Showing posts with label wood. Show all posts
Showing posts with label wood. Show all posts

Monday, 22 August 2011

How to Get a Day Right


Today started as crap, at 10 AM I was already sure that nothing is going to change this easily. Well, not easily, but it happened in the end: we bought 4 tickets (ladies only night) to an upcoming ballet performance at the Budapest Opera of Shakespeare's "A Midsummer Night's Dream", with the music of Mendelssohn. I just love the opera and love dance arts so I can't wait to see it, especially in such a great company.

And then in the evening we took a nice walk with Orsi, you know, the author of the guest post here, in search of banana turmix for me. It took a while but we wound up not only drinking turmix but eating the best rakott palacsinta (crepes cake) of the city.

So whatever strangers/work/conditions/etc. mess up, true friends can always make it right!

Thursday, 18 August 2011

Why Not 1.

Why not be just happy about the most simple things in life? Just like...

- Compliments about the new ring I bought yesterday
- 5 pieces of pogácsa free of charge from the baker in the morning
- Sizzling indian summer in Budapest
- The hottest (or so they say) chili paprika bush which will provide components for the gulyás we plan to cook in the garden on Saturday
- The book written in the unique style of Amos Oz
- The textile seahorse that turned into a cute brooch today
- Killer Callanetics lessons together with one of my best friends
- My friendly cactuses on the balcony that I got from the Mom of another one of my best friends
- And: why not?

Tuesday, 16 August 2011

Dedication


Yeah yeah yeah I know I am neglecting my blog and all that but believe me, I just wasn't in the mood of doing anything creative. Or better said, I have been creative in many other ways.

But now I have decided to dig a bit deeper into all this jewelry making and get more out of it. Now the decision has been made, I just need some time to realise it - I don't know about you, but this is always where the bottleneck is for me. So I will spend some time brainstorming and then discover all the possibilities that come to my mind and are affordable. Time to be as dedicated as possible!

Tuesday, 26 July 2011

Variations on a Pink Bead


Just please don't ask me to say anything right now. I have nothing to say. But please stay with me until it all gets better and I have something to say from my heart.

Saturday, 23 July 2011

Time


Companies are getting more and more innovative when it comes to marketing and promotion. At the company I work we have loads of such tools and presents and my favourite is a kind of magnetic sheet that consists of many words that can be separated by tearing them apart from each other and down from the head of the sheet itself. When you do this, you get a bunch of tiny individual words you can use as fridge magnets. There are a lot of professional words and a lot of ordinary words so you can just use them as a mosaic and compose funny sentences on the fridge.

We have one such collection in our company kitchen, it has already given us a lot of funny moments at work.

The main purpose of this tool is to make laboratory staff do the same when they are waiting for a session to run in the lab, as labs are full of fridges to store the reagents and so on.

But there is one word which means more than anything to me and yesterday, I must admit, I took this word to my desk and sticked it on a metal surface: TIME.

Do you know that time is the ultimate decisive force in our life, that no other thing has such a great power? With time you have everything. You must take it and use it for what it is and never waste it or take it granted, never think that you have as much of it as you want. The time that is gone is gone forever.

When you are late, you are late and cannot turn it around. When you are too late, you cannot buy more time. When you have no time, you have nothing.

Thursday, 21 July 2011

Cross the Sea

This piece has its owner already, a lady who loves lighthouses. She asked me a long time ago to make her something in the sailor-theme so I bought the components immediately but somehow forgot about the project later on. It was already a shame so now I recovered my backlog towards her.

These earrings are 8 cms long which could be too long for a lot of people but look great with the long neck and curly hair she has.

And then when I was ready I forgot to take proper pictures so I only have this one which I took for her to give confirmation via email. But I decided to post it anyway because this story brings warmth to my heart no matter how great or not the photo might be.

Sail on, cross the sea, find your lighthouse darling!

SOLD

Tuesday, 19 July 2011

No More Lonely Hearts

Do you remember the crochet acorn I received from a lady hand-making them in Holland?

I ordered it along with some other designs, such as this 100% romantic pink stuffed heart. I know it's not everybody's style, but believe me, the girls loved it at the fair, I saw many sad faces leaving when their Mummies said "no".

This is the only one I have in this color but in case you have a lady in your family or circle of friends who would be absolutely delighted to get a heart in the form of a necklace or charm or whatever your fantasy lets you find out, I still have some left in similarly wonderful colors. Just let me know and I will make it for you. Don't let hearts stay lonely!

Monday, 18 July 2011

Some Examples of Why It's Good to be a Woman


You can ALWAYS ask for help

No matter how stupid is the thing you want to achieve, how easy the task is, how disgusting the animal you want to get rid of - you can always ask for help. It can be your luggage, it can be parking your car, or a spider on your wall, several times in your life you will experience that asking for help is much easier than doing it alone. Men (I mean real men, not the imitation) love to help us and to look brave/smart/strong, so why not make both sides happy?

