Glad To Be Back

   For all those who used to read this blog and would have been thinking the blog had been closed, I'm happy to say I am once more back using the blog to show off the beads I'm making plus more of my customers jewellery, jewellery in which my beads have been used.

 This I hope will give people ideas on how you can produce pieces of jewellery to wear with beads from my online Etsy shop https://www.etsy.com/uk/shop/pebbledreams
   At this stage, I would like to ask any of my customers who would like to have any pieces in which my beads were used shown on here to just send me any pictures and I'll happily post them for all to see. With us being in lock-down because of the Corona Virus more people are trying new crafts including jewellery making and bead jewellery is indeed a wonderful way to start. You will find a wide range of beads in my shop from the basic plain inexpensive spacer beads to the more expensive unique one-off beads many of which are only found in my shop. All beads I sell are hand made by myself I do not sell any mass-produced imported glass beads. I do sell a small range of Greek-style ceramic beads which can be used on their own or alongside my own beads and there is also a small range of metal Greek-style pendants.

   So please everybody try to stay safe out there and while you're in lock-down and looking for new things to try have a think about making some stunning bead jewellery like many of my wonderful customers. With the help of a huge number of books and youtube tutorials which show how easy it is to start making your own jewellery I'm sure you will be surprised how easy it can be. So go on, give it a go I'm sure in no time you'll be proudly wearing your own handmade pieces.

Thousand Up!!

   After many years selling the majority of my beads from my Ebay shop, it was only last year that I decided to concentrate on building my shop on Etsy into my main source of income, it was going to mean hard work and many long hours at my torch but was surely going to be worth all the effort.
   At this time I had been seriously thinking of giving up my Ebay shop, their selling charges had gradually risen and the shop rent was not cheap, ok on a good month it was fine but if you had a bad month of sales then it really could hit your profits. So after a few evenings research and checking numbers and pricing I felt it was time for a change. The first job was to clear out my Etsy shop of old stock and start to list nice fresh new sets and focal beads, which was quite enjoyable, to be honest. Next move was to jump in at the deep end and close my bead shop on Ebay, this was a big decision and one I thought long and hard about, but money wise I knew I had to do. I could and will still sell odd sets on Ebay but I wasn't making enough money to warrant having a shop, there was the worry of maybe losing customers who would think I had given up making beads but with nice new business cards I was sure that problem was solved and they would find the Etsy shop.
https://www.etsy.com/uk/shop/pebbledreams
   So within a few days, the Ebay shop was no more and the Etsy shop was going to get most of my attention, it was a fresh start yet a move with big risks.
   I often set myself targets in life and this was another such time, but this time the targets were set rather high and there was no expectation of seeing them reached in the new future. Firstly my aim was to reach a target of 500 items listed in the shop, these would include bead sets, focal beads and spacer bead sets. From past experience, I know that the bigger the selection of beads on sale the better, customers love a wide choice giving them more chance of finding the beads they need to work with. Secondly, I wanted to reach a thousand sale orders, not a thousand items sold but orders received, this was really a bit silly as I had up until then only had a couple of hundred orders and I was guessing this target would be a long time coming.
   Well now after a hell of a lot of hard work there are well over 600 items listed in the shop and yesterday saw my one-thousandth order, to say I'm over the moon is an understatement, I'm really proud of myself, as we Ashwell lads would say, "it took balls" but the boy did it. This just goes to show how hard work, dedication and belief can produce the goods and this now means I have a good solid base on which to build on, with the use of social media and working to a good solid standard I hope I can move forward. Now I see my beads used by some very special and talented jewellery designers, designers from all around the world and that really does make this old bead maker happy, it's all I've ever wanted and if I can continue to form beautiful interesting beads from molten glass then I'll be happy spending the rest of my days in my little bead world.

   On the bead side of things again I've been mixing glass to produce some unique one-off spacer sets, the "Toffee Cream" spacers as seen above being my favourite. I think most bead makers should spend a few hours each week mixing glass it's relaxing, interesting and throws up some great results.

Perfect British Bank Holiday Weather

   Spring Bank Holiday and still the rain is falling here in the fens with some parts of the country even getting snow, only our British weather some would say.
   So for this old bead maker, it is a day in the dry sorting through beads, making up more sets and packing orders ready to post in the morning, the hopes of spending hours in the veg garden are now on hold and will hopefully transpire next weekend.
   A few customers have asked if I'll start a video blog with clips posted here, well I will look into it but like a lot of people I'm really not that comfortable in front of a camera, but I promise to think about it and looking into how easy it is. I guess I could start with a short video of one of my cycle rides but we'll see how it goes. But for now, I hope everybody enjoys their day off and stays dry.

