Mail out time!

Just thought I'd chime in here to display a little 'ol teaser for the holiday greeting I'm sending out! I have them all packaged up and ready to go in the mail tomorrow. So for those of you on my snail-mail list, look out for it in your mailboxes in the next week or so.

I'm anxious for Christmas early this year (only 22 days left!) and I'm going to head out shopping again tomorrow... always trying to find the perfect gifts for everyone!

Nothing else new these days... I have a few custom orders I have to make in the next week and then I think I'm going to take a break from the torch for a little while before the holidays, and start fresh in the new year prepping for the March Oasis show!

Be back soon though, no worries.

Another Success

Another show done... and it was another success! Thanks to all of you that came out to the show (even though it was pouring rain pretty much all day!) As expected, there were a lot of new faces and new contacts as well as familiar customers that attend all the bead shows in the Toronto area!

It was a nice venue with more than enough volunteers that did a wonderful job making sure the vendors' tummies were full of food and Tim Horton's coffee! :) They were all wonderful! I also donated one of my "Fairy Pod Pendants" to the silent auction, where the proceeds went to the Grand River Gallery. Congrats to the winner... if you're out there reading this! :)

I now have a couple of custom orders to make, so I'll get started on those first thing tomorrow! ...as well as Mary's bead, as winner of the Colour Contest! (see previous posts!)

Back at the torch tomorrow, right now I have to put all my show stuff away, until the end of the month for the Toronto Bead Society show!

Enjoy this crisp autumn air (if the rain holds up!)

Be back soon!

New Work in the Works!

Hi all! I just wanted to chime in here for a quick update... I wanted to let you all know that I just uploaded the last of the first (hope that makes sense) gallery page (I had only partially updated the photos on page 1). I've been really busy at the torch these last couple of weeks, working on some new techniques and new (or just different) styles than what you've seen from me in the past. I'm excited to debut them on a sixth gallery page soon enough, but none will be offered for sale on Etsy, eBay or otherwise until after the Canadian Bead Oasis Show in late March. If you're planning on coming to the show, take a peak at my new gallery pages in the next coming weeks, take a visual note of the beads you like and hurry into the show first thing on Friday morning to snag the ones you want ... many of my new beads will not be able to be closely reproduced due to some new reactive colours of glass I've been working with! You'll see what I mean when you take a look at my site! They have wonderful variations, changing colour hues, oilslick shimmer and dichroic sparkle! I will not be taking any custom orders from now until after the show, so hopefully you can make it out to see the beads in person!

I'm excited to announce that I am now a "MAC-User", well sort of. I'm getting the hang of it, slow but sure. I am amazed at how different a Mac is from a PC ... but I have to say even in the last three days I have come to the realization that I love it a whole lot more (also because I have a designer-brain and it seems more convenient design and graphic-wise!) But as I said, I'm still trying to get the hang of it, so if any of you out there reading this have any useful hints, tips or tricks for me, please leave a comment to share!

I better get back to my beads (they've been asking me to take photos of them for the last few days) so I shall take photos of them! Photographing beads is always a time consuming thing to do ... and that is why my next (6th) gallery page will be up in a week or two! I'll be sending out a long-overdue newsletter to my email list in the next couple of weeks as well so if you don't want to miss that, sign up for my emailing list on the home page of my website www.airwynnglass.com and make sure to keep an eye out for something from me!