You can be nice

Yes, this is also a kind of luxury these days. A woman can always be nice without anybody thinking she is gay or is a stalker. You can make friends practically anywhere, you can talk to kids or dogs or anyone on the street, you can show your love to your friends and family without losing your image. What a relief!

And last but not least: Jewelry of course!

Tuesday, 12 July 2011

Back to Reality

I am back to life, back to reality - as the song says.

Yesterday I celebrated this with another piercing. They say once you start getting a tattoo, there is no more stopping to getting more (we'll see that) and more and as I see the same seems to apply for piercings. It was just a small one now but it made me so happy!

Today I celebrated the second day of this by making this bracelet. It has been a while now that I last had worked on a bracelet even though I had several ideas on my mind.

Thursday, 7 July 2011

Kitten in my Pocket


This charm with the kitten was a present from a far away country, where I ordered a couple of charms from. It is really cute so I definitely wanted to use it for a piece for young ladies and my past experiences show that actually almost any girl can be made happy with a charm.

So here it is: the kitten you can bring with you anywhere you like!

Waiting for a loving owner at a very pleasant price soon.

SOLD

Wednesday, 6 July 2011

Two Lives

I have a colleague, let's call her Esther. She works in the same position as me but for a different area and often says that actually we both have two lives which are very different from each other.

In one life we work at this company, dress according to the company policy rules (means clothes I would never buy if it wasn't for the policy), do certain things and represent something. In our other life we forget about all this and wear simple clothes and care about nothing else than finding the best place to run/cycle in her case, going for a trip in mine. Sometimes it is really like being two different persons in one.

In this other life today I walked many-many miles of forest paths, was laying in a field of wheat listening to the summer breeze and watching clouds go by over me, saw a deer standing behing us on the road as we were walking by, and discovered a hidden waterfall deep in the forest. I am now so tired and still not tired at all.

SOLD

Tuesday, 5 July 2011

Step aside

Again so much time passed without any post of new jewelry, I know. But you must forgive your La Kukac: she is on holiday and tries to spend as much time outside and with family as possible.

Today I was walking alone with our dogs in the forest and I walked so far only listening to my thoughts that at one point I did not really know where I was exactly. It did not bother me though - I kept on walking. Anyway, sometimes a step in the seemingly wrong direction or a step back can lead us closer to our destination. Just keep an eye on the goal to achieve, on the top you aim at and never mind if you need to step backwards sometimes or to the side in order to get there.

Thursday, 30 June 2011

Get rid of the pain: get a piercing!

I think today I discovered one great remedy for any kind of bad day: get a piercing! All the pain leaves your mind as the piece of metal enters your skin - and will stay much longer than the pain itself that you had before. I can say it really turned my bad day into a good one.

The wooden chest I show you here was a present from the girl who got this earring from me. She made it for tea filters but as I never drink tea we decided to use it for my supplies. Nowadays it is hard to even close it as full as it is, no wonder that last time I broke the glass when I wanted to pack my things up after the fair. It has small sections inside and smells of wood. Lovely, isn't it?

Unfortunately Kata, the maker does not have a blog or website which I could link here which is a pity as she has already made plenty of useful stuff worth showing.

Wednesday, 22 June 2011

Apples

Every fair is a lesson at the same time, a lesson from your customers - and also from those who did not become your customers.

One of such lessons from the last fair was that I need to make smaller, shorter earrings too, but I need to make them in the way that at the same time I do not lose sight of my own style.

This pair of earrings is one of those I made based on this pattern. Not too short though - you will later on see that I made some shorter ones too. It has the mark of my stlye on itself I think: the wooden material, the green color, the touch of nature in the form of an apple.

I hope you will like it!

Monday, 13 June 2011

Caretta


Today we browsed photos of Zakynthos, the island where I used to work and live for a while and I showed one taken of the Caretta caretta, the giant turtles which lay their nests at a southern beach of Zakynthos. If you are lucky enough you can see them swim next to your boat in the sea.

This key charm I made yesterday at the fair is my version and tribute to these wonderful animals.

Thursday, 9 June 2011

More space, less stuff


I am sure I have talked so much here about being against collecting property without any sense that it might even be boring by now. I even dedicated a post called Piles to this.

Those days we organized an evening with my friends when everyone brought their clothes they don't need anymore. We had fun and everybody was happy to get rid of their unneeded stuff and get some new for free.

Now I am making the next step and put some more on sale on eBay (you can take a look at them here). I like these clothes and they are in very good condition but I feel like they are strangling me.

I guess I need more space and less stuff.

SOLD

Tuesday, 7 June 2011

Theoretic questions about going on a holiday with your dog(s)

We are back from holiday but I promised myself that I will share one impression with you on the blog.

The subject is: where can you go with a dog?

The answer could be simple: anywhere! This is what I see in Austria for example - it is totally normal to go shopping to the mall with your dog by your side. In Hungary you just cannot do this. Malls are forbidden area for dogs, but to make you happy some of them organize one day per year when they open their doors to your best friend too. Wow, I should be impressed I guess...

