My Garden...oh so pretty

May flowers

Three of my favorite flowers seem to be especially prolific this month.

LILAC

COLUMBINES or GRANNY'S BONNETS

 

and PANSIES

 

 

Which is your favorite?

 

My Garden in April and May

Tubs, Cloches and Cats

 I bought three new tubs for the patio, now of course I want to replace all of them...next year perhaps!

.

and at last a large cloche for the vegetable garden, so I can keep my plants under cover until the danger of frost has gone.

We had some warm weather yesterday so I decided to open it to let the air circulate.....but guess who took advantage of a new place to sunbathe!

  

.....yes Hoot of course...I suppose I must be grateful all four of the cats didn't move in! 

and now some of the very beautiful May flowers

 

 

And even the dandelions are amazing this year!

  I would love to hear about your gardens, window boxes or favorite outdoor space!

Spring

Has Spring come at last?

Snowdrops one of the first flowers in my garden ...and one of my favourites!

Designer Challenge

Introducing NoSnowSupplies from Etsy

At the end of last year Etsy shop owner Vente from Lithuania asked me if I would like to use some of the products from her shop..Nosnowsupplies and see what I could create with them.

Soon a packet arrived...

I was fascinated to read why and how Vente set up her shop.

This is what she told me

I’m a journalist by profession. I opened my shop a few years ago. I`ve always enjoyed arts and crafts, and was always making something with hands, especially during winters, which are very cold here, sometimes so cold, that people don`t leave their houses for several days (so you can see why I named my shop "no snow supplies" :-). I inherited a big box of buttons from my grandmother, who was a tailor, and then started to collect vintage beads and buttons from various sources to mainly use for myself, until I realized I really have too many and it was time to open a shop. I love vintage beads because of their bright colours and funny shapes. I think that contemporary beads are not made this creatively. I mainly sell beads from the Soviet Union, West Germany, Austria, Italy, France, Czechoslovakia and Japan. They date 1950-1970`s. I also have some modern beads, but not much. These soft flexible plastic beads are from West Germany, a small town, called Kaufbeuren, which had a big bead factory and a jewelry school (both closed already). There was a huge fashion to wear jewelry and accessories made from these beads in 1950`s and you can still find some in the flea markets in Europe (they were exporting them all over Europe and also to US). They`re fun to play with and can be stacked in different designs. These beads are very hard to find and my stock is limited. 

 

  So I started working with the plastic ‘flowers’, they are very light and flexible so layering them was very easy. I added a few supplies from my own stocks and here is what I came up with, I hope you like them.

I used white knotted cotton cord for the necklace then layered the green and white flowers, finishing them off with crystal glass beads .... I made matching earrings too.

and then some more earrings ...

Dark blue and pale yellow flowers, I added silver wire centers and dark blue rings and completed the earring with silver studs

 

Orange feather shapes with paler glass flowers

Dainty lilac daisy with three tiny plastic flowers bunched together in the center. I added tiny glass seeds and silver ear wires

This shape was really challenging , I layered it with a paler yellow flower, a white bead center and a tiny yellow seed bead to finish. ... I was pleased with the results.

For this bracelet I layered the brown and black flowers and added some natural wood beads. I affixed them to a dark charcoal crocheted wrist band.

 If you would like to try them for yourself  here is Vente's shop address on Etsy.http://www.etsy.com/shop/nosnowsupplies

Vente has lots of other goodies in her shop, well worth a visit!