Monday finds #1

Up-left: www.etsy.com/shop/juliacalimera

Up-right: www.etsy.com/shop/azulado

Down-left: www.etsy.com/shop/SoleDeVita

Down-right: www.etsy.com/shop/LoreTree

Check them on etsy.com!

Have a nice Monday

Necklaces

I think a piece of  jewelry should be something that you wear without thinking about it. it should be not heavy, and must give you a touch of something.

With this idea I have prepared my new necklaces:

 The steel cable allow me to put more and more beads with different light and colours, without adding so much weight!

I use mainly natural semi-precious stones. Smooth or faceted, that doesn't matter if the colours are well combined.

I always think: would I wear something like that?

I know that could narrow my view, but I'm not going to sell you something I wouldn't wear myself!

Sometime this thing becomes a problem, because I want to keep them for myself and not to put them in my shop...

But the marvellous thing about doing jewels yourself is that you can have one and sell another..
;)

Starting sales...

Time has come, and after some months I had my first sale on etsy!!
This bracelet of mine was send to France. Hopefully it will become a fine present for someone.

I wanted it to be a present just as it came out from the envelope! I hope my packaging could render the idea!


It was a great emotion to prepare it from someone who considered my work valuable!




From my hands to their hands...






Soon after a new sale came.. just yesterday night! The buyer is a friend of mine who now lives in Germany. When I saw the order I smiled and then I thought she could tell me before buying. I wrote an e-mail to her and she answered to me saying that the price is already too low, so she doesn't want any discount for her purchasing ...
My very first earrings are going to become the present for a friend of hers ...
I'm very happy about it, I perfectly know that my friends see what I do with "the look of love", but I can't help appreciating their words so much!

Food, or not?

Etsy is much more than a marketplace, it is a world where you can find almost everything!!

One of the prettiest things I found in my wandering is a particular kind of jewellery:
Food jewellery
Miniature of food used as earrings, rings, brooch, etc... are very popular, not only on Etsy!
What I personally adore are those miniatures where you could mistake them for real food and even eat them.

Aren't they gorgeous?!

1. (up left) Allart's kitchen: http://www.etsy.com/shop/AllartsKitchen
Chiara sends her beautiful pieces from Bologna! Her pictures are really funny, and she knows how to make her customer hungry, for sure.
In her shop you can find any kind of pastries! Entering her shop is like entering a real kitchen!!

2. (up right) Bijotti&Ciciotti: http://www.etsy.com/shop/BijottiCiciotti
Cristina does much more than food miniature, her jewels are fun and cool, and dreamy and... many much more!! She is a real artist in what she does!
Her shop deserves more than a look!


3.(down left) Le chou chou Bijoux: http://www.etsy.com/shop/LeChouChou
Paola has a particular retrò style that make her jewels extraordinarly fine! You could think that she is a very British lady, but she is not. Particularly skilled in cups of tea, she lives in the north of Italy, while her origin are from the south.
Let's have a cup of tea with her!

4. (down right) Amabito: http://www.etsy.com/shop/amabito
Roberta's works are peculiar for one single main reason. She makes glass on her own! That would be enough to have a serious look at her jewellery: All her beads are totally handmade by her. These cupcakes are made of real glass, that's quite new if you think that usually food miniature are made in polymer clay...
What are you waiting for? Go and see her incredible art!!


That's about four particular crafter that I have found on etsy, of course if you go directly into the cauldron you can find even more!!
I like food jewellery, and I made a particular present for a friend of mine through etsy, a tray of biscuits! She really appreciate it, it is the kind of thing you can wear to go to work or to go out at night. Something that make your style more personal! And that made my present surely personal!

What's new?

Putting my new hobby on Etsy made me think a lot about what I am doing...
Now when I create something I try to be as "original" as possible, though that is not always easy!!

My new life on etsy is also something I am never tired to talk about with my friends. One of them seemed particularly interested in this world, but he is not very confident with computers and social media. He is a goldsmith and he is trying to find a way foe his job in this particular moment.

Thus I thought about a collaboration among us! I cannot but learn from him about jewlry, and I can be of some use to introduce him to social world!

The first result of this collaboration is this woderful pair of earrings:

https://www.etsy.com/listing/111569403/copper-earrings-hammered-very-light

 

These beautiful earrings are in copper. a leaf of metal hammered to obtain the particular effect of reflecting light. The greatest thing of these earrings (in my opinion) is that they are particularly light but spactacular, so easy to wear, while give you a touch.

stay tuned to know what is going to come!!

