Leaf Bracelet - Kit review

Last October I visited the Welsh Bead Fair in Cardiff and bought some kits from Spellbound Beads. I chose this leaf bracelet as it reminded me of the Saraguro beadwork that I had seen exhibited on the Beadworkers Guild stand that I really loved, except it looked a bit easier!

I can't find the name of the kit right now as the bag I kept the instructions in is packed away while decorating & I couldn't see it on the Spellbound Beads website either but I still wanted to write about it before I forgot!

The instructions for the kit were really comprehensive, nicely laid out and easy to follow. There were plenty of beads and the colour choice is beautiful, I know there were other lovely combinations too. The patter itself was much easier to work than expected and went very quickly so a win-win! I bought other kits there too and after doing this bracelet I'm glad I did because I felt that this was good value for money and an easy way to try something different. Here is the link to the Spellbound Beads website, but don't click if you don't want to be tempted to spend lots of money!

Belated Show Review.

I realised that I didn't really say much about the Welsh Bead Fair that I visited on 4th October and since I haven't taken any photo's for a while I thought I could break my blog silence with a quick post about it.

The Welsh Bead Fair was held at the Village Hotel in Cardiff and is run by Stitch n Craft Beads which is one of my favourite online bead stores. The show was smaller this year as there was a larger Fair being held in England on the same day & a lot of traders had obviously decided to go to that one instead.

There were about 15 stalls which included 3 great seed bead stalls; Stitch n Craft, Spellbound Beads and Oaktree Crafts, I bought from each of them of course, my favourites being some matte denim blue 11's from Oaktree, cranberry lustre 11's from Stitch n Craft and some lovely kits from Spellbound which I plan to blog about as they are completed. The lampworker Ray Skene was there and I bought a few beads from him, he was very nice to talk to and gave me a lovely leaf pendant for free with my purchases! There were various other stalls there including one showcasing knotwork, Wellhead books with an amazing selection, Anita's Beads and Precious Sparkle Beads which had wonderful semi-precious strands but I stayed away from there as I wanted to focus on the seedy side of beads. Another highlight was the Beadworkers Guild stand which had some lovely Saraguro style beadwork. I love the Saraguro collars that I have seen, in particular the ones designed by Chris Prussing and I plan to make one one day, maybe when I am retired, as they look like a serious amount of work!

While it was smaller than many other bead fairs, I still had a lot of fun and bought too much! I love the fact that it is so close to my birthday as it gives me a good excuse to treat myself!