Hurrah for Someone Else, and their garden

So there I was, all stressed about school uniform (of all things!) and we were also mega low on groceries, so I decided to do something constructive and go out and get those groceries - the essential ones, anyway.

Outside, the sky was a deepening purplish-pink towards the horizon, and the last of the golden light was gently glowing on the golden fields; the leaves were dark against the yellow stone of the old houses, with splashes of rich colour from the garden flowers.

Basically, quite a few people round my way have really nice gardens.

Needless to say, my own garden seriously needs taking in hand - but I prioritise looking after my gorgeous little boy while holding down a more-than-full-time job. My garden trails well behind, a straggly and unkempt third.

So these earrings are officially inspired by... Someone Else's Garden! Thanks to all the anonymous gardeners for providing me with joy and inspiration from your carefully-tended, cleverly-planned gardens.

The metal is antique something (brass?) - it's softer metal than the silver-plated copper I usually work with, so I had to have a few goes before I got the wire-wrapping right. The hand-decorated white beads feel cool to the touch, so I think are glass. The large pink leaf-shaped Czech glass beads are fairly translucent when held up to the light, and also reflect light from their surface, so they don't dominate the earrings when worn. The larger, clear-looking beads are actually very pale blue faceted Czech glass, and all the seed beads have a golden core so there are little highlights of gold when the light catches them, like the last of the sun's rays catching the edges of the leaves in the garden.

So there's lots of movement and sparkle in these earrings, but the antique wire stops them from being overly gaudy.

I like them. They will remind me of long summer evenings and the tangled, unruly beauty of things that grow.