When naughty sequins happen to good people

So I've been trying out some new photography ideas, trying to make my product images a bit more interesting. I tried some adorable teeny tiny star sequins for my earrings however this happened...

As pretty as it looked I really didn't want to pick them all up off the floor!

This was the end result:

Not perfect yet but I'm getting there! Anyway I've found a new app called Lumyer where you can add awesome effects to your images, check this out!

I love it! I'm going to play around with this for hours!!

New Arrival

I've been closed for a little while, and that's because I was busy creating my own little bundle of joy! 

Say hello to Oliver! Born in January, and he's been keeping me very busy since. 

So whilst I've been on maternity leave I've decided it's time for a few changes around here. Nothing too dramatic, rebranding, new packaging and some fresh ideas.

Over the next few months, FunkyPinks will be getting a bit of a face lift, so watch this space!

Be back soon!

We Got Married!

I am now a married lady! I've taken the last month off from FunkyPinks so that I could enjoy my beautiful wedding and fabulous Honeymoon!

Our wedding was truly the best day of my life, we had an absolute ball and shared it with all of our wonderful family and friends.

It was all very glam of course! The theme was 'Woodland' and my gorgeous mum made most of our decorations, I'm going to be writing a separate blog about it all in the next few weeks, as I know a lot of brides-to-be can take a lot of inspiration from it all, just like I did with others!

May Wedding Promotion
And FunkyPinks is open for business again! To celebrate my wedding I'm running an promotion this month.

Throughout May, any orders of selected Wedding Jewellery will get personalised gift boxes absolutely free!

Here's a picture of the boxes I gave to my own Bridesmaids on my wedding day, all o their jewellery was handmade by me of course!

I made them all leaf charm jewellery, matching the colours of their dresses; always one to stand out, I had four different colours!

Green, pink, blue and lilac. The colour scheme ran through the entire wedding and it all looked fabulous! 

I gave my girls sterling silver jewellery, with diamante leaf charms, which added a lovely bit of sparkle to their outfits.

I am planning to add these charms to my wedding jewellery range in a few weeks time!


Watch this space!

I'm famous!

I'm super excited this week as my jewellery has been featured in 'Make and Sell Jewellery' magazine!

I'm a regular subscriber to this fab magazine, (a must for any budding jewellery maker!) So when they asked if I would like to be featured in their regular 'Etsy Edit' section I jumped at the chance! <br>

I felt very honoured to have been asked to be featured. I didn't expect a sudden wave of new sales considering my audience would likely be competitors; for me it was more about being recognised by my peers. The handmade jewellery business sector is heavily saturated, and standing out from the crowd can be a difficult thing to do!

It also made me have to get new headshots of myself (something I was dreading!) and so my other half had to take endless photos of me until I was completely happy with them! It was a tiresome job as I'm very rarely happy with photographs of myself as I'm sure most people are!

My birthstone jewellery is available to buy in my Etsy shop: www.funkypinks.etsy.com

Coming soon to my website too!

My First Craft Fair!

It took me a while, but I finally got there!

I was nervous about spending the money on a table only to be disappointed, but it turned out to be a real confidence boost!

I wasn't sure how much stock to take with me, so I decided the more the better and spent most of the week before making like made to use up as many of my supplies as I could to have a full table. 

I was concious of having too much on the table and it would look cluttered, but overall I think I got it about right!

It took longer than I thought to set up the table, I had my mum and sister in tow and we only just managed to get it ready within the hour we had before it opened.

My lesson there: plan the layout in advance and make sure my stuff if ready to put out straight away, we spent a lot of time just deciding where to put things and which items to put on the stands, so my advice to crafters: plan, plan, plan!

I think we did pretty well, this is my first attempt at the table:

Look! I even remembered a mirror, thanks to my nan for bringing it to me last minute ;)

Next time I will try to make the stall look more symmetrical, but overall I think we did pretty well :D

This was the first time that the event had been held at the venue, so I was optimistic going into it, it was a 'Family Fun Day' so there were a lot of children around, and I don't think I capitalised on this enough. They loved the bright colours, but my jewellery is more for Ladies rather than girls.

Lesson two: Know your audience! If I had more products aimed at children, I might have sold a bit more, and if the girls were keen then their relatives might have been too!

I took most of my jewellery making beads, findings and tools with me, following advice that looking busy and showing customers that you actually make your items can help to generate interest. 

This turned out to be great advice, (especially as I had my demanding Nan asking me to make things for her!) right at the very end two ladies wanted the same pink watch, but I only had one. So they asked me to add a watch face to one of my bracelets, so I did and clinched another last minute sale!

Overall I had a really great day, it was tiring but great and I'm really glad I did it! And I'll definitely be doing it again!

Kirsty signing off xxx

In The Beginning...

Hmmm, this is all a bit new for me!

My name is Kirsty, I've been making my own jewellery for about half a year now and I've been amazed by the hidden online crafting community I've found! Not just jewellery making but all kinds of handmade goodies that people are so passionate about, I've found it really exciting and quite addictive networking of Facebook and creating a shop on Etsy.

I've thought of blogging before but didn't think I'd have anything interesting to say that anyone else would want to read! Over the past few weeks people have been interested in my Facebook page and pictures, not just to buy my jewellery but asking me advice on how I take photos and make certain things. So I thought... let's give blogging a try!


I want to share jewellery making techniques as I find them and feature tutorials and guides to share my passion! There's so much information out there, I want to pool all the passion and inspiration on my blog as I know there are so many people out there who share my love of crafting! Here's my first one:

Anthro Power Of 3 Tutorial

I am dying to try this! I've got all the bits and bobs just need to sit down and get stuck in!

  http://southernfairydesigns.blogspot.co.uk/2011/01/anthro-power-of-3-knockoff-tutorial.html

I also want to share my experiences with other crafters trying to sell their creations online and help people out, although I will point out that I'm no expert in any sense of the word! I'm a big believer in that the more you share and explore the more success you will have.


That's all for now, I'd better get started..... in the meantime check out my Facebook page: www.facebook.com/FunkyPinks


Kirsty @ FunkyPinks x