Translating into Italian

Etsy is growing... and learning a new language: Italian.

The project started, and many members of Etsyitaliateam are helping in this great issue of translating etsy into Italian.
I've never translated a web-site before. I am very gratefull to my informatics course at University, otherwise html would be an enormous difficoulty. These codes are everywhere while translating and sometimes they make it difficult to understand the real meaning of a very simple sentence or phrase.
It's tricky, but so far is also interesting.

What is strange about it is that it must be functional, there is very little to "read". What we are translating are basic information to surf the great sea of shops on Etsy. Thus, we need to focus on the very use of words.
Another thing to take into consideration is lenght. Bottons and links are supposed to take the same amount of space of the english ones.

Luckily, we have a thread to compare our doubts and talk with the admin to be sure of doing a good job. Once again, what makes Etsy different from other places on the net, is the main idea of community.

Working (and living) with what has to do with languages, I've been wondering about this project before joining. We are doing it as volunteers, we are just partecipating in what we want to became real. We first wanted this site to speak Italian. But translation is also a serious matter, people do it for a living, so... how fair is it doing it for free?
I hope someone is supposed to revise our whole work, in the end. Someone that do it for a living.
So far, once again I am learning something new!

Dark blue-green, earrings in Murano Glass

My latest trip in Venice was really great time spent with a dear friend of mine.

He was very kind and waited for me choosing glasses in a little shop along the street.

I love this colour (and he loved it too) It's dark but shining too.



This time I decided to use only Silver 925 as a metal. Hooks and the rest are totally in silver.

Probably I want to make them just more.. precious!!

Though they seem heavy, they are quite easy to wear.
Perfect for summer, to make you shine!!

FREE SHIPPING!

Happy bithrday to me!!
Yesterday was my birthday, that is the kind of thing that makes me happy... so happy that I decided a discount for anybody will choose one of my items in this week!
Take advantage and insert the code: MYBIRTHDAY012

 

http://www.clode83.etsy.com

 

first sale!

My first sale on Etsy was on the charity shop. Someone has bought the earrings I've donated to the charity shop. I was very excited about it and luckily I could send them almost immediately after the sale!

I am particularly happy about this sale, I hope that it could bring me a bit of luck about my future sales. I've earned nothing, of course, but it was a real pleasure the same!

have a look in my shop to see the new items!
;)

It is a matter of size sometimes...

Bracelets are a totally different matter from earrings when you create a piece of jewellery...
Because bracelet may have a right size!

When I started working on this bracelet I didn't consider it, since I was busy in preparing the stones. The solution came quite easily, anyhow: putting various rings at the end it becomes suitable for different "wrist".

Matching agata with nacre is quite unusual, but I like these two colours togheter!
The result is a very fine bracelet.

I think I'll prepare a pair of earrings with the same motifs, since I still have agata and nacre...

Stay tuned!

what's in a hobby

I need to keep moving my hands, particularly when I'm nervous or worried for something...
That's why I play the guitar.
That's why I like cooking.
That's why I started this new hobby!

Earrings are my favourite piece of jewelery! What i like most is that they move while you move. According to this idea I try to make all my earrings move somehow. Though the long tubeis static, the final agata at the end can move.

That's just an hobby for me, of course. In etsy I found a way to share it first of all, and let see what is going to happen...

Even blogging was just an experiment at the very beginning and eventually made me in real contact with extraordinary people here around...

Too much time is passed since then and my blogroll is to be updated... I'll do that too.

Hope you enjoy what you see so far!

Time goes by...

...and new projects come to life!!

I've been thinking about my "English" blog, and how to keep it alive. Italian lessons are still something I want to do here, and language learning in general is still among my main activities.
Recently, I started something new...
A new hobby, if you want to say so... I started creating jewellery. At first I was not so satisfied with the result, but I kept on trying and... what I'm doing now is a bit more pretty to see (or, at least I hope so!)

Yesterday night I opened a virtual shop on Etsy. I "studied" a bit before opening it and I finally decided to try...
Here is my first item:

I bought the glass during my last visit in Venice. In the fine little shop where I bought these two, there were no others with the same colour. What I really like about these earrings is the colour! It reminds me of water, and the shape too convey to this idea! That's why I decided to put nothing else than the glass for these earrings.

I hope you like them, and hope that you enjoy visiting my shop!
Stay tuned!

The earrings are available here: http://www.etsy.com/shop/clode83

Flowers and memories

Foto from Flickr

Every time I see this flower I can't help but think of my Grandmother. She used to have one of those plants and she was so proud of it. She showed it to every body, made pictures... I don't know why she loved it so much, if you look at the flowers, they are peculiar, but you could say they are not so pretty. And she could explain to you every single piece, and the meaning of it, so to understand why it is called 'passion flower', and all the symbols of crucifixion...

