Back in the enamelling workshop today for the first time in ages - trying to get stuff finished off in time for the Christmas craft fairs. 

I had a couple of spare mounts so decided to do some quick and easy pieces to go on them. The piece on the left has round blue glass beads fired onto a base of transparent light blue; the right-hand one has amber-coloured square beads fired onto blue flux. The blue flux layer wasn't quite thick enough so there are little holes in it from being fired for so long (to get the beads to properly melt into it). I kind of like the effect though. 

Always fun messing around with beads - tricky to get the firing time right so that they melt just enough but not too much. 

Last week's theme at The Little House in the Park was apples (in celebration of National Apple Day on 21 October). Here are some of our appley things. 

The biggest one is a willow wreath wound round with wool. Matthew couldn't quite manage the winding but was very enthusiastic about choosing autumnal colours and finding the ends of balls of wool (which he is quite handy at). 

The top right apple is made from plaited ribbon glued onto card in a spiral, and the bottom right one is glitter and other shiny bits scattered onto that sticky foamy stuff (don't know what it's called). We glued a safety pin on the back of that one too, to make it into a badge. 

Can I take this opportunity to sincerely wish everyone a very Happy Apple Day.

This is what we made last week, at The Little House in the Park (where we go every Friday). The session was all about portraits. We started off decorating large cardboard frames with bits of tissue paper, feathers, glitter etc, then we made colourful backgrounds using inky paint and sponges. We stuck it all together with black and white photos on top, and then went crazy with collage. Matthew's choice of white frayed ribbon for his picture led to interesting/disturbing results. Would the Mayor of London please go and wash his inky hands. Now.