It's Over Now | Back to Business

I feel like I can breathe again ... the Christmas holiday season has always been my favourite (with Halloween being a close second) but it is indeed a stressful time of year no matter how hard you try to make it easy-going. Realizing that it's been nearly a whole month since I last posted, I'm trying to think back to what kept me so darn busy. It did however, seem that I was out shopping almost every night even though I had thought I was successful in completing my Christmas shopping early. I had several issues with the gifts I had for a few people I had bought for early, which led to numerous trips to the same stores, countless phone calls to every Home Hardware in the province and an exchange or two due to shotty manufacturing of an expensive item! Anyway, it's all over now and everything turned out very nicely! The highlight for me was watching my parents open the gift I gave to them! I had been wanting to give them this gift for the last three years or so but it just never seemed to work out. I dug out the old video camera from the basement (which has been broken for about 11 years with a half-used tape stuck inside) and I got all of the home videos transferred to DVD's! It was so great to watch old family vacations and birthday parties, forgetting we ever looked the way we did back then! Needless to say the out-of-date video camera is no longer, in order for the tape that was in there to be removed without getting damaged, but it's the memories that were on those tapes that are important! I got some pretty nice gifts as well! I got a Hydroponic Herb Garden in which I was eager to plant the pods on Christmas Day and already I'm seeing sprouts come up! It holds seven "gourmet" herbs including Italian Basil, Purple Basil, Parsley, Thyme, Cilantro, Dill and Chives. It's really neat to see them sprout up without even being in dirt! My sister got me a lovely Lennox Disney Tinkerbell to add to my collection! She sits upon a minty green coloured thread spool and she has beautiful pearlescent wings! She's wearing a crystal necklace too! Keeping with my Disney-themed collection, I got a dish set that displays original black and white sketch images of Mickey Mouse in different positions using different expressions, with artist's notes and such from 1937. It's so unique, yet it doesn't scream out loud DISNEY, it has a more subtle, mature feel to it. Jay, my fiance, got me a beautiful handmade piece that I fell in love with three years ago! It's a hand-carved, hand-blasted and hand-painted piece of glass with a wooden base. It's a beautiful flowing mermaid painted in a Monet-sorta-style using my favourite colours; teal green that fades to celadon, fades to mint green... it's stunning! It has a light behind it so it gives off a nice soft light! He also got me a really nice tri-pod for our new camera! Not only will it make it easier to take photos of my beads, it will help in taking photos outside and in the dark, with a steady surface! Both Jay and I are excited to take up photography as a hobby, snapping interesting scenes while out for a walk or simply taking more photos at home of family and friends!

Perhaps it's because of all the holiday candy and chocolates, turkey dinners and desserts, along with quick fast-food meals while shopping in the malls all month long ... I've been feeling rather "sluggish" lately with very little energy and some days if I had of allowed myself, I would of stayed in bed 'til 1pm! Even with my late nights, going to bed at 2 or 3am, sleeping in past 10:30am bothers me, leaving me with a feeling that I wasted my entire day merely because I didn't get an early start at my day. I don't know. So beginning January 2nd (after one last New Years Day turkey dinner!) Jay and I have decided to do a 30-day detox! It may end up being a 21 day detox, or it may even end up being a 14-day detox, but gawsh'darn it I am going to try my best at it! I'm not setting myself up for failure by thinking I won't succeed, I'm just being realistic ... detox systems are hard to stick to! I'm really looking forward to the fresh, energetic feeling I'm hoping I'll get from it!

Back to business: I want to thank all of you for all of the Christmas custom orders, it is greatly appreciated! Those orders that were not Christmas gifts and for those of you that said it was ok to wait until January, I will be working on your beads again starting tomorrow and hopefully have them all shipped out by the end of the weekend. Thanks for your patience! Also, I'm still working on creating new images for my gallery pages and Etsy so stay tuned for that too!

I hope you all had a fabulous holiday season, no matter what and how you chose to celebrate it! I'll be back in the new year with the last FREE Bead Giveaway for voting for my site! Good luck everyone and thanks for chiming in!

Back to normal.

Well I'm back from my shows and I'm ready to head back into the studio full-force this weekend, getting busy creating some new beads and working on some new designs and a little something else that's new for me as well! I'm still in the experimenting mode, so it'll be a little while before I can debut this new upcoming line of work. The Ottawa show was fantastic and a huge success! Congrats to Grace for organizing such a great show! I am positive that it will be expanding for next year, so look forward to that!

I hope to list some new things in my Etsy shop in the next little while as well. As for site maintenance, I'll be adding new eye-candy to my gallery! Now that things are getting back to normal, I'll be able to start taking custom orders again after this weekend as well. Those of you that are thinking of Christmas presents, you may want to get your orders in soon to ensure delivery before the holiday mayhem begins!

Nothing much else to share tonight. I'll be back again soon, hopefully with those gallery additions as promised! :)