Free Contest, Have Fun and Win Butterfly Earrings

I will ship these earrings to anywhere in the world for free, to the lucky winner of this contest. The earrings feature a pewter butterfly in antiqued gold finish, with sapphire coloured rhinestone in a heart setting.



To win, simply guess the number of butterflies in my room! I will give you some guideline hints below. The contest will run until midnight Perth Western Australia time on the 21st September. The winner will be either:

1 The person who guesses the exact number of butterflies.

2. The person who is closest to the exact correct number of butterflies



In the event of multiple people guessing the same number or being equally close to it (ie in the event of a tie) the names of the people tied up will be put in an online randomiser and one winner will be decided by chance.



My family members are not eligible to enter. My friends who have had access to this room are ineligible to enter. This is a contest for my online friends and readers, and will be fairly refereed.



To enter, just leave a comment below with the number you wish to guess.



HINTS and TIPS

The room is small-medium room measuring 3 metres by 3 metres.

The room is multi purpose, it is my dressing room with built in wardrobes and tall boy drawers, it is also a room housing tall bookshelves.... it is a room I sit in and read comfortably, listen to music, and sit or lie on the day bed. I find this room very relaxing.

My clothes are all put away inside the closet/wardrobes so any butterfly clothing is not counted in the tally.

The curtains and upholstery do not have any butterflies on them.

There are 4 framed pieces of art hanging on the walls.

There is a pin up board on which hang all my personally owned earrings, but none of the earrings made for my stores are in the room.

There is not a ridiculously large number of butterflies in the room, although I can look in any direction and find butterflies, their numbers are not overwhelming.

Do not guess 500 or more butterflies that is way too many!



I will announce the correct number of butterflies on Wednesday 22 September and who has won!

Why not visit my fellow etsian and awesome blogger Jess who has very kindly featured me this week in her segment 'makers', you can read my interview, and while there, explore recipes, spiral jewelry, tips for your own handmade success and all kinds of fun posts!
http://messy-bessie.com/2010/09/makers-starzyia/

Wedding Gift for My Cousin

Hi, I am still alive and well... just bowled over by how busy I have been, I go to bed each night thinking how happy I am, so I can't complain. I have even found a bit of time to read at night and have a large stack of new books to slowly pick my way through. I am also happy to say I no longer need to save for that out of pocket surgical expense!

This week I have taken some time to hand make a pair of earrings for my cousin who has just gotten married, I wanted something classically beautiful and elegant for Elizabeth and of course they had to have a special meaning.

These pearl and ivy leaf earrings are hopefully a perfect match for my cousin's taste in jewelry. Ivy is a traditional wedding gift to promote fidelity, and pearls are for married happiness, wisdom, and women's health.

I do have some jewelry in my stores designed for married happiness and one pair of earrings in my www.madeit.com.au/Starzyia store a little more exotic, named Song of Solomon after the classic love verses in the bible.

Creating With Vintage Postage Stamps

I confess, I love the way vintage postage stamps are being reused and let's face it, reborn, for use in beautiful jewelry and papercraft projects. I wanted to show you my two current favourite etsy pieces in case you need some inspiration.

The top picture is a ring! yes, a beautiful handmade ring using vintage butterfly postage stamps, there are a lot of butterfly and dragonfly pieces in this etsy shop levydesign the quick link directly to this ring is www.etsy.com/listing/48725199/in-mauve

This vintage postage necklace is from izzabellarose on etsy, www.etsy.com/listing/50228620/vintage-postage-necklace

And in case you don't have a stamp collection of your own to raid, you could always try shopping for stamps on etsy, and I do have several sets in my store www.starzyia.etsy.com In addition to the birds, butterflies, flowers, etc that are in my store now, I will soon be adding more flowers, and christmas stamps absolutely gorgeous for special seasonal creations!

Recreating the Created, Reinventing My Handmade Jewelry

I have just been remaking some of my early, unsold creations... I had nice elements, but tended to make everything too big, too over the top... which was probably more to do with inexperience than taste, since I prefer classically elegant, feminine pieces. You will also be able to see that my photography has improved, though I will always be learning new tips and tricks.

The apple earrings above are remade from the earrings below.... I don't know why I thought these beautiful glass apple charms needed any additional beads, they are just so lovely on their own. Plus the section with the swarovski butterflies are set aside to make a different pair of earrings, so I've turned one creation into two.

