Hi

I'm running late on my June page, but thought I'd better introduce myself to all of you. I'm Claire, and I'm currently living in Galway (Ireland), but will be moving back to my home town of Nottingham in the UK over the next month. I'm really looking forward to this, as I've been wanting to stretch my embroidery skills and try new stitches for a while, and I'm hoping that by signing up for this project I'll actually do these things instead of just planning them (isn't procrastination fun?). It's also fantastic to see what so many different beaders are doing, and all the differences in style.

I've decided I'll be making my pages into a book, and they're going to be 5 3/4" square. This fits within a scrapbook kit I've had hanging around for a while, so I'll be able to use the covers from that kit for my book. As a very loose theme, I'm going to try and incorporate a face into each page - this will let me use some of the buttons and cabs I've been collecting for a while now!

I'm way behind on my first page as I've not actually put needle to fabric yet, but I finally sat down last night and sketched out a rough layout for the page. As I'll be moving away from Galway soon (after 2 years living here) I've been paying more attention than usual to my surroundings and I wanted to incorporate them in some way into my page. With this in mind I've gone for a sea theme and colours as I've been mesmerised by the changes in colour to the water in Galway Bay over this month, and I'll really miss the sea when I move back to the middle of England. I've posted this initial sketch on my blog, and added a 'Bead Journal Project' category to my posts.