6 weeks, I’ve had a smile on my face. I’m going to play the hand I’ve been dealt in the best and most positive way I know how. I’m so fortunate my boys are older, they drive, they can do laundry and help around the house. There will always be some people in this world who have it better and some who have it worse. That’s just life.I’ve been an Etsy addict since around this time last year, when I started doing treasuries. My sister Jenn, of jennreese7 and my niece Kelly, of SweetnessJewelry, are also crazy about Etsy. The one thing I’ve learned in the past year is that Etsy has made it a point to have their competing sellers be friends through promoting each other in the treasuries. That sounds kind of funny, but, on the quest to have the “coveted” FP, we create treasuries, we comment on other treasuries, we “convo” people all over the world to congratulate them on their successes, and we make friends. Aren’t we supposed to be competing for sales?? Well, maybe some things are just more important than sales. From the moment I had a diagnosis, while still in the hospital, my Etsy friends were first on the scene – building treasuries just for me, wishing me well, offering advice, sending gifts, and a few have gone so far as to donate proceeds to the American Cancer Society in myhonor!! Just to remind you………these are people ....I’VE NEVER MET! They have completely gone out of their way to be a friend or try to put a smile on my face. I now even talk to some of them on the phone! Now, I’m not talking 2 or 3 friends, I’m talking like 30 or 40! Some people just have checked my profile and offer words of encouragement! The first day that we learned about my chemo and all the ‘ins and outs’, the ‘goods and bads’, etc., my husband went online to search for support groups. He said to me that night, “I will never do that again, I was so depressed that I had to get off the computer” I said, in reply, “I don’t need support groups, I all need are my friends on Etsy”! They lift me up on a daily basis.

It is Sunday. Tomorrow morning, I will leave my house at 7:30 am for my first round of chemo. I will have an IV drip for about 6 hours and be home around 5:00 pm. I will do that again on Tuesday, then again on Wednesday. then again on the following Monday. I look forward to 8 months of that chemo schedule, followed by another year of some form of maintenance chemo.

There are 4 things I know for sure:

1. I am a Christian and I believe God has a plan for me.

2. I believe in myself to do the very best I can do and try to help others in the process by getting my story out there.

3. I have the most wonderful and supportive husband, family and friends.

4. Logging onto Etsy everyday and hearing from my friends will keep this smile on my face, not matter what I am going through.

You can help and give support as well. If you would like to take part in helping to raise the awareness and money for research of cancer contact slinkymalinkicat or ThePeachTree for further information OR do a search on the word etsyprojectembrace on Etsy and buy one of the amazing creations that is taking part in this project. Proceeds of these sales are being donated to American Cancer Society

Life is short and life is precious .. I love to make each day count.

As I get any further links I will be adding them to this post. Thank you for taking the time to read this.

Signified

YAY .. I finally did it!! I got my 2nd shop opened on Etsy. For a while I have been wanting to do this as I just didn't enjoy seeing my mosaics and magnets mixed up together in one shop. I love to make my magnets and I am so happy that I have finally got Signified up and running.

I must thank two very special friends for helping me out.

Renate from Kreativlink who gave me the right 'push' into getting off my behind to make this happen and also for helping me with the new shop name .. thanks so much .. you ARE a genius!

Frances from enchantedpond who created the banner for Signified and also a new banner for my Sigmosaics shop on etsy .. thank you so much as I am thrilled with them both!

euphorianchicstudio

I came across Yoshika's art work once in someone's treasury .. ever since then I regularly check her shop's, euphorianchicstudio and euphorianchic to sit and drool over her latest creations.

Lavendar berries 3pc Set 3D Relief Wall Art Metallic Gold Finish .. completely beautiful art work with her unique 3D signature relief

Set of 3 Flower Room Illustration Prints (Branch Version) from Yoshika's euphorianchic etsy shop which is filled with prints of her original art work and gorgeous eco tote bags

Pawprints and new work

Once again i've let time pass without posting .. so, i'd LOVE to share with you a few special things!

