The Life of the Hummingbird

Follow the pictures anti-clockwise and you can see the Life of a Betty Jo Hummingbird, {My favorite bird}
And because I also love Mexican embroidered dresses......

You can imagine how much I pine for one like this handmade beauty.
Viva la Picaflor!

Weekend Snapshots

On Saturday we gave 10 nine year old boys bows and arrows. It was Charlies 9th Birthday party and luckily a very experienced person was in charge! All boys were delivered home to their parents whole. Just don't try it at home....go to a BIG field!!


On Sunday I started making some more "Petal Seasons" necklaces for Blackbird Corner.


Yesterday I spent a lovely afternoon doing nothing much at all ( if you call walking through Darebin Parklands with the boy and the dog nothing much). There was also a bit of sky gazing and wondering how it became autumn so quickly.....

You are Invited!

Betty Jo News

Betty Jo Designs has two lovely new stockists in NSW. A selection of lino necklaces will now be available at Blackbird Corner : the ONLY place to get your fix of heavenly handmade in Newcastle. And for those of you near the Murray River border, the lovely emporium Hen's Teeth Trading in Tocumwal will have a range of lino brooches and pendants.

And some other exciting news. Betty Jo will be appearing at the New and Improved Finders Keepers Market in Melbourne this April. We will be having a stall full of beautiful handmade delights from our Gleaners Inc. friends as well as newer Betty Jo goodies {and some old favorites}.
It is being held in the iconic Exhibition Buildings in Carlton, and the line up is pretty awesome!And closer to home, the "I say Doily,You say Doyley" exhibition opens next Friday from 5.30 pm at Gleaners Inc. Some drop dead gorgeous pieces for the show have been arriving so it will be an event not to be missed. Cam from CurlyPops whipped up some pretty bunting from her doily stash especially for the show. My Hummimgbird likes it alot!

Wearing Orange

Dress : Polly Pratt
Necklace : Betty Jo

Petal Seasons

New Vintage Lino Necklaces by Betty Jo Designs. Coloured Lino Petals with seasonal accents. Now available on Etsy or at Gleaners Inc.

Fresh Clocks

Petite Owl {cuckoo} Clock..now at Gleaners Inc. It only has a soft wee ticktock sound and it doesn't shout CUCKOO every hour!

Little Skull is sitting in the window of Gleaners Inc. until it finds a home. I hope it shan't be long......

Busy Lizzie

Yep, that's me. Making, planning, organising, writing stuff , photographing, selling, shop girling, Mumming {big job that one} and what else? Oh that's right, blogging {albeit less often than I used to}.

{new doily skull clock}

And because it's all about Doilies in Betty Jo's studio, at Gleaners Inc. and in day to day life it seems, I can NOT look around the online world or in reality any more with out seeing a doily or six.

{new Flying Ducks}

Today at the pool..doily trimmed bathers, in the trashy mags...doily dresses, not to mention the AMAZING doily creations arriving for the "I say Doily, you say Doyley" exhibition.
I even had a doily moment yesterday evening when catching up with my old school friend.

We were both wearing doilies!!

Talk about embracing our inner Nana!

Patchworking......

I finished my *Quilting*.

conversations........

I'm having a lot of conversations lately. Nice chatty ones when I'm in the shop talking about things like : finding studio spaces, sleeping patterns of babies, dentists, cycling, finding old lino, Nana's china, memories of childhood.

I tune out a bit when the conversation shifts to the state of The Economy. Then my eyes drift away and I start humming in my head.
I have been having a few online conversations lately too. Talking about doilies and exhibitions, handmade products for Gleaners Inc. and catching up with old buddies.
I love the banter between my chatty facebook friends. Back and forth with witty repartee. So much fun! And lets not forget instagram. That's super fun too, but it's more like chatting in pictures.

I just discovered blogger now lets you have conversations by allowing you reply in the comment section. Why am I so slow to realise these things??? Well I'm a wee bit busy by day and I don't have a computer at the shop (by choice), so it's just the iphone or nothing!
Talking about blog comments, here are two I received yesterday.
This one is my all time favorite: "totes presh! <3" (Short, sweet and to the point!)
This is one of my least favorites (because it's spam baby) "Hello. Great job. I did not anticipate this. This is a impressive story. Thanks!"
What sort of conversations do you like best? Face to face, online tweety talk or my least fave, phone conversations?

"I say Doilies, You say Doyleys"

"I say Doilies, You say Doyleys"

Submissions are open for a new exhibition in the Stairway to Nowhere Gallery at Gleaners Inc.

Start collecting doilies {or doyleys} and repurpose those beauties into something gorgeous!
If you love doilies, whip them out from under the ornaments, get crafty and give the humble doily a NEW life. Gleaners Inc. wants your Doily Craft!
This exhibition opens on March 16th , so plenty of time to get inventive with the DOILY!!!!

See the Gleaners Inc. blog for info or contact Liz for more details : gleanersinc@gmail.com

What's new Pussycat!

A lovely customer ordered these ducks after she visited a clairvoyant who told her "this year, things in your life will fall into place like flying ducks"{or words to that effect} .

Thanks to this .....

I needed to make more of these! Get your own here or from Lord Coconut.

I found a seat for the gnomes at Gleaners Inc. from the bountiful nature strips of West Preston!
And I've organised some workshops at Gleaners Inc.
"Make your own Colour Collection Shadow Boxes with collected bric-a-brac in all the colours of the rainbow." Visit here for bookings: Gleaners Inc.

"Message of Love"

The other day I noticed this new comment on my set of Rubbish Rainbows pics on Flickr:
"I don't know you, but I love you."
I'm taking it in an honest way and not a stalkerish or creepy way!
I consider myself very fortunate that I have never had any yucky comments or messages on my blogs and other websites. Not even about my sometimes dodgy spelling/grammar!
I do recall one guy making a snide remark when my beach plastic pics were on Cymbacon :
"So Betty Jo got herself a book on the British artist Tony Cragg and thought: “Hey, these are neat, how about I just rip his work off and pretend it’s my original idea – today’s hipsters won’t know anyway?” .
I quickly googled Tony Cragg and yes, I can see where this dude was coming from. And I quite liked his turn of phrase.
But as far I can tell it's been Nicey,Nicey in my internet world. Phew, I can't abide moody, rude or totally unhelpful criticism!
I know it goes on and several upbeat and generous bloggers have had their share of nasty pasty commenters. Crabby, Be-achy, Mean people should put their typing fingers away and just get on with it!
There will be no negative Nellies allowed to have the chalk with my New "Message of Love" Owls.
But messages involving chocolate, kittens, massages, hugs, meetings at cafes or tickets to New Order will be highly regarded!

Promote Australian Day!

Australia Day, amongst other things, is a day to celebrate Australian made products and businesses.

So, for an unashamedly opportunistic piece of cross promotion, check out some special homegrown designers who's work can be found at my shop Gleaners Inc.

Greg Mann's quirky jewellery made from recycled cutlery and found objects.