But I know, I might be wishing for too much so let's just stay outside and discover our beautiful nature together. But forget about lakes, even the most remote and empty ones have huge signs at their entrance: dogs are not allowed! Well, first of all, we wanted a holiday to spend with our little "family" together so leaving them in the car is out of the question, just as leaving the lake is. This is what happened to us at every lake during our break.

Funny thing is, in the end we could enter all of these areas with our dogs and also swam with them in the cool water. So if the people who are there or even who take care of the lake don't bother, why the warning sign?

This all also leaves a theoretic question in my head just as the "dogs forbidden" parks of our country. What is the real reason behind? Dogs are dirty? Well, I travel on the tram with a lot of people who are much dirtier than our dogs. Dogs will piss in the water? They don't even do it in front of us when we go for a walk but they search for a hidden place. Dogs spread diseases? And what about men who forget to wash their hands after going to the restroom?

So the end was happy as you see: we were not forbidden. Only in theory. As long as it stays like this, I will leave my questions theoretic too.

SOLD

Friday, 27 May 2011

Coins

Now you will understand why I use coins so often for my jewelry: because I love them in general.

As I collect foreign coins, whenever somebody around me travels to a place I have never been I always ask them to bring one coin for me. I also love to hunt for them at antique shops or bazaars abroad where I can buy them by the loads and make a good bargain for them. I have many which I could not identify so far because I cannot read the Arabic or foreign letters and even the seller did not know where they were from.

So by now I have collected quite a few. I hope to get a proper album or display for them one day but until then, they are just as fine in the ceramic mug I keep them in.

Wednesday, 25 May 2011

What Everybody Must Know about Hand-made and Natural Jewelry

I have been thinking about writing this post for a while but today I felt like it was time.

When people look for and buy jewelry they do it out of fun if it is for themselves just as well as if it is as a present. Jewelry is something you can live without but you don't want to. Nowadays a customer can choose of thousands if not millions of offers on the web and all over the place. You can want almost anything, sooner or later you will find the maker for it.

But if you want natural materials and/or hand-made stuff, your expectations must be a bit different. These aspects are better considered before than after the purchase. Many of them are positive ones of course and don't really wish for considering but some do.

It is easier to sum up what you do not buy with hand-made jewelry: pieces that are produced by the thousand in China, pieces that are made by machines, pieces that mean a compromise for you and that you will see on many others. What you do buy is jewelry made with care, made by taking the time for it, and most of the time pieces that are unique. In my case, you can be sure you will never bump into any duplicate piece anywhere. I can make similar pieces but never duplicates. It is a kind of principle that might sound stupid but for me it increases the value of each item. This can be one of the reasons why I am so happy when I actually meet the person who will wear my stuff - because the person is just as unique as the piece of jewelry she bought.

But you must know that because humans make mistakes and machines do not, your hand-made item might not be perfect in the sense of being flawless. Every jewelry-maker aspires to do their best but we are not CNC-machines to be able to do exactly the same bend or length twice.

In the case of natural materials, this factor is even more important. Nature is perfect in its own way but not in the way machine-moulded plastic pieces can be. Please do not expect a wooden bead to look or feel like it was plastic - fortunately, this is impossible. Do not expect two beads to be 100% identical if they are made of ceramic or shell or wood and so on. The necklace of today is a good example to this: this is the whole amount of this big brown wooden bead that I could get and some are not immaculate. But I loved them and decided to use them. Still, the necklace will not fall apart because of these faults. If you look at the whole piece itself you will see that these small faults will not worsen the overall image.

As you might have already noticed I am fully against anything plastic, for many reasons. First of all, it is artificial and just as much as I don't like it around me, I will not wear it on my skin, after all it is nothing but a lot of disgusting and harmful chemicals moulded into a kind of desired shape. A plastic bracelet is no different from a plastic bag you get for free at the check-out of the supermarket.

As for my items, I am always ready to give as much information as possible. If we meet personally, you can always check my items however you want to, you can try them on, you can compare them, we can talk about them for as long as you want to, I can even make certain modifications if this is your wish. You are not just a customer but a person who holds a piece of my inner self in her hand and who values this effort.

Considering all this, what you can expect from a hand-made natural piece is to be perfect in the sense as anything natural is perfect. You can expect it to be unique, to reflect your own style and to last a certain time.

And besides all this, you can be sure that you will respect, cherish, and love this piece of jewelry more than any other you have bought in a shop never knowing where it was from or who it was made by.

SOLD

Tuesday, 24 May 2011

Rain from Holland

Two weeks ago I finally received a very much expected package from Holland. It contained the works of a lady living there and making cute crochet stuff.

I discovered her on Etsy selling her crochet works. You can also visit her shop here.

She made some custom items for me upon our common ideas.

The acorn key charm I present here today was made using an acorn made by her. Just as I was making it today the rain started to fall after a hot summer day in Budapest, refreshing the air and cleaning the mind. It seems that as I opened the package I let the Dutch rain out of it together with the items.

Or maybe it is just that the acorn is lonely and sad all alone. Waiting for a nice owner to take care of her!

SOLD