The British Museum

Today we spent a lot of time at The British Museum.
This wonderful building with it's remarkable collection was founded in1753 and spans over 2 million years of human history.
We saw only a small fraction of the exhibits there. I was so impressed and really you could spend a week there and still not see it all.If you get the chance to be in London I would suggest you take a look, it is worth it. Admission is free, a donation is optional. Some special exhibits may have an admission charge. It is also a really beautiful building, light airy and of grand proportions.

Photos.
1. This reconstruction suggests the original arrangement of the jewelry worn by a Sumerian woman in the Royal Graves of Ur.
Lapis Lazuli, carnelian and gold.The gold beads have a bitumen core.

The site of Ur lies in southern Iraq ( modern Tell al-muqagyar). The ancient city was inhabited from as early as the Ubaid period( 6000-4200 BC) until the 4th Century BC.

2.Beads and bud pendants of gold, carnelian and lapis lazuli.
3. A gold and lapis lazuli diadem with pendants of bulls, buds and leaves.
Small animal pendants like these were usually made withhold leaf over a bitumen core.

I saw many beads on exhibition in the museum from different periods, these are just a few that captured my eye from this interesting and ancient site.

Off to breakfast now,

Cheers,
Jenni

Beads purchased in Turkey

Hello dear readers,

Here are a few beads I purchased in Turkey. Actually, the silver beads and tassels only are Turkish.
The colored and metal ones are from Afghanistan. I have seen these at home in Australia, but they seemed quite inexpensive which is why I purchased them!
The silver tassels were probably not a bargain, possibly cheaper than purchasing on the Internet though!

The bag is made from an old kilim and fits my iPad perfectly!I love the 'rose' on it.
That reminds me, I meant to say on my travel blog that I had rose syrup on my yoghurt each morning and rose jam. Both such a pretty color, too. ( we could also choose from persimmon or apple tea, both were tasty as well as beautifully fragrant)

I was a little disappointed as far as bead shopping in Istanbul goes.
I had this preconceived idea that I could just wander to the Grand Bazaar and purchase swathes of interesting beads at good prices! Ha! How silly wasI !?
We did find streets of bead shops that made me drool, but they were wholesalers and would not allow purchase of one of this or that and I was not in the market to purchase a huge load any way. Oh well, we shall see what comes next.. Maybe London or Hong Kong will pass some interesting little treasures my way.

Must away now,
It is good to be back and blogging, I missed it.
My daughter tells me I am addicted, I think she is right!......

Cheers for now,
Jenni

Bead Table Wednesday, goodies from Florence

Yesterday we visited a beading shop in Florence called Beaded Lily
It is in the Oltrarno area, which is the area where there are a lot of handcrafts and local artisans.
Lily and Tim have been in this shop for 10 years, Lily looking after the beading side of things and Tim creating lamp work beads. It is a great shop, full of beads, fantastic dressmaking dummies, old couches and chairs and generally a very eclectic look.
I purchased some things, of course!

In the above photos you can see;

1. The locally made charms, I totally love these.
2. The loot! Beautiful Italian wire mesh ribbon and silk cords, metal beads with mesh around them, locally made charms- the Duomo, the lily, the Florentine emblem, a beautiful large lion charm, some lamp work beads made by Tim, and a few other brass charms.
3. Metal balls in Italian wire mesh.

Unfortunately, Tim was not there when we went there, so I am tempted to go back today, which could be financially dangerous!

Cheers for now,

Jenni

Goodbye Venice

I have re-included the photo of the necklace I purchased from Davide Penso, (in Murano)as I had a request to see it in it's entirety, here you are Collette.
Davide is a glass tester for Vetrofond glass. Both the colors used in this necklace were a limited edition test glass. Both the cream and light olive green have a beautiful luminescence which is not that easy to capture in a photo.

The next photo are some interestingly shaped Venetian glass lanterns, which captured my eye when we were walking back to the Hotel Galleria one night after dinner.

Cheers for now,

Jenni

A Visit to Murano.

