sshhhhh….it’s a secret sale…..

Just for you, my dearest blog friends and loyal customers….I need to do some spring cleaning and have put everything on my website for sale at 15% off, now through Sunday, May 4th. Just in time for Mothers Day too!

Celebrate the return of your romantic garden with these pretty vintage broken china necklaces – Click HERE to see more....

Or maybe you’d rather wear your garden on your wrist? Click HERE to see more

Perhaps you’d prefer a vintage Cherub Broken China necklace? These sweet little guardian Cupids will watch over all your romantic notions and are guaranteed to bring you love and joy every time when worn….Click HERE to see more

Whichever you prefer, please come visit quick before your favorite is gone. To receive your secret discount, you'll need to type “Charming” in the Voucher Code area on the checkout page. Then simply click the “re-calculate” button to see your savings. Happy Secret Shopping!!!

xo ~ Joy

Vintage Bling!

Jewelry For Your Home! I want to share this fun project with you that I just completed today….a Vintage Rhinestone Encrusted Picture Frame! I’ve been seeing these beautiful frames in upscale gifts shops lately and they are always sooooo expensive. But it’s very easy to create.

First, I raided my stash of vintage rhinestone bling, then grabbed my trusty hot glue gun and an old metal picture frame. You can use any picture frame you like, but I wanted to go for an “elegant shabby” look, so I spray painted the frame a creamy white color first. Then I just hot glued on bits and pieces of old broken jewelry around the frame.

I really like how this came out. I won’t be offering these on my website, but I think these would make terrific gifts! I plan to make a few more and thought one of these would make a great Mothers Day gift too. I think I’ll make one for my mom and put a special picture of the two of us together inside, or maybe a vintage mothers day card inside would be nice too. The possibilities are endless! I hope you’ll give this fun and easy project a try!

~ xoxo Joy

Come With Me To The Bead Store!

Today was a treat….I started work early in the studio and realized I was running low on supplies and needed to run over to one of my favorite bead stores - Buttons, Bangles & Beads. Just look at all the beautiful, sparkling treasure to be found there. I have to seriously watch my pocketbook because I want one of everything!

It's at this point on the sidewalk that my purse begins to twitch.....


Beautiful Semi-Precious stones in the most yummy colors.

More Semi-Precious stones...if you listen quietly, you can hear them call your name...yoooo-hoooo, Joy, over heeeerrreeeee....

A gorgeous basket full of large and unique silver beads. The shells would make the most beautiful beach jewelry!

Bins and bins of sparkling Swarovski Crystals in a rainbow of colors. I love playing in these bins!

A colorful wall of Czech Crystals and Glass Beads

And the Pearl section is beautiful too! Such a selection!

Now, there is a down side to going to the bead store and it has nothing to do with my purse…To get there, I have to drive by this….

Today was one of those famous Florida beach days…low 80’s, nice breeze, low humidity….I had the top down on my little sports car (I call it multi-tasking…working on my tan while I drive).

I was really tempted to just pull over, grab my pink beach chair from the trunk (kept there for “drive-by” sunbathing opportunities) and head down to the waters edge.

But not today, my studio work had to come first, so I headed home with a bag full of beads and the first hint of my summer tan starting to emerge.

Almost home and back to work…….Thank you for coming with me to the bead store!

xoxo ~ Joy

A Whisper Of Beauty From Yesteryear….

I had a very productive weekend in the studio! I finished several custom orders and also had time to complete these antique Broken China Bracelets for my website.

I just LOVE this beautiful Wedgwood Flow Blue china! This gorgeous pattern was produced between 1890 and 1900 and the flow blue is just beautiful. This pattern features fluffy cottage roses.

I was a happy girl the day I found these plates with an antique dealer. They sat unsold forever due to chips around the edges. Not really usable for eating and not pristine enough for display. I am so happy to recycle these beauties into a treasure that can be worn and loved in a new way. Click HERE to see more on this bracelet.

I also finished this Victorian Rose Garden bracelet.

This pattern was produced in the early 1900 to 19-teens. This is one of my favorite china patterns. I just love the large pink cottage roses against the black background. That’s a pretty hard combination to find in the world of dishes!

I wear black pretty often and this china pattern looks wonderful against my black outfits. I acquired this china from another antique dealer who had a box of odd pieces. Not enough to match up into sets and many pieces were broken. My heart skipped a beat when I saw about a dozen pieces of this china in the bottom of the box. And once again, I am so happy to recycle this very pretty china into another life to be enjoyed once again. Click HERE if you would like to see more on this bracelet.

I hope your weekend was happy and inspiring too!

xoxo ~ Joy

Vintage Bridal Hankie Jewelry

I wanted to share these new (old!) pieces of jewelry with you that I just added to the website. I found two vintage bridal hankies on a recent visit to a favorite antique store. The center part of each hankie had seen better days, but the lace around the edges was still beautiful. One hankie is French lace and the other is pure Irish linen lace. I used these forgotten pieces to create a few special pieces of jewelry. I just love lace and every window in our home is dressed in lace panels. There is something so romantic and timeless about lace. I also enjoy the history of lace and want to share a link to a blog friends site, Miss Maddie’s. Susan is a vintage textile appraiser and recently blogged about lace. Please visit her site to read her charming entry. And please click HERE to see my newest creations!

xoxo ~ Joy

Studio Tour

I finally finished shooting a few pictures of my studio this afternoon and I thought I would invite you in for a visit. My studio is small, nothing fancy, but it is the space where my heart sings. When I walk in each morning ready to work, I breathe a sigh of contentment. Please come for a visit and stay awhile. Friends are always welcome! Click HERE to visit me!

xoxo ~Joy

Fun With The Parents-The Last Day

Well mom and dad are on their way back to Virginia. Their week vacation ended today and we were sorry to see them go. For our last day together, we took them to visit some of our favorite stores and we also spent some time at the beach.