A few weeks back I had a request through a potential customer to see if I could custom make something 'dog related' on bowls. Pawprints seemed to be a good direction to head in. I had a discussion with my friend Mitsy and look what she came up with:

Mitsy (a.k.a Artmind) was extremely helpful and made these amazing pawprint tiles for me to use in my mosaic works for this customer (as yet I haven't made a bowl but you can see a little bit further down for what I have made). I'm really excited by these pawprints, they are completely perfect and so terribly cute!

While I was awaiting the tiles to arrive I tinkered around with my own ceramic tiles and handcut paw prints for a small bowl. I think it came out pretty well actually .. (there are 3 of these placed evenly around the bowl). The customer really loves this and has also seen the pictures of Mitsy's tiles so she's VERY excited about all of this!

Having the kids away for the weekend has been absolute bliss .. as much as I miss them it's been great just having time for me and time for making some new mosaics .. here is a sample of some of my new work in my etsy shop

Perfectly purple dish

Little lemon eggcup

TO DO LIST ....

I'm one of those people that writes lists, oh how I love a good list .. I gain a certain amount of satisfaction from crossing things off my list.

Over past months i've been building up a good supply of items to mosaic .. I stopped writing a list about what I needed to mosaic .. it's gotten a little big ....

This is a small 'preview' of some of the types of creations that you will be seeing sometime (i hope soon) in my shop.

Face painting ..

It has quite literally been a cracker of a day today .. no clouds, loads of sun and heat! Nice. The perfect day for playing outside in the garden ... and frollicking around being silly twits together .. I love that!

The my son says 'mummy can you paint our faces' .. 'please' (you know, that whining please that won't let up until you action what they want) ...

anyone would think that their father was spiderman .. it's almost always the same face requested .. unfortunately this time though I'd run out of black face paint so they had to settle for red with brown webbing ..

My eldest daughter (aged 5 going on 25) did her own .. actually i thought it was none to bad indeed .. you can be the judge ..

Gabriel and Simone

Inês

together .. spiderman RULES!

LeelaBijou

Maria from LeelaBijou recently hosted a giveaway on her blog http://lilbitof.blogspot.com/2009_02_01_archive.html . It was maybe the 2nd or 3rd time I had entered a giveaway and I truly was a bit gobsmacked when she let me know I had won!!

When the mailman recently brought me a package from the Canary Islands I was very excited as I knew it was the necklace!! Maria had super gorgeously included a beautiful mountainous photo from Gran Canaria, a really sweet photo that read ' Congratulations dear Kerrin' and a lovely note AND a discount voucher! Phew!!! She's got her marketing skills done well!! You see, I have been coveting some of her work .. so how could I not go visit her shop and use the voucher?!!!

Funnily enough (she must be a mindreader) she included a mars bar too .... it was yummy!

So I will share with you in the photo below the perfectly lovely necklace I won and then just a few images of some of the other unique and wonderful creations that Maria has in her Etsy shop LeelaBijou do please go visit her shop!

This is MY necklace :D (but that's not me in the photo .. i'm not that white, oh ok, i'm not that slender either ... oh ok, probably my boobs don't sit that firmly these days too ... geesh! )

Exquisite green crystal ring

Romantic collection - Tender Topaz - Spring collection

Romantic Collection - Purple Tulips - Spring Collection

Yoni glasses

Today the post van drove up and delivered a box I had been waiting for .. with supplies I had purchased recently in Holland :) I had actually forgotten that I had purchased some 'Yoni' glasses whilst sipping a coffee in a café in Holland ....

~YONI~ glasses .. for coffee .. oh, of course they could be for tea too!

Yoni of course has another meaning .. click here to see what else it means (other than a super cool way to drink that hot cuppa without burning your fingers on the glass because it is double glassed so it keeps your beverage hot while keeping your fingers cool) ...

some may find it strange to drink from something shaped like a 'you know what' and well I suppose it is .. still, they are pretty jolly cool if you ask me!

Oh to be flexible again!

Earlier tonight the kids were practising their kindy 'gymnastics' ... look at what my almost 4 year old can do ..... and i must add that her head is not touching the floor!

My Secret Easter Bunny ... it's here!!

