Feel Free...!!!!

Feel Free

I thought it about time to post up some of my Artwork again.. Loosen those ties guys... and well just Feel Free.. It's well amazing.. 

Meanwhile... I've been busy designing and making some more necklaces for Orlando Menswear. At the moment I'm currently working on a rather striking necklaces made with the beautiful blue gem stone Lapiz Lazuli. Meaning 'lapis', the Latin word for stone, and 'azula', the Arabic word for blue. It was once one of the most precious and expensive gem stones and because of this many pictures of the Madonna, were created using paint made from pigment ground from this stone. So if your looking for the truest blue of them all this is the magical 'Ultramarine'. Coming soon...

Vintage Men's Style...So Deschevele...

Native American Bear Necklace

I thought it was about time that I posted another in my occasional series of men's style/fashion tips. I love... the look of the vintage style distressed beads.. which I use in my jewellery designs @ Orlando Menswear...and what better to go with them than Vintage jeans...

Too new and jeans.. well.. just don't.. cut the mustard...And definitely no creases down the middle plea...se... (reserve them for when you wear your nice little striped polo shirt...Perfect for visiting your mother in law....!!!!).... We're thinking....Cool ....Warrior.. the kind of guy who would.. Well...Wear my Native American Bear Necklace...

Beams Plus Slim-Fit Washed-Denim Jeans £190

Source: mrporter.com via Jolie on Pinterest

 

Try teaming them with a suitably dishevelled shirt... so deschevele....And no ironing required...

Hartford Classic Linen Shirt £100

Source: mrporter.com via Jolie on Pinterest

   

Go easy on the boot polish... Try these for size...

Church's Sahara Suede Burnished Desert Boots £235

Source: mrporter.com via Jolie on Pinterest

 

And don't forget... Real Men... Smear their butter on their toast...

 

Browser Compatibility Problems!!!

Just as a I thought it was safe to get back to my jewellery design…. O my G… Browser Compatibility Problems @ Orlandomenswear.com …… Well…I paused to think… how on earth am I going to cope with this…I sighed and reached over to my pile of Dummies Guides…this time ‘HTML, XHTML and CSS’ by Ed Tittel and Jeff Noble (if you wish to know more, check out the Amazon widget at the bottom of my sidebar..). I was advised to go to the great Validator in order to find out what was wrong with my seemingly innocent HTML. From what I could decipher, this Oracle told me it had something to do with old HTML in my front page layout.. (Oracles speak in strange tongues..)…It didn’t like my Meta tag language very much either. I decided this might be something to do with my using a very old copy of Dreamweaver… which due to somewhat straitened circumstances …I cannot afford to update. Thankfully, however, my trusty guide advised me that all was not lost, I could actually go to the ball after all… With a wave of the magic wand.. A free WYSYG editor called Kompozer appeared and I was able to design a table for my front page in quite a straight forward way, without any depreciation in the design. I then pasted my table into a ‘Test’ page on my website, to check it’s compatibility with other browsers. I’ve been working on my website so far on a MacBook with a FireFox browser. It didn’t look to cool in Safari. With a little tweaking I deduced that I needed to widen my Header in my CSS style editor, as my logo and search box were cut off at the bottom. It is a little wider than I like in FireFox now, but in order to make it look good in Safari I had to compensate. I then checked out how it looked on Internet Explorer on my Mum’s PC Laptop, then went onto see how it looked in Google Chrome and Opera. It now appears to be fine in all these browsers. Just to be on the safe side, I  also decided that I had better check my links using Broken Link Checker. I thought this wise, as I transferred all my posts from my Blog… Jewellery by Jolie… on Blogger, using the WordPress plug-in Blogger Importer. All the links seemed to be working apart from a link to M&S where an item was no longer stocked. Sigh of relief….
I apologise if you have had problems viewing my Website, please contact me if problems persist, and I will see what I can do ( famous last words..)….
Now time for some SEO (Search Engine Optimisation). On the advice of ‘The Idiots guide to Creating a Website’, by Paul McFedries (if you wish to know more, check out the Amazon widget at the bottom of my sidebar..), I submitted the Url  Orlandomenswear.com to Google, Bing and Alexa. I found this a little problematic in WordPress, as you are advised to paste the Verification Meta Tag into the HTML in the Header part of your Web Site. You can’t do this in WordPress as the Header is in CSS. Thankfully, I found a plug-ins for this WordPress SEO, by Mervin Praison. Go to Plugins – Add New – search- WordPress SEO – Install – Activate. Go to the bottom of the Dashboard and a large M will have appeared – Google Authorship and Analytics Settings – Webmaster Tools. Thanks Mervin! Finally, following the advice of Paul McFedries, I decided to submit my url using multiple search  engine submission sites Add Me and Submit Express.
Now… fingers crossed.. its back to some jewellery design….