We had a beautiful day…sunny and 85 degrees. The beaches in our area are some of the most beautiful in the world and a couple of them are listed almost every year on the Travel Channels Top 10 Best Beaches list.

We also found time to visit a few new gift shops. These pictures are from Coastal Cabana, they specialize in “Seaside Chic”. I fell in love with this chandelier covered in seashells! How clever is that! I thought this would look wonderful in an outside garden area too.

These terrific chairs made from vintage water ski’s. Another clever idea!

This was another favorite shop, Erika’s Place, I purchased a pair of Cherub candlesticks from here that I could not leave without. Mom had to get a pair too!

We popped in here for lunch. This is a cute and casual restaurant that is literally right on the water as you can see from the photo. Now that’s waterfront dining! Hope you didn’t mind my sharing photos from our vacation time with the parents. Playtime is over and I am back in the studio catching up with orders and creating more jewelry. Plus a few more craft projects that I want to share with you too!

xoxo ~ Joy

Today We Were Bad - Very Bad

Parents visit - day 3. No antique shopping today. Instead, my mom and I found our way into a beautiful jewelry store - now how did that happen? :) We tend to egg each other on, so this can get out of hand real fast! I have to confess….I have one of those special milestone birthdays next week. I won’t tell you how “old” I am, because I don’t believe in numbers. I lost a beautiful sister to cancer when she was only 37 years old, so to me, each birthday is a GIFT and as those numbers roll higher and higher I tend to celebrate even more…for me and for her. But I feel that birthday milestones deserve and warrant a little something extra. My sweet mom wanted to purchase something special for me and we went for BLING…a girl can never have enough sparkle! We found these stunning Crislu classic stud earrings…4 ct. tw…and somehow these found their way onto my ears.

Now, this is what I call “PLAY” jewelry – but it is fine jewelry…. Sterling Silver layered with Platinum and handset with top quality CZ stones. Our budgets don’t allow for the real thing, so we are happy to flash our play jewelry. Seeing how excited I was about the sparkle of this jewelry, Dearest Husband came over and decided to make birthday shopping easy and suggested I select a necklace too!! This is what I wore out of the store….an almost 19 ct tw tennis necklace with round and heart shaped CZ stones set in Sterling Silver & Platinum.

Now, my momma decides that she too has to get in on the fun and she starts shopping for herself. She leaves with a Crislu 4 ct tw pear shaped necklace.

Our sales girl was a doll and we had soooo much fun on this little shopping adventure. Truly a lifetime memory because we never splurge this BIG, even on play jewelry. Ooooh what fun we had and you would have thought we had won the lottery and were in Tiffany’s!

Today's treasures from the past...

Tiny little antique baby shoes…how precious are these? Today’s antique shopping spree with the folks produced this wonderful find. I think these are the oldest baby shoes I’ve ever seen. Very soft leather, original buttons attached and they are sooo very sweet. I am not a collector and I have no knowledge on what these sweet items are worth or how old they may be…I bought them because I loved them…if anyone has any information on what you think the history of shoes like this might be, please feel free to send me an email and let me know what you think.

xoxo ~ Joy

Treasures

This is shaping up to be a real “jewel” of a week! Not only are my parents from Virginia visiting us this week, but each day we are spending time together shopping various antique and flea markets in town. It’s such a wonderful way to spend time together as a family because items we come across tend to trigger memories. Between stories of the past and ideas for future projects, there is so much laughter. Not only are found treasures going home in the trunk of the car, but we are enjoying the treasure of time spent together. And what could be more precious then that. Here is a quick photo of today’s treasure I came home with…a vintage jewelry box filled with old rhinestone jewelry…and yes, I am a rhinestone-aholic!

Purchased Relatives

You know the old saying that goes “you can’t pick your relatives”? Well, actually you can! And sometimes they are CHEAP! Meet my new “relatives” Elizah & Kate Roberts of Mt. Pleasant Iowa. How this Civil War era picture ended up all the way down in a Florida antique store, I’ll never know. Please feel free to right-click their image and you can “adopt” them too.

So often when I am out antiquing or wandering around flea markets, I see boxes and boxes of old family photos. It makes me feel so sad to see these photos practically abandoned and forgotten about. Where are their people? Why did no one in the family want these old photos? I have an overwhelming desire to “adopt” them all and I usually come home with a small stack. I’ve been going through my collection and I am starting to pull these photos and feature them on my website. Click HERE to see an example. I am thrilled to see so many talented artists out there who use old photos in their mixed media & digital projects. I think it’s such a lovely way to bring past and present together. My collection has grown to the point that I have started scanning these photos and making digital images that I can save to CD’s. I will probably offer these CDs for sale on my website or use them as give-away’s or include them as a special treat with various orders…..something, anything, that I can do to give these “relatives” another life. I would love to read your comments or ideas on things you do with your old photos.

xoxo ~ Joy