This year the European Street Team (which I am so proud to be a member of) on Etsy decided it would be a fun idea to make a 'Secret Easter Bunny' surprise (continuing on from last years very successful Secret Santa). ArtMind aka Mitsy is our wonderful team member who coordinated everything, sent out questionnaires and matched each of the particpants with another team member.

We have until 25th March 2009 to make our secret easter bunny surprises and I was terribly excited the other day when the postman delivered a very special package to me!! It came all the way from Italy ... can you guess yet?

I have to admit that i'm not the best at waiting until easter to open my surprise and as soon as I saw who it was from I just HAD to open it!

can you guess YET????

My secret easter bunny is none other than enchantedpond aka matchstickgirl aka the super lovely Frances.J.Melhop ... !!! I feel like the luckiest girl on the planet as I am totally in love with her work!!

She wrapped my surprise in the coolest bright orange paper and drew the cutest Easter Bunny on it .. clever girl eh what!






Mmmmmh, now what could be inside here????????








I am now the super proud owner of 'a real fairy' photo ... and I am just dying to get it framed so that I can hang it on my wall and gaze at it daily!! If I sound like i'm gushing over this, believe me I am ... I was literally bouncing off the walls when I realised who the Postman had brought me a package from ... my kids did look at me rather strangely :)




I was going to borrow my neighbour to take a photo of this most amazing 'a real fairy' photo but decided to try to do it myself :) Excuse the ever so slightly 'dorky' pose but I had to kind of crouch down to get myself and the fairy in the shot .... (hey, it's a large photo of the fairy and i'm standing on the bidet!!) ....

Frances, I cannot thank you enough for this incredible photo ... I adore fairies, I adore pink and most of all I adore your work ..

And thank you again Artmind for going to such a tremendous effort in making all of this happen!

Frances honey, you really do rock .. you totally made my day in giving me this special photo and I encourage every single one of my readers to check out Frances's shops enchantedpond & matchstickgirl ..... to see more of her amazing work!

Holland trip and mini EST meeting

Recently I had the supreme good fortune to travel to Holland for 10 days to stay with my best buddy Vanessa (fellow kiwi lass living with a dutchman there) ... it was much needed time out!! I want to share with you my meetings of some very special ladies from the EST (europeanstreetteam on Etsy) .. 10 days wasn't long enough in the end and I missed the chance of meeting more, but maybe we'll have a EST convention after all this year, who knows!

First of all Vanessa and I travelled to the city of Schiedam (near Rotterdam) to meet up with Liz of AgapeBridal. Liz is a super gorgeous Singaporean lady (and she is just as lovely and sweet as she appears on the thread!) married to a dutchman. Liz's husband stayed up the night before to make chocolate muffins, especially for our visit .. how sweet is that?! Dear Liz made us the yummiest shepherds pie for lunch too!

I had recently (before going) purchased a few gorgeous items from Liz's etsy shop (AgapeBridal) and I asked her to wait and give them to me on this day!! We had the honour of seeing Liz's wedding album (which is in the form of an amazing hardcover book) ... extremely beautiful photo's with touching words throughout. I'm not at all ashamed to share with you that both Vanessa and I cried over one part of the album, it was breathtaking.

This is a photo of Liz and I .. you know, I actually felt short over in Holland but I was feeling kind of tall that day when I met Liz ;)

A few days later we travelled to the city of Eindhoven to meet up with Mitsy from Artmind and and Myrte from Mirthquake and MirthQuakeClothing. Goodness me, I don't think Eindhoven has heard such laughter from a group of girls for a long time! Seriously, we met, me sat, we talked and talked and laughed and talked and giggled and talked and laughed some more!! It was the best time i'd had in such a long time ... our jaws were hurting from all the laughter! They'd (the cafe/restaurant) NEVER have believed us if we told them it was our first time meeting each other. Myrte gave us all gorgeous buttons from her shop and Mitsy had baked very special biscuits for us all .. totally yummy! Two more truly awesome, sweet, lovely and gorgeous girls from the EST team!!

These are photo's from that day .. I must just point out that in the first one I am wearing my jewellery purchases from dear nanouke. Stylish and funky stuff eh what!!

I came back feeling refreshed and was immediately swept up in masses of hugs and kisses from the kids .. nice to know I was missed!!