Orlando Menswear Store is now officially open.....

Arrowhead Warrior Necklace

I declare Orlando Menswear Store is now officially open!!!..And this is my first blog... Those of you who have been following my blog will know that it has taken quite some time to get this site going. So I feel it is quite an accomplishment to get this site officially launched!!! I was intending to tell you every thrilling installment of my struggle to create this web site... This being a site about the day in the life of a Jewellery designer starting her own business. However, I felt I had to keep working away and get it constructed.. There were some hairy moments... and so I haven't blogged for a while. I thought I might share what I have learned, none the less...

 Taking the advice from The Dummies guide to Social marketing. I decided I wanted a WordPress blog,and on further investigation found that many web sites are designed with WordPress. Including Etsy and Life Magazine. I thought I could maybe be a bit more ambitious and have a store of my own. I followed the recommendation of the Social Media Marketing All-in-One For Dummies and chose the Server Bluehost as they already have WordPress installed, so you don't have to launch your website into hyperspace using FTP.. Which does take a lot of the stress off. Needing more information.. I bought...WordPress For Dummies, WordPress Web site design For Dummies, HTML, XHTML and CSS For Dummies and Blogging for Dummies... If in doubt, buy a Dummies guide or five... On the advice of the WordPress web site design guide, I decided to modify a theme. There are free themes which you can select through WordPress in the way you can choose a Template in Blogger. I chose the theme Pinblack which is inspired by the Pinterest site, which I like. It's not as easy as it seems modifying a site...just a word of warning...I altered the CSS style sheet and it's rather like a detective game trying to find out which fonts, backgrounds etc..are the ones you are looking for.. and once you decide to change the colour theme.. you have to keep on going until it all coordinates..It took a bit of tracking down.


For my Store I designed the layout in Dreamweaver MX. I luckily have an old version I bought, when I designed my web site for Ziffo eleven years ago. Fireworks MX isn't compatible with Mac Os X 10.5.8, but thankfully Dreamweaver still works!! I created the layout in Dreamweaver, copied the HTML, and pasted it into the WordPress page window. I also used Dreamweaver to create a layout for the HTML in the sidebar. I pasted the HTML into the Text widget section. I decided to use Mal's E-Commerce, for the Shopping trolley, which I also used in my Ziffo web site. You can link your store to his site using hyperlinks and it's reasonably straight forward.... What's more it's free for the PayPal version. I tried using the WordPress plug-in Cashie Commerce, but I found it a little complicated. Next I decided to be brave and upload all my blogs from Blogger, I used a plug-in for WordPress called Blogger Importer. You can find this by going to Plug-ins on your WordPress dashboard - Add new- type in Blogger Importer. The nice thing about WordPress is you get lots of free plug-ins, tools, widgets etc..It only took a minute to import, but about three days to check the HTML and re- load the featured images so they appeared on my Blog Board.

It's now back to SEO again ( l am learning the jargon... for the uninitiated that's Search Engine Optimisation..)...I am amazed to find that that's now a specialized subject and there are now books devoted to it!! I thought you might be interested in the books I used for this project...So I've put all the Amazon books I mentioned on a widget in my side bar. I've got this widget thing going.. while you're at it, check out my current favourite tracks on the Amazon MP3 player... Cool...

Native American Symbolism...

Native American Style Men's Necklace with feather Charms and Turquoise Stones..

