Zibbet finds of the week - Stripes, stripes, stripes

Have you missed the finds of the week? You know how it is. Time is running and lately I just have been too slow to run with it.
I'm back, however, and today I bring you lots of fun stripes from Zibbet sellers. I hope you will like this great variety as much as I do!

Pink stripe socks for women by Bits Off The Beach

Ceramic planter pot by JMN Pottery

Striped pillow cover by ShadoBoxHome

Striped slouchy for women by piqi

Denim striped tote by Katelyn's Krafts

Crochet tiger hat with earflaps by Greenphoenix13

Wristlet clutch vintage inspired by VirtuoSew

Quote of the week

Vince Noir and Howard Moon, former zookeepers, are working at Nabootique now, the shop of shaman Naboo and his familiar Bollo. Vince has a history of coming in late, though.
If you need an excuse for being late the next time, why don't you try these?

Howard: Come on then, let's have it.
Vince: Hm?
Howard: Every day you're late and every day another crazy excuse. What is it this time?
Vince: What do you mean?
Howard: Lego avalance trapped you?
Vince: No.
Howard: No? Your pyjamas turned into nitrogen? You got stuck on the ceiling of your bedroom? Giant kingfisher came into your room and pecked you under the duvet? Got your, uh, jodhpurs caught on a magic hedgehog? I write'em down, you know. What is it? A scarecrow took you to Paris, yeah?
Vince: I just had a few things to do, that's all.
Howard: That's not funny. It's not even going in the book. It's awful.

Got inspired? So if you try it, let me know how it went!

The Mighty Boosh, UK, 2003 - 2007

Tackle that stash - A button??

I have never liked buttons. I tolerate them, but if possible I avoid them. Okay, that's not completely true. I never liked buttons on my clothes. There are beautiful vintage buttons, but the ones that I liked when browsing were always too expensive for me to just have them disappear in my supply drawers.
So when I read that the topic for a challenge in May was "use button/s", I declared right away that I was out. I'm a zipper girl. Sorry, guys. Not a button to use around here and I didn't feel like going shopping for one button.

May went by and still no button had crossed my path. June came and I didn't think about it anymore as the challenge was over, anyway (although we are quite cool about deadlines, we all have been late one or the other time). Until yesterday, that is.
I was playing around with my Little BigShot lens and randomly grabbed tourmaline beads from the shell next to my light tent which also holds some Swiss coins. I have not the slightest idea where they came from. I have even less an idea about the thing I picked up next. In fact I don't even know why I picked it up.
It was a button, and I stared at it as if I had never seen a button before in my life.
It was made to look like an old Austrian coin, 20 Kreuzer from 1826, and showed the double-headed eagle with "GAL.LOD.IL.REX.A.A. 1826" on one and  "HVN.BOH.LOMB.ET.VEN." on the other side of it.

That means Hungariae, Bohemiae, Lombardiae et Venetiae, Galiciae, Lodomeriae, Ilyriae, Rex A.A. = King of Hungary, Bohemia, Lombardy and Venice, Galicia, Lodomeria, Illyria, Archduke of Austria.
Some of that I knew by myself, but I had to google for the other ones (Lodomeria? - never heard that before).

This is not a treasure, but it was an interesting find nevertheless and again - where did it come from in the first place?? It's a pity I couldn't find out when this was produced, so instead of obsessing over its past, I started thinking about its future.
I held different wire colors against it and decided to use a dark copper tone for a wire crochet bezel. Tiny orange carnelian beads for a bit of color. And last but not least a bronze tone ball chain to pick up the brassy color of the button.

Voilà!

Oldies but Goodies - The Graduate

16th of June, 1983. We sat in the kitchen of the little house that was just for the higher grades. One of us sat in the open window that faced the path coming from the main school building. He held a champagne bottle in his hand and every time someone came walking over from the school he yelled out "Finished? Finished!!!!!!"
It was the day of our oral exams.
School was over for good. Around here we didn't have official graduation ceremonies. No speeches, no diplomas, no caps and gowns. We had marched through the school, one half of us dressed in mourning clothes, the other half doing samba in the hallways to show we were both sad and happy. We spontaneously decided to have a small book burning of old school books and some of the boys set up a tombstone for our (at least) thirteen years of school, a stone some of us used to visit each year on the 16th of June, so they could have a small reunion dinner afterwards. And of course we had a party in the gym.

