have you been here?

Have you been to icraft.ca ?

icraft is a Canadian venture, similar to Etsy...where you can buy emmsgems in Canadian dollars! Okay, you can buy a lot more than just emmsgems, and you can buy in other currencies too.

Check out iCraft!

Be sure to visit my creator exhibit: emmsgems

local!

Etsy has a fancy little buying feature: shop local. You can enter the name of a city (like your own), and find all items created by artsies and craftsies in your neighbourhood! You can shop handmade local - or find something special to send to a far away friend from their hometown!

Here is a local treasury:

dressing for the kitchen

It's as if a light went on in my kitchen last week! I finally understand why people wear aprons. I am fairly "new" to kitchen endeavours: a "green" chef and a "raw" baker.

I am constantly running my hands under water, and drying them on my kitchen hand towel. I find myself tempted to just wipe my hands on the dishtowel, and sometimes even the hand towel, in order to save my hands from drying up. Then it hit me....like a bag of flour...if I was wearing an apron, I could just wipe my hands on it!

I'm embarrassed.

Here are a few of my favourite aprons:

Jungle Apron from Solanah

Fresh Squeezed from Snazz

50's Cocktail from Wheredidyougetthat

New...vintage...there are so many cute options!

You can even use your favourite fabric and make your own!

from the Patternstash

Am I crazy to say, "Bring back the apron!"

what's new to me

My exposure to Etsy, "Your place to buy and sell all things handmade", has opened my eyes to a whole new world. The obvious is that I am open to all kinds of neat things to purchase. My purchases have included reusable produce bags, lip balm, note cards, a scarf, and some soap. I admire purses and totes, jewelry and paintings.

But Etsy and her sellers have sparked a renewed interest in craft. I have always wanted to sew and crochet, and I own a sewing machine for whipping up quick fabric creations. But I had never heard of "felting" before now, nor had I known that such adorable doodads could be made with felt. To me, felt is a material for school children.

But now I see felted bowls, needle felted beads...

fiveforty

artbydonnarose

3FUN

So much fun! So much potential!

True felt is made from a natural fibre, usually wool, through stimulation combining friction and moisture (or by using special felting needles). Essentially, the structure of the natural fibers is tangled and bonded...forming felt.

A New Piece

A NEW PIECE for emmsgems!

Be sure to read the story behind this "Ghost" of a gEM!

I foresee some matching earrings in the near future...

I love the red beads in this necklace! They have a matte finish, are extremely light weight, and are made from the Buri nut...which come from the Buri Palm tree in the Philippines. Beads aren't the only thing made from parts of the Buri tree. The trunk is used as a source of flour, and the palms are used to make hats!

my favourites

I just took a stroll through my favourites on Etsy, and I noticed a recent influx of the colour YELLOW:




Is it representative of the changing season?
Daylight until well past 5 p.m.?
Is it my cheery mood?

I think that yellow is often overlooked.

storing earrings

I don't know about you, but storing the earrings that I wear on a regular basis is a challenge.

For one thing, they get all tangled up in each other. It doesn't matter how many little compartments I have, I end up throwing them all in the same one. So compartments aren't a good idea.

Another problem is, just like socks...I can never find a matching pair when I want one! I spend so much time rifling through the tangle of dangles and hoops, that I give up.

While browsing through Etsy, I discovered this beautiful and seemingly handy piece:

Earring Frame from ParadiseHillDesgins

I might just have to buy this!