I thought it about time to give you a sneak preview of my Autumn range for Orlando Menswear. I am very inspired by Native American design and this collection has quite a few pieces that particularly reference Native American culture.
The Native American feather was given as a sign of respect and honor. Native Americans who had a personal accomplishment or achieved something great for the tribe was often given feathers by chiefs or elders as a symbol of strength. The Native American with the most feathers in his headdress is usually the chief.
One must complete a brave deed in order to be given one of these feathers. For example, coming back from battle after conquering the enemy or returning from a hunt with food for the tribe would most likely earn a Native American feather. The feather could only be worn once the Indian has retold their story of bravery in front of an assembled tribal court.
In this necklace I have combined the feathers with Turquoise stones. Turquoise is commonly referred to by Native American  as the Sky Stone evoking the sky-blue shade of the stone most commonly found. I liked the connection between Bird and Sky.
Native Americans believe that the earth is alive and that all things, no matter how small or apparently inanimate, are precious. To the Native Americans, turquoise is life. There are stones medicine men keep in their sacred bundles because they possess powers of healing. Stones and crystals have unique attributed that support and heal us. Turquoise, especially, is known for its positive healing energy, an aid in mental functions, communications and expression and as a protector. If you’re wearing a turquoise ring and you look down and see a crack in your stone, the Native Americans would say “the stone took it”, meaning the stone took the blow that you would have received.

Native American Style Men's Necklace with feather Charms and Turquoise Stones..

Sky Horse...Native American style men's necklace

The horse was one of the biggest contributors in the progress of Native American civilization. It was taken as a symbol of honor and reverence and treated with great respect.The horse was a symbol of grace, beauty and nobility.... As well as of strength, power and freedom...

Sky Horse...Native American style men's necklace

The Native Americans also attributed the horse with the four elements of earth, air, fire and water. In some tribes the horse was prominently featured on war art. This was because the horse fought bravely alongside the Native warriors in the battle field. Special war shirts for example were often adorned with horse hair of different colors to honor the contribution of.. and the relationship between man and horse.
The horse is a powerful being, that combined the power of the earth with the wisdoms of the spiritual world for the Native Americans. The honored animal was proudly featured on many different works of art. 
I have chosen to complement the horse in this necklace with Turquoise stone, the symbol of sky. Along with the traditionally used silver... Silver has a transcendant, spiritual quality which is believed to be magical.... Which is why I chose to call this piece...Sky Horse....

Son of Suntree and a slowly developing website...

Son of Suntree..

Son of Suntree.. Wallpaper..

I have been busy... Things are slowly happening on my new website Orlando Menswear. I have chosen my host (hopefully with the mostest..). I have decided Blue maybe lucky for me - so I have taken the recommendation of my copy of the  Social Media Marketing All-in-One For Dummies  and decided to go with www.bluehost.com. I liked the idea of  building my site using Wordpress... so I bought more Dummies guides both Wordpress for Dummies & Wordpress Web Design for Dummies ... and have been dedicatedly reading...

After much deliberation... I decided that I wanted to customize a Wordpress theme, so I chose the theme PinBlack.. It is based on the Pinterest site, which I think is very well designed. I then did a little decorating and changed the background to a wallpaper developed from one of my art works based  around the theme Suntree (you may remember an earlier Art work - the one I used for Facebook), I will call this one Son of Suntree.... I am now slowly working on deciphering CSS and HTML....

Meanwhile.. I have designed eight new necklaces for my Autumn range @ Orlando Menswear. I took my first photographs today.. Sneak preview... coming soon...

Reflections In The Magnifying Glass

Reflections In The Magnifying Glass..

As promised... I thought it was about time I put up some more of my Art work. Here is a photograph I took in my bedroom of my magnifying glass...

Today is the Ist of September... somehow, that day always seems a little sad... Maybe it's because it heralds the end of summer... Here in Colchester, England there is a definite chill in the air and the sky is grey....

Meanwhile... I have been busying working on my new range of men's jewellery for the new website  orlandomenswear.com ( still working on that too... awaiting one last Dummies guide.. hoping it will fit all the pieces of the puzzle together... Voila....). I thought it would be cool to have different designs from my Orlando Menswear store at Etsy. I am particularly inspired by Native American jewellery, so expect to see feathers, bears, horses, arrow heads, distressed beads and turquoise. I do love beaded jewellery.....

Back at my Jewellery by Jolie  Etsy store I have put up two new pieces  of jewellery using Swarovski crystal:

Denim blue Swarovski heart necklace...