Roberto and Jenni at the tool shop in Murano.

Tools and necklace purchased and a view from our bedroom window.

Vittorio at his studio, making a duckling.

I visited the glass making island of Murano, a short distance from central Venice a few days ago.
The main objective was to visit the tool making store of Carlo Dona.
Carlo and his son, Roberto make wonderful tools for the lamp working industry.

I purchased x2 bell flower presses, a glass rod holder, a lion stamp, a murrini making mould and a tool to hold the copper wire whilst making the bellflowers. Oh yes, also a pair of tweezers and a "fin" press for making a design on fish or could also be used on leaves to leave an impression of lines.
I am thrilled with my purchases and can't wait to try them out.

I also visited Davide Penso, a lamp worker and designer I have long admired.
From him I purchased a green and cream bicone necklace, simple in design but beautiful in execution. Both colours have a luminescence about them that is not visible in the photo.

Back in Venice we dropped in to see the studio of Vittorio Costantini a master lamp worker whose speciality is items from nature. His amazing studio is full of fish, birds, insects and marine life, all so wonderfully life-like and all made only from glass. Beautiful!
I purchased a few items from him, one of them a blue-wren, a little bird that I use as my logo.

A totally wonderful day...!

Cheers for now,

Jenni

Color Palette blog walk - My Inspiration.

Hello dear readers,

Well as I mentioned in Monday's post, I am participating in Brandi's color palette blog walk.
(please see previous post for background information.)

I thought about where I drew inspiration from and, like a few others, I would have to say, I do take it from mother nature herself.
My particular source would have to be my own home garden.
Over the years, I have been a passionate gardener - planting nearly all the trees and plants in our garden over a 23 year period.

As I have an old Victorian-era home, a lot of my plants have had a cottage theme; lots of roses, bulbs and perennials. They are constantly changing, always beautiful and often re-seed in unexpected places, providing seasonal surprises.

These days, I do not do the hard work in the garden. However, I still take delight from it and take photos of it throughout the year. I can always find an interesting subject in the garden, even in the depths of winter.

I also like to collect old, sometimes slightly quirky, curios, so I have included a photo collage of a much-loved container in which I store my watch and bracelets.

The process of making a palette from a given photo has made me realise there are actually many more colours in almost any subject than I first registered with my eye.

Thank you, Brandi for organising this wonderful blog walk. I have really enjoyed making my palettes.
Hope you enjoy them, too!

Iris from my garden

Rainswept poppy

The old container on my dresser

Here is the list of all participants in the palette blog walk - for you to visit:

Monday, Feb. 28th
Brandi at Brandi Girl Blog
Erin at Treasures Found
Jen at Jen Judd Rocks
Shari at Exploring the Wonders of Life


Tuesday, March 1st
Karen at Creative Thoughts and Inspirations
Julia at UlvDesign
Jessa at The ReArtingDotNet Blog
Lyn at Lyn Foley Jewelry Blog


Wednesday, March 2nd
Jescalyn at Peach Honey Love
Paige at Paige Maxim Designs
Katrina at Ma Joie Press
Jenni at Jenni's Beads  YOU ARE HERE


Thursday, March 3rd
Christie at Displaced Urbanite
Rachel at TatterBeans
Brittany at The Home Ground
Cindy at Sweet Bead Studio


Friday, March 4th
Rachel at Balanced Crafts
Wren at Each Day
Kelly at Mackin Art
Kristy at Simply Shiny Blog

Cheers for now,

Jenni

Color Palette blog walk

Hello dear readers,

WEll, I hope you have all had a wonderful time at the bead soup blog party, my eyes are bleary from looking. There was a totally amazing array of gorgeous pieces, (Please see my previous post to catch up on all the wonderful work of 210 participants.)

If I have time, ( I am off to Venice on Fiday!) I will feature a few of my favourites.

Thank you to all who dropped by to look at my necklace and who kindly left comments, I really appreciate it.

However we are now moving on to the next wonderful event-

The color palette blog walk has started, organised by Brandi

This is the second palette blog walk organised by this successful designer and jewelry maker.
She is obviously also passionate about color in her life!


