2013

For the last few months I have well and truly neglected anything to do with my jewellery world. No Etsy. No making. No blog. Since September all of my time has been taken up with the Costa side of life. We had new starters to train and then I moved store in November to York which was really exciting, but tiring. Now I'm feeling a bit more settled I've been having a few jewellery related thoughts, some designs ideas, the actual urge to make something and I've been wanting to start writing again. The obligatory 2013 recap felt like a good excuse for a post! 

I wrote a post called 2012 - year of the gigs and 2013 has been pretty similar. At the start of 2012 I had promised myself more live music and that's something's I have tried to keep up in 2013. And will continue in 2014... This year I've seen The Gaslight Anthem, Green Day twice, Pitbull - don't judge me! And Dave Hause 3 times - I saw him as support for Alkaline Trio last year and he was fantastic. On this tour Northcote was support and was brilliant. Dave Hause played mostly on his own but was sometimes joined by Northcote and Mitchell Townsend, he said the idea was to play the songs from his new album 'Devour' as they were written, the album has a full band so to hear the songs stripped back to a guitar or piano was cool. 

I also tried to be a bit more "cultural" and went to the theatre for a few shows, we saw Beautiful Thing and Blood Brothers, with both I wasn't sure if I wanted to go but said yes anyway and both I really enjoyed! And then there was two Rocky Horror shows. This was a brand new production and it was awesome. We were a bit worried it wouldn't live up to the shows with David Badella in but Oliver Thornton was fantastic, as were the rest of the cast. 

I've been to London 3 times this year, all for gigs but on the most recent visit I went to the East London Design Show which helped fuel the jewellery fire. There was several jewellery stands, all with really different designs and techniques, some amazing work on show. 

I have continued with my silver smithing class, I missed the last few lessons because of work but am hoping all will be well for the new term. I made a rediculous bracelet, that took up the first two terms. Then loads of rings. Absolutely loads. I don't have enough fingers... And a couple of pairs of earrings. After the epic bracelet I have really just been experimenting (then turning the experiments into rings) and have discovered my favourite thing is the doming block. I love punches as well for making patterns but I think silver dishes is where it's at for my next few projects. I actually don't have any grand ideas for the new term so I'll have to have a think...

Here's to a great 2014!