Tell your jeans you love them... Denim blue Swarovski heart necklace... with beaded silver chain and matching Denim blue Swarovski cut crystal bead, set of with delicate blue seed beads. Finished with round silver toggle clasp. Handmade by Jewellery by Jolie.. £12.95 GBP Only 1 available

Size :
Length of chain - 16 inch/400mm chain
Heart pendant - 18mm

&

Pink Swarovski Butterfly Necklace

Prettiest...Pink Swarovski Butterfly Necklace with Silver Beaded Chain... accented with delicate seed beads. Finished with silver toggle clasp. Handmade by Jewellery by Jolie.... £12.95 GBP Only 1 available

Size:
Length of Chain - 16 inches/400mm.
Butterfly pendant - 18mm wide.


Coming Soon.... Pink Swarovski Butterfly Drop earrings...

I post too....
United Kingdom
European Union
United States
Canada
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The perfect Linen shirt...

I've  found you the perfect Linen shirt ... and it's on sale too.. a bargain at just  £19.00 GBP... It Was: £29.50.... so go ahead treat yourself...

It would look exceptionally cool with my....

Cool...Native American style men's beaded necklace with hand carved bone bead and distressed striped, faux ivory and copper seed beads. With hand wound copper wire. Finished with vintage copper extension chain and lobster trigger clasp. Handmade by Jolie for Orlando Menswear.

£17.50 GBP  Only 1 available

Native American style men's beaded necklace with hand carved bone bead..

Length: 16inches/400mm with extension chain 22 inches/560mm


Just added to: 
Orlando Menswear...

Blue Harbour Pure Linen Grandad Collar Shirt

Source: marksandspencer.com via Jolie on Pinterest

Saturday - update...

Just thought I'd better post a little update... What's happening you may or not ask... well... I'm still banned from Facebook.. My page is still up there.. but I can't post anything or reply, 'Like', comment etc.. and I haven't received any explanation as to why I am banned.. Still feel a little shaky about the whole thing.. It's been a rather bad week.. I am currently going through a divorce... need I say more...

On a brighter note... I have got my Dummies guide to Wordpress Web Design today..  So I can finally start work on my website orlandomenswear.com. It does seem a little daunting (which is actually what I predicted ) but faint heart and all that ( whatever the Scot's say... did I tell you I lived in Scotland for a while.. yes... both Edinburgh and Glasgow... a tale of two cities...). Apparently I have to create this website in what is known as a 'sandpit'.. so if you see any sparks flying out of orlandomenswear.com you'll know I've made a mistake somewhere.. (highly likely I predict...).

Despite all the ca...phuf..uffle.. (I don't think there is such a word, but I like it!!!) I did manage to get some new stuff up in my stores this week..

Charming Feather drop earrings, with lilac and orange bohemian cut glass beads in vintage gold. Accented with delicate seed beads in shades of purple and orange. Handmade by Jewellery by Jolie. Finished with vintage gold stud earrings.

Bohemian glass beads are often referred to as Czech beads. Bohemia was a part of the former Czechoslovakia, now part of the Czech Republic, and was famous for its beautiful and colourful glass.


And for the guys... Handsome Black & White Beaded Men's necklace - with black glass bugle beads.. Finished with gunmetal extension chain and lobster trigger clasp. Handmade by Jolie for Orlando menswear.

I've been banned from Facebook!

Suntree

I got a big shock today, I decided to create a second page for my new store Orlando Menswear and had just started to make it look nice. I put some of my artwork up, started to 'Like' a few people, and then suddenly I was asked to log in, confirm my mobile phone number by typing in a code and then a few minutes later I was banned from Facebook for 30 days. I emailed them, but received a message saying that they would not respond to my email. My gosh I feel like a criminal! It's a really horrible feeling, I am really shocked.... Is it because I put up a second page?... I needed the second page because I couldn't link more than one store on Etsy to Facebook. I thought this was a good idea... my gosh... oh no... Well I wasn't particularly successful on Facebook anyway.. I say trying to reassure myself that I am OK about this... Nobody found me there anyway... the only person who 'Liked' my site was my Aunt Annette in Australia... oh dear.... well they say it's cathartic to talk about ones problems... oh dear I am feeling a little tearful...well that's that I guess.... gosh i'm shaking....
I wish I could get on with my website Orlandomenswear.com, unfortunately I am still waiting on my Dummies guides to Wordpress and Blogging to arrive. So I'm afraid I am no further forward.. Just to cheer me up, I am going to post up the artwork I put up on my Facebook page... I had thought it would be nice to put up some of my artwork on the blog anyway.. I thought it would make it more interesting and colourful...

