Anyone got a fairy???

I could really do with a fairy to come in and blitz my job list!! So if any of you can lend me your job fairy that'd be great!!

This weekend I will sort out my webpage listing for the PMC Starter Kits - yes this has been an ongoing saga, but they're finally ready.  I'll be offering a couple of different level of kits, with basic tool kits starting at £25.  I wanted to include the best quality tools so that you don't waste money on cheaper versions which then need to be replaced.

Also top of my job list now is to re-write the PMC Certification pages on my website.  I put the exisiting pages up as a temporary measure so that everyone could see what the modules covered.  I'm trying to get sample pieces made up so that there will be at least one photo example against every project.  But at 20 projects in total that isn't going to happen overnight!!

Hopefully I'll have a couple of pictures for you over the weekend if I get to finish some of the sample pieces.

Changes for 2010

I hope you all had a lovely Christmas, and I'm sure many of you out there are looking to 2010 now and planning your resolutions.

I don't make resolutions, but I do try to write down achievements that I want to strive for during the year.

In order to get one of my achievements, I'm having a re-hash of my website Fired Silver The site will now be for Tuition, Supplies and Tutorials only.  All of my jewellery will be for sale on a separate website, which I'll be developing this year.

Here's a sneak peak of the home page so far - New Home Page I still need to add a banner, and some piccies, but the essence of what the site is for is there.

I'm already working on my first tutorial. It is my plan that some of the tutorials will be free and some will be paid for, and I will also be building up the Resources page with lots of information.

There are also lots of new class dates listed on the site HERE 

Finally, thank you all for stopping by and supporting me during 2009, and I wish all of you a happy, healthy and prosperous 2010.

Capesthorne Hall

I am really thrilled to be attending the Christmas at Capesthorne Hall event.  I'll be selling my jewellery, but I'll also be demonstrating how to use PMC.

Capesthorne Hall is a beautiful Jacobean style country house, set in 100 acres.

The fair is taking place on Friday 27th November 6.00pm - 8.30pm, Saturday 28th & Sunday 29th November 1.30pm - 5.00pm.

So please come along and visit and don't forget to say hi to me!

Gosh, aren't my posts sporadic at the moment!! There is such a lot to get done, time isn't on my side!!

I spent Tuesday running a private tuition day at the studio. I had two lovely ladies who made some great work, and hopefully they learnt lots too! I really enjoy private tuition - the people who book usually have previous metal clay experience and want to expand their knowledge in certain areas. Group classes don't always fit in for everyone, so its great to be able to offer this service on a more regular basis now that I'm in the studio.

The rest of my week has been taken up with day-job work, and trying to get my head around my marketing leaflets etc. I've designed a leaflet which I'll be dropping through letterboxes local to the studio (have to put my trainers on I think!), I made it a 3-fold leaflet so that I could maximise the information on there, but now I have to sit and fold them all up!

Tomorrow is going to be a lovely day at the studio. One of the ladies that came on my first ever class up here in Cheshire is coming to my studio. She's been on lots of classes, and we've become good friends, so we're just having a play-day tomorrow. I can't wait - it'll do us both the power of good. Bronzclay is definitely on the agenda tomorrow. Although I've played with Bronze, I haven't fired and finished anything yet, but that'll change tomorrow so watch out for some bronze pieces soon.

Metal Clay Weekend

Two posts in one day!!

I've managed to finalise the details now for a weekend of classes at my studio. Anyone fancy a weekend in the lovely Cheshire countryside??

To have a look at the details of the classes available, please click HERE

Any questions, just let me know and I hope to see lots of you in June!

Workshop Update

As promised, here are some inside shots of the workshop space. I was going to take them when I first arrived this morning, but forgot!

So, here's a before shot





After a couple of hours of swearing at the furniture! Here's an after shot

I didn't get as much time here today as I would've liked, but I'm quite pleased with the progress so far. Fingers crossed my next day there will get the sorting finished off, I may even spend a couple of evenings this week trying to get it all done.

Lots of New Metal Clay Classes

Now that I finally have a base, I've got my class schedule sorted for the next couple of months, as well as running full day classes, I've added some short taster classes which I've wanted to do for ages.

There are too many to list in full, but there's a ring making class, beginners classes, stone setting, and more so just email me if you're near Cheshire and fancy making some jewellery!

Here is the cause of my excitement, and lack of blogging the past couple of weeks

I finally picked up the keys today, to a workshop space, ok, so I have to share some of it with my husband for office space, but I've still got a massive amount of space to work in!! Considering I just have an alcove at home at the moment, this is pure luxury! It's the start of a very exciting time now, and I really need to get on with building the business up - I have overheads now!