I really think that she somehow 'loved' this plant and the great effect it gave to her garden, but I've never asked myself whether she loved this plant more than her granddaughters, we were for sure her favourite flowers.

The House of Sleep

"The house of sleep" is one of my favourite book, a novel by Jonathan Coe and the topic of my final dissertation at the end of the first three years University.

The novel is diveded in six sections, the first is titled 'awake', then you can find the four phases of sleep and the last one R.E.M. phase, in the end there are three Appendixes (Poem, Letter, Transcript). Each section consists of three chapters, odd-numbered chapters are set in 1983-84, even-numbered chapters are set in June 1996.
The different sections of the novel are closely linked through words, they don't come to an end just dissolve, like an interrupted dream, in an incomplete sentence, the final word of each stage of sleeping is picked up at the beginning of the following one, but in another context and sometime even by another character.

The story deals with a group of students that share a house in th '80s and fall in and out of love, the we see them in the '90s with their lives changed. We can say that the very protagonist of the whole novel is Sarah, she suffer from narcolepsy, and in the 80's she's not aware of it. Narcolepsy is characterized by Eccessive Daytime Sleepiness (EDS), cataplexy, vivid hallucinations, brief episodes of total paralysis. Who suffer from Narcolepsy can fall asleep even in active conditions, like eating or talking, what is called sleep attack. Adult patients often perceive narcoleptic symptoms as embarassing and social isolation may result. They may experience interpersonal problems, and are perceived as lazy or are suspected of illegal drug use.
Sarah's symptoms will cause a large number of misundedrstanding throughout the story, sometime caomically and sometime less. At the beginning of the story Sarah has an affair with Gregory, a fastidious student of medicine, who seems to be more interested in her as a medical case than as a person, and her girlfriend. We will find him as a doctor in '96, a very precise doctor who run a clinic for sleep disordes who starts to hate sleep, because "the sleeper is helpless; powerless. Sleep puts even the strongest people at the mercy of the weakest and the most feeble". Then she knows Robert, who falls hopelessly in love with her, Robert seems to be one of the few to understand that she suffers from a real desease. At the beginning of the story he's studing modern languages, but then he change to psychiatry, probably to find a way to help her. He has is life totally changed by this woman. Terry is a student at Ashdown with Robert and Sarah, he sleeps almost 14 hours per day, then he will be one of Dr. Gregory patients because of his insomnia, he says that is his curse, always tired and never tired enough to sleep. As a student he was "plagued by dreams" and then he became a journalist obsessed by movies, a kind of dreaming without sleeping.

Sarah's symptoms cause a large number of misunderstandings throughout of the novel, but narcolepsy is also an excuse to talk about medicine and doctors. There is a comical conference with psychologists who try to sustain their own ideas even when everything demonstrate they are wrong. Doctors who consider research even more important than their patients' lives. Jonathan Coe is humorous but while you're laughing inevitably think about the context in wich the scenes takes place and some characters in the story are frightening when they have the chance to explain their own vision of life.

In the end is one of the best novel I have ever read, it is well-written, witty, never banal. Give it a chance!

In Padova

I can't draw. And I don't like it. Even when I was a child, I hated the moment our teacher used to ask us to draw a picture. Because I can't do it.

But every time I pass by this little shop I can't avoid stopping in front of it, and I would like to enter it once. Now, I don't dare because I know that there is nothing for me inside, but stopping in front of the window I wish I could draw and paint, just to enter. I know that in a place like this probably there is an old shop assistant, one of those who perfectly knows everything about art. One of those who knows everything about Giotto, for example and can explain you how to make a perfect picture. Because in these old little shops, assistants are always like this, I'm sure!

This shop is in the very centre of Padova and it is one of my favourite place, because when I stop there to look at the window my mind can wander and imagine things, because like many old things is something rare and beautiful.
And still, I can't draw, and I don't like it.

Language education

I live in the north-east of Italy, in Veneto, the Italian region were the local dialect is used the most, as I learnt from my latest exam. My family is a mix of different cities inside this very same region, my father’s family is from Rovigo (the city where I live), but my mother’s family is partly from a village near Venice and partly from a village near Treviso (I’ve already talked about where they live). Anyway part of my family live in Verona, and others live between Mantova and Ferrara… And they are only those with whom I am in contact.