Throw away the bow ties guys....

What does the 21st century man wear?... When he's dressed to impress... Bow ties.. Well... a little bit outdated... Think 2012... Even Mr Simon Cowell might be impressed... ( I know he doesn't go for ties..)


Here are a few suggestions.... Lets start with a shirt...

Dolce & Gabbana Gold Fit Nero Collar Cotton Tuxedo Shirt

Source: mrporter.com via Jolie on Pinteres

Lets add a necklace.... Try this Native American style white beaded Men's necklace for size.... Wire necklace with White AB Miyuki glass cube beads,  clear glass Miyuki beads, and opaque white seed beads. Finished with a silver extension chain, and lobster trigger clasp. Handmade by Jolie for Orlando Menswear.

Native American style white beaded men's necklace

What about some trousers?.....(or pants.. as some would say...)

Ralph Lauren Black Label Contrast-Placket Polo & Five-Pocket Pants - Neiman Marcus

Source: neimanmarcus.com via Jolie on Pinterest

Some Boots.....What about these... Made for walking... Maybe... A little dancing....

Salvatore Ferragamo Aritz Chelsea Boot - Neiman Marcus

Source: neimanmarcus.com via Jolie on Pinterest

What about an Elegant Evening Jacket...

Deconstructed Blazer. Black washed corduroy. Dolce & Gabbana.

Source: store.dolcegabbana.com via Jolie on Pinterest

A little bit of Window Shopping...

Blue Chevron Native American style Mens beaded necklace

While I've been waiting for my latest  Dummies guides to arrive....with hopefully... all the info needed to design my new Website orlandomenswear.com... I decided to do a little research. Which has included rather pleasantly a little window shopping... something you can do rather effortlessly on your lap top... 

So I was inspired to do a little pinning on Pinterest, I must say I just love this idea. Pinning's great fun and the  Boards look cool... I just found out today you can embed the pins in your blog. (You can see I'm having problems with my HTML here, it's not perfect, so I thought, well why not write about it... they say a problem shared is a problem halved... If I find the solution in one of my Dummies Guides, I'll let you know).

 I thought I might come up with a few suggestions as to how to wear my mens jewellery... Goes perfectly with a blue chambray shirt you might ask... Well which chambray shirt.... No problem here's a suggestion...And you can actually go buy the shirt too!

So why not treat yourself to a new shirt and make it perfect with a cool Native American necklace?.... well...from... Orlando menswear

The Perfect Blue Chambrey Shirt!

Source: boden.co.uk via Jolie on Pinterest

Well what about a suitable shirt for that shades

of grey necklace? ....Worry no more I have the

solution... I found the perfect shirt at M&S.....

I think you would look very smart in this grey shirt with...well....this rather cool Orlando Menswear necklace... What do you think... And... well of course... we have to loose the tie...
 

Men's necklace - in suitable shades of grey

Source: marksandspencer.com via Jolie on Pinterest

Delivery from Mr Pigeon!!

Those of you who have been following this blog, might remember the story of Mr Pigeon... and well wish to know more...You will be pleased to learn, Mr Pigeon arrived safely in England after a long and strenuous journey from China of  many weeks...The Chinese it seems no longer send their packages by airmail but have returned to the ancient ways and prefer Pigeon Post.... I was rather curious to meet Mr Pigeon, had the Chinese, one wonders, succeeded in breeding an exceptionally large jumbo jet sized pigeon?.... I am sorry to say, I cannot enlighten you in this matter... my mother opened the door... and well failed to comment on the matter.....

Thanks to Mr Pigeon, however.... I now have some very beautiful peacock feathers and needless to say one of my Peacock feather creations is now for sale in my Etsy store Jewellery by Jolie....

Peacock feather necklace with beaded vintage chain

As to Orlando Menswear, my new website orlandomenswear.com, has been stalled for a bit, as I decided to invest in some Dummies guides. I'm a big fan of Dummies guides, if in doubt buy a Dummies guide, say I. So I bought three - Wordpress for Dummies, Wordpress web design for Dummies and finally Blogging for Dummies. I do like my Dummies guides don't I?