I'll be running all my PMC/Art Clay classes from here too, and it's in a really nice rural spot, so great for my visitors. I'm sure that I'll have plenty to blog about now, so you'll all be fed up with me soon!!

I thought the blog looked boring without many pictures of my jewellery! So here you go, they may be bad, mobile phone pictures, but at least you can see some of my recent metal clay work.

I'm working on some new pieces ready to launch my Etsy store. There'll be a range of these necklaces with matching earrings. They are highly polished silver pillow-shape beads, simply strung on sterling silver necklets. There are countless options for these in all sorts of different textures. They look really pretty on - in fact I'm tempted to keep the ones I've made so far!

These lentil shape beads are lampwork beads by the fantastic Claire Morris. They had a top decorative layer of glass that I decided to cover up!! I painted some silver paste onto the top, and left it fairly uneven so that it took the shape of the glass underneath. It silver has cracked in some places which I love because it adds to the texture of the glass. I think there's about 10 of these beads, so I see them being split up into a few different pieces of jewellery.

Better pictures will follow as soon as I can get my hubby to take them. We're currently looking into equipment to set up a proper lighting / photography area. This will mean much better photos and hopefully, even I will be able to point the camera and take a decent picture! Well, maybe!

Becci

xx

PMC / Art Clay Class

I spent a very lovely day yesterday teaching a beginners metal clay class. I had a lovely group that just seemed to gel, we had lots of lovely chat as well as them all making some fantastic first pieces. I think I've managed to convert more people to the world of PMC and Art Clay!!

It has got me thinking today about teaching. I've had a bit of a love/hate feeling about teaching. I've come to the conclusion today that the reason I've not enjoyed it so much in the past is that my creative time has been very limited with me being a stay at home mum. It meant that the creative time I did get was mostly spent teaching rather than creating. Now that I've got more creative time as my little girl is in pre-school, I feel like I can get a good mix of both teaching metal clay and actually working with it and making new jewellery. So, teaching is definitely part of my business plan (yep, I'm being disciplined and writing one!!), I've got lots of new class ideas which I now need to develop and of course need to come up with a class schedule!

Mailing List Competition

So, there's still a lot going on behind the scenes here at Fired Silver!! This means no time for blogging unfortunately, but hopefully in a couple of weeks I'll have some exciting news which will then mean lots of blogging cos I'll have lots to talk about!

Anyway, as there are lots of new things coming up, I thought some of you may like to join my mailing list to be kept up to date with all the new product lines, news and classes. Don't worry you don't get bombarded with emails, I'll hope to make it a monthly newsletter, or more often if I have something exciting to share!

I'm running a prize draw for those who sign up to my mailing list before the 14th February 2008. I'll draw a name from the hat, and you'll receive a surprise! Needless to say it'll be silver!! So if you fancy taking part, just sign up to the newsletter at the top of the screen here, and that's it. I'll announce the winner here on the 15th February.

Bye for now!

Interesting couple of days

I've been quiet for a couple of days haven't I!

I'm really giddy at the moment, I went to Kilncare yesterday to get a new controller for my kiln. Mine has been broken for months and months, so I've been limited as to what I can make, but there's no stopping me now! I did my first firing today and it's fantastic!

So the pieces that you saw as work in progress are now fired, except for the glass work. Everything's going around in the tumbler now, so hopefully there'll be photos soon.

I had planned to do some more work tomorrow, but I've been asked to step in and teach a beginners class for someone tomorrow as her tutor is ill. I'm quite excited as I enjoy teaching and it's a place I haven't been before. There's also the chance for me to teach there again if tomorrow goes ok, so I just need to come up with ideas for new classes - no problem there, I've got a long list that I've never got around to doing anything with. It's a small class, so should be a nice day.

I put this piccie up on Frit Happens, but thought it might be fun to show it here as well - it's my work in progress.

I think it's sometimes hard to imagine how pieces are going to turn out, so seeing them part made gives you a bit of an idea

There's a mix of things on here, it'll be interesting to see what you think of the finished pieces compared to the WIP!

I'm getting my kiln repaired on Friday so watch out for lots of lovely glassy goodies, as I haven't been able to do any glass work because of the kiln ggggrrrr.

New Class Dates

I've set a date now for my next Beginners Class. It will take place on Saturday 7th February 2009 and runs from 10am to 4pm.

I'm also going to run another open studio date as we had so much fun last time, so that will take place on Saturday 21st March 2009.