The little house doesn't exist anymore, there's a more modern and bigger building now. I'm almost sure the tombstone doesn't exist anymore, either. Every time I come by my school (at least once a week) I wonder about that, one of the these days I'll have to walk into that yard and take a look.
And almost exactly 33 years later our Jewelry Artisans Community Oldies but Goodies Challenge is about graduation gifts. I don't remember what I would have liked to have, I don't remember what others might have received as gifts.
This, however, are some jewelry ideas from our members. As always there's more to see if you click the link above.
What do you remember about your graduation?

1 and 4 Cat's Wire
2 and 6 Jewelry Art by Dawn
3 and 7 MC Stoneworks
5 Violetmoon's Corner

Quote of the week

I vividly remember the discussion about children thinking that cows are purple thanks to a commercial icon. I had the luck to have a godmother whose parents had a farm, and my very personal cow there, Diana (whom I desperately wanted to buy), was light brown and white.
I also remember listening to parents at our local zoo who told their children the most incredible things about our animals. It usually didn't go down well if I took the liberty to educate them on the goat NOT being the sheep's mom and I didn't even go that far to tell them the goat was in fact male.

Maybe that's why today's quote made me both roll my eyes and laugh out loud at the same time.
We are in the beautiful county of Midsomer (where your life expectancy is about as high as that of a worm surrounded by a flock of hungry birds) and people have come from the city to drive their cars off-road through the mud of the countryside.

Brad: Oi! Excuse me? There's a farmer who deliberately put a load of bulls in the field we want to go through.
Brad's pal: Yeah!
Brad: Now a bridle path has a public right of way. Why would he do that?
Garth: And where was this?
Brad: It was in a field at the Melham Cross Road.
Garth: Hm. I think you'll find they were cows.
Brad's group starts laughing.
Brad: Cows (laughing). When was the last time you saw cows with horns?

I can only understand Garth's feelings too well ....

Midsomer Murders, UK, 1997 -

Oldies but Goodies - Black Tie

Have you ever been to a black tie event? Honestly, I haven't. Okay, so I don't really wear black ties at all ;-) For such an event it has to be a bow tie, I read. I remember that when I was a teenager it was totally in to wear a bow tie, both girls and boys did it, sometimes even with a special t-shirt. We were such fashion victims ... erm, rebels. One of mine was metallic blue leather.
I'm digressing. This week the Oldies but Goodies Challenge at the Jewelry Artisans Community was about black ties, not metallic blue ones, about formal, fancy events, not about a party for teenagers.
For once it's a good thing we are no experts for men's jewelry. Did you know that at such an event you are not even supposed to wear a wrist watch, no matter how fancy it is?
So instead we set out to see what we could find to spruce up a lady's gown for the fancy black tie event. Enjoy!

1 MC Stoneworks
2 Jewelry Art by Dawn
3 The Crafty Chimp
4 Cat's Wire
5 Violetmoon's Corner

Creating for charity

I remember how I once knitted a cat from black wire, black crystals, with yellow crystal eyes. Unfortunately I only have a really bad picture of it.
When I posted the picture of the sparkly cat (still without chain then) on my Facebook page, I wasn't sure yet what it should be, so I added the question "What should I do with it?" and got the answer "Donate it to a cat rescue." The lady also came up with some cat rescues in the US and Canada right away although I tried to explain that I am in Germany.
Okay, so that hadn't been exactly what I meant, I thought more in lines of should it be a necklace or maybe a brooch, but then again ... why not?

Since then I have donated pieces for more than one charity or a cause dear to my heart, both in my own and other countries. Usually I don't find out how much they have actually brought in for the charity, but I'm always hoping I could help at least a little bit.
You won't be surprised to hear that the charities or small clubs that I donated for usually have to do with animals.
Often they have an open day where they sell things or maybe there's a raffle or a silent auction.
Here are some of the items I made for them. I wish I had taken pictures of all of them.
Somehow it seems right to make something that is related to the cause itself. A cat for the rescue organization or helping out with vet costs (not mine or it wouldn't be a donation ;-)), little birds, animal patterns for the local zoo ...

Another way is of course to put something in a shop and donate all or part of the proceeds. I think that makes most sense if you have an own category for those items, so you can collect a amount instead of donating a few bucks every, now and then. Personally I prefer the other way, also because I like the idea of creating something for exactly this event.
Thinking about it it's time again to look out for some events.

And if you wonder now why I am telling you all this, well, the month is almost over which means it was time for the blog carnival at the Jewelry Artisans Community.
Let's see what other members have to say about the topic or what items they will show us.

Jewelry Art by Dawn
Violetmoon's Corner