THE WEBSITE WILL BE UP IN TWO DAYS!!!

Yes! You really read correctly! January 1st, 2008, Cherry Runway will be up and running for business! Our full, shopping cart website will be beautiful, and easy to use. Please stop on by and tell us what you think of it!! I would love some feedback!

www.cherryrunway.com

Fly Away!

Seriously, who wouldn't love a hot air balloon necklace? I've come to figure out this is one of my best selling necklaces.

If my memory serves me correctly, a gentleman and his son create all these amazing clay charms. I found this one particularly stellar! I know you will too!

This is one of my best selling necklaces. Everyone thinks the balloons is a trip, and i don't blame them. It is a really cool necklace!

Busy Lives and Chocolate Potato Chips...

It has been an EXTREMELY busy month! I will never again complain when i work a measly 40 hours a week and only have one day off a week. For, the month of December 07, i only had three days off. Almost all of those wonderful three days were spent being responsible and getting what needed to be done, done. Never again, will i complain about only getting 5 hours of sleep, when this past week i worked three 16 hours shifts and only slept 13 hours combined for those three crazy days.

All of those crazy hours and hard work has [man, i hate to count my chickens] worked out for me though. I am not only being kept on staff at my new job, but i got promoted as well!! It's a great honor and was the MOST determined I've ever been at a job. Thank GOD it worked out!!



This year i tried to make chocolate covered potato chips, which was WAY harder then i anticipated, but everyone seemed to rave about them! This is the recipe i used;



INGREDIENTS
1 pound high quality milk chocolate, chopped
8 cups ridged potato chips

DIRECTIONS
Place about 3/4 of the chocolate into a heat safe bowl, and place over the top of a pan of simmering water. If you have a double boiler, use that. Heat, stirring occasionally until the chocolate has melted, then continue to heat the chocolate. Stir occasionally. As soon as the melted chocolate reaches temperature, remove it from the heat, and stir in the remaining chopped chocolate until melted. Continue stirring until the chocolate has cooled. Touching a dab of chocolate to your lip will feel cool.

Use tongs to dip potato chips one at a time into the chocolate. Place on waxed paper starting at the point farthest from you and working your way in so as not to drip on your finished chips. Cool until set. You may refrigerate if you like.

[I do have to tell you though, that 'use tongs to dip potato chip part is CRAP! I had to literally paint each chip individually because the chocolate was to think and the chips were to delicate. It took over two hours to paint all the stupid chips. They did come out great though.]

Amber Apple Earrings

Amber and Bullseye Onyx. A wonderful combination!

Amber is such a lovely stone, there are many shades, all of which are in the rich golden color spectrum. 8mm Bullseye Onyx makes an appearance in these earrings as well. Sterling Silver lever back closures protect your ears and the loss of these great earrings.

December is Gone?

Well..it seems as though, the Holiday season has slipped away from me. I didn't have nearly enough time to devote to Cherry Runway. I did pick up hundreds of hours between my two jobs, and oddly enough, after writing down all of my December sales, i did pretty dern well.

Strange...

So, hopefully i can get down to business again, writing about new artists, finishing my website and devoting more time to Cherry after i see where I'm working at the start of the new year. (Cross you fingers I'm still working at both places!)

I hope you all have a stellar Holiday, and a safe trip wherever life takes you!!!

<3 Jenipher and Cherry Runway

Dangle Dangle

These beautiful shades of pink dangles dance off of a silver colored chain. In a lariat type necklace you have the ability to wear this stellar gem in a variety of ways. Wear this jewel as is, or add a charm [or even your initials or sorority letters]!!

Knit This Time!

Can anyone guess what these bracelet charms are?? Oh come on, you must have guessed based on my blog title. These stellar jewels are made from knitting needles. So clever!!! Nancy has a shoppe called Sassafras Creations. She makes me want to take up knitting as my second hobby. Okay, maybe not, but they at least make me want to turn something ordinary into jewelry. :)



I have always crafted; I'm 46 now, so let's say 4 decades.

I did a lot of sewing in my teens and 20's and also learned to knit somewhere in my early 20's. In my late 20's I had 3 sons (#2 and #3 are twins), so I pretty well lost all my free time for a while. After my twins got out of diapers, I found I had a little more free time again and I got into beading and jewelry-making, then eventually came back to knitting. I was laid off from my 24-year corporate career in 2006 and I became determined to do something more creative with my time, so I took some metalsmithing and jewelry-making classes. Somewhere along the line, I got the idea of using aluminum knitting needles in my jewelry - they're colorful, come in assorted sizes and are very lightweight. So, for the past 6 or 9 months, I've been playing with that idea and just seeing what I can come up with.



Inspiration comes from all over - I read lots of knitting and jewelry magazines and books. I also have a tendency to try to apply whatever medium I'm currently working in to everyday situations -- a few years back I was heavy into working with polymer clay; when a plastic guide rail on my dresser drawer broke, I made a new one out of polymer clay. I also tried to knit with polymer clay - it could be done, and it was unique, but it was a heck of a lot of trouble to make the string. Now I'm using the tools of knitting and seeing what else can be done with them.



The challenges I'm facing right now are questions about my own capabilities and where I want this to go - I'm ramping things up slowly and trying to be very conscious of my production time - since I am making all of the little pieces that go into my jewelry, I have to try to calculate how much it costs to make each one, in order to ensure that I am really able to pay myself for my time. But I'm having a lot of fun and have really enjoyed the positive responses that I've gotten from folks all over.





Nancy has plenty more awesome jewelry items for you to look at, so head over to her Etsy site and tell her hello!!

New Etsy Items Up!!! Check um out!

Mytini, Yourtini

A cute Martini toggle makes a statement as a practical pendant. This toggle just cracks me up. I am in love with the bar with the olive on it, and the Swarovski crystal pimento is just a trip! Weather your a martini drinker, or just a fan of how cool martini's look, this necklace will surly express a statement.

Parties for Grandma's!!

Grandma Party is an event usually held early in the year. It's for local artists to self their handmade crafty items, and hopefully get some great exposure. Last April was my 1st Grandma Party and i honestly had no expectations to sell anything. I did wonderfully. This year, i had slightly higher expectations but i was a lot more prepared and organized. Although it was a rocky start, i did quite well, and for that i am very grateful.

I recieved great feedback too! So many people gave me AMAZING encouragement, which is brilliant! One girl even said i had the best quality, another said my jewelry was one in it's kind, that no one had anything similar to mine. Thanks for all your kind words folks! I appreciate them!



It's driving me crazy that i can't post my table picture, so above is the "fitted" version, and below is the real size one. :) My friend Devan made my Cherry Runway sign. Isn't it stellar!!!! She is amazing! She also made the cream colored boards my jewelry is on, but that might be hard to see.



I had the two coolest helpers a gal could ask for. Lindsey is great at talking with people and helping me convince them they need some Cherry Runway jewels, and Riley tried to help one poor slightly tipsy guy that if he gave a random girl a necklace maybe he'd get a girlfriend. :) Seriously, though, they were super awesome and supportive and great company.


Lindsey


Riley



This is the flyer for this year's Grandma Party. To my amusement, there actually were quite a few Grandma's wandering about this time.