And Still We Wait

   I think I can safely say it's been a very long winter this year and after the storms of December and January followed by the "beast from the east" how much longer do we need to wait for the warmer brighter days of spring and summer? I like a lot of people find even the hint of sunshine makes me feel better, more inspired and lifts my enthusiasm and eagerness in both work and life in general, so let's hope the warmer weather soon makes an appearance.
   I guess there is one silver lining in having so much crap weather, it means I've been putting in far longer hours at my flame which in turn equals more beads being listed in my Etsy shop. https://www.etsy.com/uk/shop/pebbledreams  The spacer selection is really becoming large now with well over 250 sets now listed and even more being added each day, I was really pleased to receive a number of comments on how good the selection of spacers is and one new customer mentioned how nice it was to find such a vast number of colours to pick from and at sensible prices too. It's comments like these from new and existing customers that make the long hours worth it, most who know me and how I work, now very well that charging realistic prices and giving the best range of beads I can is all I really care about, it will never make me rich I know but I sure makes me happy.

   On the cycling side of things it's great now the clocks have changed and the evenings are lighter longer because it will now mean I can cycle morning and evening, just need the rain to ease off. I have a long list of fen villages that I'm hoping to visit and of course, I'll be posting what I discover here on my blog. It's funny but apart from enjoying exploring some of these small gems of the fenland countryside, it makes exercising a lot easier, I never really think of my rides as being an effort these days, to me they are more of an adventure, a learning curve where you never know whats around the next corner and that can only be a good thing in my eyes.
  Finally, I would just like to wish everybody a very happy Easter and I hope you enjoy a little time off from this busy world we live in.
 
   

A Trip Through Welney

   This morning was a warmer, brighter and calmer one, so this old bead maker enjoyed his normal morning cycle without the hand warmers stuffed into his gloves or extra socks. The trip included a few more fen villages one of which was the village of Welney, a village I often cycle through on my longer journeys. Welney is an interesting village situated immediately west of The Old Bedford river with the well-known Wildfowl and Wetland Trust reserve just a mile or two from the centre of the village.

The parish has the perfect stop for cyclists with the village pub (The Lamb and Flag), serving hot and cold food. St Marys church stands proudly on the main street leading through the village and the bridge spanning the river is an ideal spot to stop for lunch on a summer day.
   Welney was once famous for it's Ice-Skating bosting a world champion and many British champions and still have a skating club to this day.

   All in all this wonderful little fen village is well worth adding to your cycle route and the locals, of course, have that great fen humour which is always matched with a smile.

The Village of Christchurch

   I promised to tell of the villages I cycle to or through while putting the miles in for exercise and I thought I would start with one of the closer villages to my home, the lovely quiet parish of Christchurch. The village is not the biggest you'll find here in the fens but it seems to have a great community spirit and I find the parishioners are really friendly. The village boasts a wonderful brick built Victorian church (The Church of Christ) which was my stopping point on the first months of my cycling.

   The village has a nice modern village hall/community centre at which a coffee shop is held every Monday morning, run by some of the residents and selling home baked cakes as well as coffee and tea.

   There is one public house in the village called the Dun Cow which sells beer from the famous Elgood's Brewery. It also has I'm told a very friendly atmosphere and is the landmark for a locally run Fish and Chip service on Friday evenings. The village has its own primary school and preschool, but sadly the one village store as now closed.
   All in all a very nice fen village and one I enjoy cycling through on my way back home from my many trips.

Back At My Flame

   It was so nice to be back working my flame today, after two days off it felt good to be there beside my kiln while a wonderful winter world lay outside, at times I could stop looking out the window. There is something very special about snow as kids it always excited us and still when adults there is a tiny piece of that excitement inside us all, even on a grey cold looking day like today.

   It was a spacer day for me, I need lots more sets to place in the shop https://www.etsy.com/uk/shop/pebbledreams after spacer beads sales were so high last month, I've always said I want one of the best selections of spacer beads on Etsy and boy that's what I'm going to have. At the moment I sell sets of both twenty beads and ten beads but now I'm really thinking of selling smaller sets of say six beads, some customers don't always need ten or more spacers so this would give them the option of buying more different colours without breaking the bank.

   While on the subject of spacer beads I still hear customers moan about the ridiculous prices some bead makers charge for spacers, some even charging around £1 per bead. Now I don't care who you are, how famous you think you are or how stunning your main beads may be, to charge customers £1 for a plain colour spacer bead is not right, it's unreasonable and just unacceptable. I guess some bead makers are just out to make money or are what some of us call bead snobs but hey, come on, spacers can take literally seconds to make so behave and sell them for a reasonable price.