From Monday feb 28 until Friday March 4th you will be able to view 4 blogs each day that have made a palette or two from their own favorite photos.
If you are interested in color and photography please come along and have a look at all the blogs and their stories connected to their photos. It will be a lot of fun!

There is a group for each day of the week.

I will be showing mine on Wednesday, if you care to come along. Hope to see you then.

The main page back at Brandi's is here: color palette blog walk 2
List of participants-

Monday

Brandi at Brandi Girl Blog - http://www.brandigirlblog.com

Erin at Treasures Found - http://treasures-found.blogspot.com

Jen at Jen Judd Rocks - http://www.jenjuddrocks.com

Shari at Exploring the Wonders of Life - http://exploringthewondersoflife.blogspot.com

Tuesday

Karen at Creative Thoughts and Inspirations - http://karen-creativethoughts.blogspot.com

Julia at UlvDesign - http://www.ulvdesign.com/blog

Jessa at The ReArtingDotNet Blog - http://www.ReARTing.net

Lyn at Lyn Foley Jewelry Blog - http://lynfoleyblog.com/category/lyn-foley-blog-jewelry

Wednesday

Jescalyn at Peach Honey Love - http://peachhoney.blogspot.com

Paige at Paige Maxim Designs - http://pmaximdesigns.blogspot.com

Katrina at Ma Joie Press - http://majoiepress.com/blog

Jenni at Jennis's Beads - http://jennibead.blogspot.com

Thursday

Christie at Displaced Urbanite - http://www.displacedurbanite.blogspot.com

Rachel at TatterBeans - http://tatterbean.blogspot.com

Brittany at The Home Ground - http://thehomeground.com/blog

Cindy at Sweet Bead Studio - http://www.sweetbeadstudio.com

Friday

Rachel at Balanced Crafts - http://balancedcrafts.com

Wren at Each Day - http://theapronthief.com

Kelly at Mackin Art - http://mackin-art.blogspot.com

Kristy at Simply Shiny Blog - http://shinyadornments.com/simplyshiny

until then,

Cheers,

Jenni

Jewellery Display/Storage

Hello dear readers,

Storage of any item in a home can be problematic, especially if space is at a premium.
My home is not large so I am always on the hunt for interesting yet inexpensive ways to display  my jewellery items.
As I am starting to accumulate some nice items of jewellery, I wonder both where to store and/or display it.
Some of my more valuable items are placed in a "proper" case and put away in a drawer.
But others I want to see.

To me they are 'decorator' items in themselves.
Here are a few ways I have displayed some of my personal jewellery items.

This shaving mirror sits on my chest of drawers in my bedroom. The mirror is meant to rotate  for magnification when shaving, however that doesn't happen much these days! Too laden with necklaces!

This little metal tree sits in front of the mirror. It's perfect for small bracelets and a few pairs of earrings.

The earring frame is there too.! Oh look at those 60's white earrings... I never wear those!! These frames are easily made from framing materials and wire mesh.

Close by is the porcelain bust. This was probably not the most sensible purchase, the neck is too short and multiple larger items cannot be displayed easily on it. It is interesting to look at but perhaps not ideal for photographic purposes due to surface reflection. But I like it nonetheless.

I really want to acquire an old dressmakers dummy, I have been on the hunt for some time now... hopefully it will come my way one day soon.

Also on the chest of drawers is a lovely old container, an old family heirloom. I love the colours in this 

old piece. I usually keep bracelets and my watch in here.

(photo credit- This item was stored on Pinterest and sourced from Storage and Glee)

That's it for my own displays.

I came across this very novel storage/display system on Pinterest.

.

An old rake has been used on the back of a door as a holder for masses of necklaces.

I like the fact that it is sturdy, interestingly attractive and inexpensive.

All one needs is a handyperson to cut the handle from that old rake you have in the shed , and no longer use, clean it up a little and voila, instant display and storage!

ok, that's it for tonight folks,

cheers,

Jenni