Native american style beaded necklace

Just a reminder that my Orlando menswear store is still up on Etsy...  Etsy went down for a while on Friday... My apologies to those who tried to access my stores...

Here's the perfect necklace for that blue chambrey shirt... very cool for summer....

Available at.... Orlando menswear

Up to something

If you wonder why I've been a bit quiet, it's not because I've been idle..... I've been trying to develop a new website... yes, I'm now Orlandomenswear.com (don't look yet...it's changing every 5 minutes..). I decided that my pretty little hummingbirds weren't quite the right image for Orlando menswear. I'm learning all about Wordpress - not as wysiwyg as I thought it would be...It doesn't help that I thought it might be a nice idea if I incorporated an ecommerce site, when I found out you could get a Cashie Commerce plug in for Wordpress....Nothing is ever easy....( oh... why do I keep having to learn that...).

Anyway, for all you guys getting a bit hot and bothered in the summer heat (well it might be hot somewhere...) I have the perfect solution.

Throw away the ties guys.... men's necklace... in suitable shades of grey... Orlando Menswear

More Photography?

Yes, after all that work last week and after launching my new range of men's jewellery at my new Etsy store Orlando Menswear on Saturday (Probably not the best day of the week to launch?). I decided on Sunday that I didn't like my photography and started all over again....no...o...o...o... It's still pouring down here in England, another thunder storm yesterday, what a dreadful summer we're having.... not at all good for photography. Anyway all done now....and I am a little happier with my work ( I know I've still got a lot to learn...), I have found a little more out about my camera. It's not an SLR so doesn't have an aperture, and other settings people mention, when dealing with lighting problems (remember the halogen light and the light box?), but it does have a light sensitivity setting hidden away on the second page of the menu - now why didn't I spot that before. I am sure I have read the manual over and over. Well problem solved. Still a bit of a problem with colour caste's from certain necklaces which I have been correcting in Photoshop Elements 10. I decided to photograph on brown Kraft paper - I thought it went better with my logo and made the photographs a little more interesting - can't get all the photographs the same shade of brown though.... Well here's my improved photograph.... See what you think..

Mens necklace - feather charm and native american striped style beads with twisted bronze bugle beads. With vintage bronze beads and bohemian glass picasso beads. Handmade by Jolie for Orlando Menswear. Finished with vintage bronze extension chain and lobster trigger clasp. Orlando Menswear

Orlando Menswear range launched!!!

My new men's  jewellery range is up @ my Etsy store Orlando Menswear!!!!

Striking, modern, minimalist men's necklace - black wire and miyuki glass beads. Handmade by Jolie for Orlando Menswear. Hand wound black wire accented with black glass AB miyuki beads. AB or Aurora Borealis glass has been finished with a special finish which creates a rainbow like patina. Miyuki beads come from Japan, they were invented by Masayoshi Katsuoka of the Miyuki Shoji Company in the 1980s. Finished with a gunmetal extension chain and trigger clasp.

Length of necklace - 16 inches/ 400mm with extension chain - 20.5 inches/ 520 mm

Check it out at my store....

After a week of rain and thunderstorms I finally got all my photographs taken and sent them up into Orbit in hyper space...
With the aid of my halogen desk lamp and a light box, I had previously used for tracing my embroidery designs onto fabric, I finally got there....

Now its back to marketing and well more bookmarks....

Thunder storms and ligtning very very frightning.

It's been raining, and when it rains, it pours. And I get a migraine headache... However I've still been working valiantly a way, trying to get  my mens jewellery range ready for my etsy store Orlando Menswear. Without natural sunlight I've been resorting to using halogen light and thank goodness, for Photoshop, the effect was quite natural. I managed to remove the yellowish hue in Photoshop by using Enhance -  Adjust colour - Remove colour cast. This is the resulting photograph, I rather like the gradient shade... I'm going to experiment this afternoon with a light box, I bought for tracing my embroidery designs onto fabric, I thought it might create an unusual effect.

Things are looking up on the marketing front. I am now coming up on the first page for search 'Jewellery by Jolie' for my facebook page and the second page for Etsy. All that Bookmarking is starting to pay off! My Blogs not up there yet, I went as far as page 20.... So must make a mental note to carry on with the bookmarking.

