Studio Tour

What a fun weekend it was! Veronica came down from Cobourg to assist me, which made everything run smoothly. We had two days of perfect Canadian fall weather, sunny and dry, (though it promptly clouded over and got cold when we headed off on a beach walk before dinner on Sunday!)Veronica took all of the following photos with her great new camera.

Welcoming flowers just outside the studio. Note the pink spray paint on the driveway, from spraying a lamp...not quite enough newspaper on a windy day! Thankfully So is quite indifferent to these little mishaps!
This workbench was my dad's for as far back as I could remember. He made it himself, the drawers were rescued old library file drawers. It was not pink then, of course, it was a battered and manly battleship grey with numerous paint spatters, gouges, grease spots and battle scars. I am so glad my mom persuaded me to take it when she sold the house last year. Dad would get a chuckle over the pink paint makeover...but I know he would be glad to see me using it.
The Wall of Fruit. The giant 1970s plastic fruit fridge magnets on my fan hood were a big hit. People kept asking if I had made them. Heheh.

I did bead demos all weekend. Fish and flowers, fish and flowers. For a change, hollow fish. Plunged flowers were the most requested demo. The most frequently asked questions:

1-How did you get interested in making beads?

2-Do you teach?

3-How long have you been doing this?

4-How did you get the flower in there? (I just showed you!)

Beads and jewelry displayed for sale. The big black thing is a vintage lampshade I covered with fabulous sassy black feathers left over from a corset project.

More beads and odds and ends on the workbench, providing inspiration.

The lampworking setup. The hood has been raised so I could talk to people, usually it's much lower. We forgot to get a photo of the jewelry-making table.

Velvet lined shadowbox (a yard sale find), with some of my bead collection and some vintage things

Part of the Wall of Virgins, visitors had mixed (and intriguing) reactions to this.

All in all I feel it was quite a successful weekend. We had a lot of people come out, which was great considering it was my first time on the tour and we are located a fair ways outside of town. And I sold far, far more than I had anticipated which was also quite a pleasant surprise. Our dinner on Saturday night was so much fun, with some guests providing plenty of laughter and great company.
On Monday Veronica and I went across the Bluewater Bridge for a day in the US. We raided the large craft supply store there for some items we each want to experiment with, and we were quite restrained in our buying, tempting as the fibres and fabrics and metals and papers were! (Yarn...I could so easily become a "yarn harlot"!! Silk and alpaca...cashmere...roving...)

Now it's back to eBay for a while, and focusing on remaining positive through the Canadian election, the US election and the financial crisis. These are interesting times.