At home wespeak Italian, and that was the language that we, children, were supposed to learn, but of course when we get in contact with our granpas and granmas we hear other languages. In my father’s family a chair is a ‘carega’, but in my aunt’s house (near Ferrara) there were other objects, ‘scarana’ (chair-sedia), ‘granadel’ (broom-scopa), ‘bagaj’ (thing-coso/a). And different ways to say things, another language…

I learned Dialect when I was grown-up, I used to spent much time with my granparents and the only language used at home was dialect; my sister didn’t like it, she insisted to speak Italian, and sometime reproached me for my talk. At school, no doubt, Italian was the only language allowed, and also with unknown adults. My granma worked as a tailor, there were many people at any time of day at home, and I could appreciate moments in which (and clients to whom) she spoke a fine Italian, and others when dialect was possible.

Until high-school I’ve always used Italian at school, but then in my class I was the only one coming from the city (if we can talk about city…) and all my mates came from villages around Rovigo and Padua the language used among us was definitely dialect. I still remember a group of girls from another class saying “How rough, they speak dialect!”. That’s how it was considered.

Venetian dialect is the language of great writers and artists through different centuries, and part of this language became Italian in the long process called “questione della lingua” that started with Dante, went on with Manzoni, until the language that is now called Standard Italian. So, it is clear that it is not rough or anything, they were (and probably still are) a group of posh girls!

Now, I speak Italian the most, with some of my friends I speak dialect, at home I know that there are different dialects to use with different people, and there are still words that are unknown to me in some of my family languages. But dialect is a kind of code for me, I cannot recognize the code-switching moment, but when I use it I feel at home. I consider it much more expressive, because is the language in which I usually express feelings, bad feelings most of all. When I’m too nervous to control what I’m saying I don’t use a proper Italian….

If you ask me, I speak a very good Italian, I can speak a good English (or i hope so!), and I get angry in Dialect.

"occupation for an idle hour..."

I need to do something with my hands today, I don't know if you ever have this feeling, of using your hands to do something, and the result is this.



The first try was definitely less succesful, but the second time I watch on them to be sure of the final result! Then with a bit of creme ganache it was done!

Ready to be eaten tonight!

My favourite sport

...though I cannot practice it as much as I wish!
The first time I have ridden I was 3, I can barely remember it. My uncle has a horse, and since I was a child he tried to teach me how to ride.

There is something special in riding a horse, it is not only a matter of open air and wind in your hair, there is a relation between you and the animal, and first of all you need to understand how this relation works. And in the same way the horse need to understand you. So in the very first phase you need to understand how you can communicate and how he answers. You define a contact, explaining that you (are supposed to) control the situation, and then a great part of your energy is dedicated to understand his reactions.

The gratest thing is when you realize that you're no longer thinking about it and everything is going on. This thing of being in relation with nature in such a way makes it magic. I'm not sure I can render this idea... There is not only a way to move or to do things, it is something more complicated, and thus much more enjoyable.

I'm really lucky, because anytime I go and visit my uncle I cn ask him to let me ride, and I started when I was so young that even though I fall down, and I experienced some "dangerous moments" I've never given up.

Little daisy bracelet for me!
Lucky me, I have children that bring me flowers sometimes, at least them!

How do you usually judge a book?

I must confess I do judge books by the cover, if it somehow strikes me, I'll give it a chance. When I say cover I mean the title, or the colours of the cover, or...

The author. I usually give a second chance to someone who told me a beautiful story. (but no more than a second chance, when it disappointed me...).

Then I start to handle the book, and if it smells of love story, I'll give up. I read love stories, but not when that's the main point. Love ( and death and other few topics) occurs in everybody's lives, so you don't need to consider it the main point when you're telling a story. Have you ever read a story without finding love in it?!

So far the book is in my hands...I read something about the author (if I don't know him/her) and then I read the back, usually there is a summary of the story, or something like that (the italian "quarta di copertina"). And that's the final phase, the most critical, now there must be something that strikes me, that intrigues me...
And, of course there is a very final thing that I consider, but it is just a little thing: the price. Of course I don't give up because of money (sometimes I can look for another edition), but when I didn't work, and consequently I had no money of my own, I used to go to bookshop, decide what I wanted and then I went to the city library to take it. This system never failed, and if the book was good I used to buy it.

I've been disappointed very few times by this method that I could say it is almost scientific!
And you?! How do you usually judge a book?!


P.S.
The photo has very little to do with the post, but last time I went to London, instead of the city I visited Notting Hill and Portobello road... and of course I could not but snap a pic of the very famous travel book shop!!!