I'm afraid I've heard no more from Mr pigeon, with my peacock feathers, he is meant to be here by now....I am starting to worry about him.  The last I heard from him was on the 9th July when I received an email telling me "Base on our radar system, our pigeon reported to us that he has already covered 50% of its journey of your item:" 

Oh... and I've sold a book, makes me seem rather important doesn't it..... even though it does happen to be on British History.....and not written by me at all.....

A day in the life...

5.36pm, I now squidoo, I now have my own page or should I say Lens at Squidoo - See me @Squidoo I also have now got a collection of my old books on Amazon (that was a bit different wasn't it - weren't expecting that were you?). I had a chance to link with Amazon and I thought why not, I'll sell something, well I got a bit carried away, they only listed five. I thought you might be a little curious to find out what other books I am selling on Amazon. I am always curious about what people are reading... See me @Amazon
And my boxes have arrived - cool. Also created pages on Newsvine and LiveJournal today, both good news sites. Plus keep adding to my bookmarks... All in all a good days marketing... I wonder if i've managed to change Mr Googles opinion of me... There I'll be up there with the likes of Angelina Jolie on the first page...

Orlando Menswear

I've been busy working away on my new collection of men's jewellery for Orlando Menswear my new store on Etsy. Here's a sneek preview.....

I apologise for not blogging as much as I intended, I intended this blog to be about the day in the life of a jewellery designer starting her own business. But I've been working so hard trying to get this business started that I haven't written in the way I intended too. It's the getting noticed that's so hard. I've got myself the Dummies guide to social media marketing for Blogs, Twitter, Facebook, Linkedin, etc.. (very good book - I recommend it) But I'm still finding it impossible to get seen, I can't even make it in Google! And here I am on a Google Blogger! I seem to spend half my time bookmarking everything, and seeing if I come up on Google, I don't even come up when I cut and paste a whole line from my blog... Any of you Computer experts out there got any ideas?

 So what am I planning to do today. Having spent the weekend taking lots of pictures for my men's jewellery range for Orlando Menswear at Etsy (got to get in a good plug there - you never know the search engine bots might read it), I am slowly editing them in Photoshop Elements 10 (amazing software - once upon a time I use to have Photoshop 4,  now being on straitened means, I can't afford Photoshop, however I was delighted the Elements version works extremely well). The next stage is to design my logo to make a banner for my store and  my labels. Then its a matter of placing it all up on my Etsy store. But then I'm still waiting for my boxes... I thought DVD boxes would be a little different, I bought some pretty pink ones for Jewellery by Jolie,  I just thought these would be a little more cool for the guys...

 Meanwhile I'd better do some more marketing, there's no point in blogging away if nobody ever reads this... So more bookmarking... and maybe a little page on Squidoo that looks interesting...

Seen sporting a rare Ziffo T....

Good morning, it's a lovely sunny July Sunday morning in Colchester, England. And who should be seen sporting a rare Ziffo T, why it's the charming Bruno Bear! It's his big day today  as he's at Auction... Now the reason he's sporting a rare Ziffo T is because Ziffo use to be my company, and I embroidered this T-shirt myself. The design is 'Dead Happy', I think there is something rather Rock n' Roll about this T-shirt. And Bruno is certainly is a Rock n' Rolling Bear!

Go to Auction!

Meet Bruno....

Well what have I been up to this afternoon, you may ask (or may not...well it depends...) I have been photographing a charming bear friend called Bruno... I'm sure you'll love him, so I thought I'd share his photo with you...

For the English rose...

Unique and original handmade rose drop earrings in vintage bronze with peacock green glass beads and stud fitting. Accented with lilac and turquoise seed beads.

Size : Drop length 40 mm Width: 7 mm


 Jewellery by Jolie

It..s..s Show... Time...

A once in a lifetime opportunity...Your chance to bid for.. an original & unique..  

Turquoise Butterfly & Flower Charm Necklace

A unique and original handmade design made by Jewellery by Jolie. This is a special one of a kind auction - you are guaranteed that you'll never find anyone else wearing the same necklace!




Just started on Ebay... 

 



This delightful and charming Charm Necklace features a turquoise glass hand wrapped bead, antique copper butterfly, flowers and unique beads from around the world, all accented with brightly coloured glass seed and copper beads. Finished with an antique bronze toggle clasp.

Size:  Length 10.5 inches/265 mm  Width 1inch/25 mm


Length of Chain - 16 inches/400mm