These painted shell buttons and blue beads are the new edition of a piece that was one of my first etsy stocked items.... people liked them (or claimed to) but really they were too long and too busy. Much better don't you think?

Now back to my fun, going through my stored items and reclaiming some beautiful beads that might otherwise go to waste.

Etsy Christmas in July

Its my first etsy, Christmas in July sale, and I'm offering discounts on all creations in my 'jewelry' and 'earring' store sections. The discount is off the listed price, and exludes shipping, your discount will be refunded ASAP after you have cleared checkout.

Save 15% off when you buy one item
Save 20% when you buy two items
Save 25% when you buy three or more items.

All my creations have symbolic, traditional or healing properties, the meaning and effect of each creation is carefully described in my store and can be printed to accompany items when they sell.

You can visit my store www.starzyia.etsy.com via this link or using my etsy display on the right of this page.

My Rainy Day Creation

I received these vintage buttons several months ago, and made these earrings up in five minutes today, I am thinking they might be for me, since I love green earrings (they bring out my eyes). I have four of the same buttons with purple hearts, and one pink one (shame, wish I had two, I guess the pink will make a necklace!).

The wet and stormy weather has driven me out of my office, since I have to cover things with a plastic tarp and put a bucket under the damp area on the ceiling... perilously close to my computer.... the desktop has to stay there but at least my laptop can be brought out here, in the warm dining room.

Winter is beginning to take its toll on my hands, I have wonderful hand creams, but when should I use them... I don't like it when I'm going to work with beads as I don't want greasy fingerprints everywhere, same with using the computer, and reading books.... does anyone else have this problem? I put it on before bed, but rubbed my eye early in the night... stung like crazy, tears ran down my face... that'll teach me.

It is however good reading weather, I love being snuggled up reading in winter, though I am shocked to discover the last five books I've read are classified as Young Readers or Young Adult books.... is that why I've struggled with my current book The Witches of Eastwick, I found when I got to page 14 that I had drifted through a terrible amount of the text and will have to give myself a stern admonishment to 'pay attention!'

Anyway, its time to stoke up the fire, and I confess, also to get myself over to facebook to play Treasure Madness....

Prouds Jewellers? A Little Less High and Mighty if You Please!

One of the only pieces of jewellery I regularly wear not made by myself is my add-a-charm bracelet purchased from Prouds Jewellers Australia, it is also the only piece of jewellery that falls apart at least once a year. Originally purchased in october 2008 it has fallen apart 3 times already. The first time it needed a jump ring, the second time the clasp needed to be repaired or replaced, and today again it was a jump ring.

Obviously I can repair this jewellery myself, but on principle I have not in the past, I think the onus is on them to take care of their customers and make amends for the poor quality of their products.

Today when I popped in the shop I was completely astounded when they told me it would be $3 for a new jump ring! Ridiculous! I have never paid before and certainly won't now.

From their conversation with me they know darn well how easily this jewellery falls apart, they admit the jump rings are not strong, and can even break in winter when people wear wool and the bracelet snags.... one girl who works there told me she gets all her jump rings soldered to prevent falling apart.

Excuse me? Shouldn't you sell the jewellery with soldered jump rings so that it doesn't fall apart?
I paid enough for my bracelet and did the right thing buying it from them and not the $2 stand at the beading and craft fair! I expect for the price I paid that the jewellery is sold in good faith knowing it is adequate for the intended use which is daily wear.

The intentional sale of weak and breakable jewellery is not satisfactory.

I was lucky none of my charms ended up in the toilet bowl!

I am absolutely seething, I have contacted the HQ already (snail mail.... they really don't like sharing their contact email!). Whether or not they assist me I certainly won't be caving in and paying $3 for puny jump ring, I will fix it myself on principle!

In the meantime I have found a great website, called not good enough www.notgoodenough.org
this is a great place to vent your dissatisfaction and learn from others who have had dealings with the same comany of government department you have had trouble with. I see their are other Prouds complainees, and many many Telstra (Australian phone company... we all know how that goes!)

By the way for my fellow aussies, I recently signed up for the class action against the banks, it was very easy and did not take long, and if you don't know how many times you have had the excessive fees imposed it does not matter, sign up now, and they do the research later, or you can get bank statements re-issued.

I need to take a lunch break from venting now! I don't want this to become a complaints blog but I had to get it out of my system.