Black Heart Creatives Blog

I am super excited to be releasing my very own rain cloud necklace and brooches! I know that wearable weather jewellery is nothing new, but, I wanted to put my own spin on this subject as the rain has been dominating my thoughts recently. Perspex recently released a new range of 'natural' colours, and for those of us who make acrylic jewellery it was very much welcomed. I am constantly looking for skin tone colours and neutral bases to work with, and when I received the samples and found out that they were matte to the touch, I knew I wanted to do something really simple but special with them, I just didn't know what. Until now.

Sleep is very important to me. I recently wrote for Zabby Allen's Procrastination Paper magazine about how a good routine is important for sleep, and how disturbed sleep is a big symptom of fibromyalgia and how I navigate that. If you weren't able to read it, I mentioned how I try and leave some time between working and sleeping, and make my sleeping area work free and relaxing, keeping my sheets fresh and my room tidy. I also listened to guided meditation instead of leaving Netflix on until my TV went into sleep mode as that seemed to help too.

However since Black Heart Creatives has gotten so busy in the past few months, I haven't been sticking to my own rules. My brain is constantly switched on and I am working right up until I fall asleep, and then as soon as I wake up again. I needed to try something new, something to help me switch my brain off. Guided meditation was irritating me, talking was distracting, so I looked up some relaxing soundscapes and sleep playlists on spotify, hoping maybe some white noise would help. What I found were hundreds and hundreds of rain playlists. I picked one at random and put my iPhone on a timer for 40 minutes, that automatically turns off media when the time is up (guide on how to do that here) and I was asleep in minutes. After doing this every night I found that I preferred rain and thunder, and heavy rain opposed to rain hitting roofs, I didn't like the rainforest ones but I did like forrest ones. I tried it at my boyfriends house and he fell asleep before me. A notorious insomniac(!)

Now i have a fully curated playlist which you can enjoy too. You can follow or download it on spotify here

Now, I love rain sounds, but the fact that it has been constantly raining every single day this summer has been miserable. I wake up and every day it is grey and cold. It makes me feel uninspired, unhappy, listless even. The cold and the wet makes my fibromyalgia symptoms worse, my body aches. It is loud on the wooden roof of my shed, so I can't hear anything other than the laser. I am sure that the rain is doing us the world of good, but the repetitive daily routine of checking the weather and putting on a jumper is making me depressed. Turns out I have a love hate relationship with the rain. So this is when inspiration struck and I decided to make my own little rainy clouds.

Cut on the matte textured ash grey natural perspex range, and doubled layered in my signature style, the rain clouds are finished off with navy blue transparent drops attached with large jump rings, that move and sway as you move. It comes as either a statement brooch or a pendant necklace. Earrings are still to come! Get them here!

Black Heart Creatives believe that everyone should have access to free, safe and legal sexual health care, from contraception to abortions, whatever the reason.

When I created this necklace for a customer I knew that lots of you would want one of your own. I got asked for different colour ways too so it is also available in black! Together we decided that they should go on general sale, exclusively on the BHC website and that 20% of the profits from the sales of the necklace will be going to Alliance 4 choice.

Sexual health services and abortion access across the world right now is under threat, Alliance 4 choice did great work during the 8th Amendment Repeal in Ireland but did you know that Northern Ireland stillhas some of the strictest abortion laws in the world. As we are based in the UK, we decided that we wanted to support anyone in need of an abortion as close to home as possible. You can read more about Alliance 4 choice, and how they can provide help for anyone in need of an abortion more at their site here.

All sexual health care should be Free, Safe and Legal! Remember that not all contraceptives are used for their intended purpose, hey can be used for all sorts like polycystic ovaries and endometriosis symptoms and should be readily available and accessible for all!