Skulls, Steampunk & Stones

These are a few bits I made tonight.

The gemstone necklace is for Helen my best friend.

I'm super into Steampunk at the moment so when I found the rock and cog-planet I was really excited and I'm pleased with how the necklace came out.

As a good rock chick I obviously adore skulls and the Mexican skeletons remind me of my favourite Day Of The Dead fabric I made my Kindle cover out of. The pirate is good fun too and let's face it, who doesn't fancy a pirates life of adventure and er, rum!

And of course I've continued the Alice In Wonderland obsession with the bottle necklace!

All the items (apart from the gemstone necklace) are for sale as follows -

Mexican Skull Earrings £3
Pirate Necklace £5
Alice In Wonderland Necklace £8
Rocket Necklace £8

Please tweet me @JenRaeFrances to order. Payment is through Paypal :)

Xxx Jen xxX
Sent from my BlackBerry® smartphone on O2

My Mad Fat (Not So) Teenage Blog

I can't think of a witty opening passage so I'm going to launch right into it.

As many of you my Twitter & Facebook chums will know I am to put it bluntly a big girl. I'm a size 18-20 and a little on the smurfen side so I do have the unfortunate egg appearance at times (thankfully without the bald head!)

I've long been a reader of @Bettypamper's fantastic blog http://pamperandcurves.blogspot.co.uk/?m=1 championing "plus size hotties" with daily tips on how to look awesome no matter what size you are and with the mantra to wear what we want no matter what size we are! She has even designed these awesome "attack of the killer curves tees" http://www.bettybeevintage.co.uk/pages/bakery/killer-curves-slashed-neck-tee-shirt-213.php to celebrate curves that rock.

So my new mantra is that I'm going to stop feeling fed up about my size. Although I am on a health kick at the moment, due to some icky inside problems that have been discovered, my eating of lettuce (yes you read that right!) Is about making my insides and hopefully my mood better and if I shift a few pounds in the process so be it.

I'm lucky that I'm rather into vintage dressing and 40s tea dresses (sigh), 50s wiggle dresses (sigh sigh) and 50s prom dresses (sigh sigh sigh) do suit the larger shape - ya gotta have curves to carry them off!

I also like to remind myself that I'll never be too fat for my favourite red lipstick that depending on what I'm wearing can make me feel super rock n roll or like a screen siren from Hollywood's golden era (sigh Marilyn).

In the picture at the top of the page where I'm meeting my favourite band @30SECONDSTOMARS I didn't shy away from wearing shorts 'cos I'm fat, I went and bloody sharpied all their logos over them and dare I say it felt damn cool wearing them!

So from now on to hell with feeling bad for feeling fat, I intend to celebrate the plus sides - having boobs, having less aged skin, enjoying cake, having time to make pretty jewellery & fabric pieces rather than slogging at a gym nightly and having fantastic friends and family who love me for me no matter what size I am.

Love Jen

XxxxX
Sent from my BlackBerry® smartphone on O2

Alice In Wonderland Bunting

These are the bunting flags I've drawn for my Mad Hatters Tea Party I'm having next weekend.

I'm so excited to be getting back into drawing as I find it incredibly relaxing.
Sent from my BlackBerry® smartphone on O2

London Calling

"Why, Sir, you find no man, at all intellectual, who is willing to leave London. No, Sir, when a man is tired of London, he is tired of life; for there is in London all that life can afford." — Samuel Johnson I couldn't agree more with the above statement, I love London, I love it's energy, the sights & sounds and it's energy. So as you can imagine I'd been looking forward to my trip to London with Helen & Rach for months and it certainly didn't disappoint!  Here are a few of the highlights -  Sunday -   Firstly & most importantly was visiting our favorite shops Cath Kidston & Collectif!   Next on the agenda was making the most of the beautiful weather with a walk to St James' Park. The flowers were all out and looked stunning! We also met this cheeky fella!   It always amazes me how much of a variety of wildlife there is in the London parks like this heron -  Of course being a plane geek I couldn't pass up the opportunity to snap this passing Airbus A380 ......  We continued our walk along to Westminster -    After returning to the hotel to freshen up we headed out to dinner and for a post dinner walk around Leicester Square & Covent Garden   Panoramic Trafalgar Square  The Seven Dials of Covent Garden  Monday - We were up bright & early to meet our friend Rach at the station-  First stop of the day was Camden Market.      Camden is my favourite place in the world, I love the fantastic goth &  punk  shops, the quirky stalls selling all sorts of different goods. There are loads of cool pubs and gig venues like KoKo where I met 30 Seconds To Mars for the first time back in Nov 2009. So whenever I head up to Camden my "Nice Shirt" (Long story) makes the pilgrimage too ...... One of the cool, new discoveries I made on this visit was the graffitti table where I left this little doodle -  After a good poke around the market we went up to the zoo!  Me & Rach monkeying around One of the Komodo Dragons from Skyfall  Lions Anyone for flamingo croquet? I loved the Butterfly tunnel!  Posing penguin! Meeting the Monkeys!   Giraffes! In the evening we got to do one of my favourite things which is walking around the city at night. I have a love of cities at night, they're totally transformed and London always puts on a fantastic show.   Chinatown  Out for dinner  There was a brief trip to M&M world ................ Then a quick hop along to Piccadilly Circus     Eros I also took a few 'arty' black & white photos -  London Eye   St James' Park by night Tuesday - What a beautiful morning in Covent Garden! After a final walk around Covent Garden it was back to Westminster to hop on a riverboat tour   Here we are rocking the nautical look!

A few pics from the tour -

 St Paul's Cathedral

 HMS Belfast

 The Tower Of London

 Tower Bridge

We alighted at Greenwich - 

 The original maritime hospital, now part of the Maritime Museum

We found a gorgeous riverside cafe to eat at called Byron's which I highly recommend,  great food & fantastic service. If you're in the area then check it out!

Rach & Helen awaiting fed

View from Byron's

 Cutty Sark

Greenwich Market

It was an absolutely amazing few days in London and I came back re-energised and inspired. I'm now dreaming of my own stall selling my jewellery & bits n bobs in either Camden or Greenwich Markets!

Thanks so much to Helen & Rach for a fantastic few days.

Love Jen

xxxxxxx

Ps here are a few recommendations if you're planning a visit to London-

Where we stayed - Travelodge Covent Garden really good value and helpful staff, just round the corner from Covent Garden market,  a 5 minute walk from Leicester Square & a 10 minute walk from the British Museum. In fact we like it so much we're going back to stay over August Bank Holiday weekend!

Where we ate - as I mentioned above I can't speak more highly of Byron's they have branches all over the UK too. 

River Cruise - We used Thames River Services amusing and knowledgeable guides and if you have a valid Oyster Card or Travel Card for the day then wave it at the ticket office to get a 30% Discount. 

Attraction Tickets - If you're passing through Victoria on your way to London Zoo or other busy attractions then buy your entry tickets at the Oyster Card counter. It will work out a little more expensive than the 2For1 train offer but when we arrived at the zoo instead of joining the end of the 2 and a half hour queue we were ushered to the front and were in the zoo within 5 minutes!

Getting about - If you can then walk as much as possible (weather permitting - this is the UK after all!). The Underground & bus service is fantastic but there is little as pleasurable as walking around London and seeing all it's stunning architecture. A lot of the famous attractions are closer together than you realize - for example we discovered Chinatown was literally tucked behind Leicester Square!