Trollbeads Newport aka Jeffries Jewellers Event Saturday 21st March 2015

I seem to be developing a habit of being fashionably late with event posts at the moment... however this is the last one, so definitely a case of last but not least!

Invitation from Trollbeads Newport

This was an event I'd been looking forward to for several months, way before I even knew what the Trollbeads Easter 2015 Release would be - back then like many others I thought it would be another variation on bunnies & eggs, so I was far more focused on the trollbeads community side than the actual beads.

Trollbeads Bag owned by a lovely collector,
please can we have some of this in the UK?

I've been writing about Trollbeads Newport aka Jeffries Jewellers for a while now, they were brought to my attention by another collector who was singing their praises and I've featured them a few times since... I've always been impressed by the lengths they go to for their customers and my dealings with them have always been exemplary.

Trollbeads Easter Collection 2015
Photo credit: Trollbeads Stock Photo

So, given that the Easter Release was finally revealed as Dragon themed and I was going to Wales to buy Dragons and meet people I've "known" for a long time but I've never met in real life; I was super excited!

There was only one snag... the dreaded Bead Budget, now I had been saving up for this trip as I knew Jeffries would have some special deals, and I *really* like dragons, so I had set aside quite a stash so I could plunder the booty - actually I'm quite well behaved so read "plunder the booty" as "legitimately buy in a legal sense some pretty beads".

However, I also really like my Bus... and she was misbehaving at the MOT station at the time and with plans for the Summer I had to divert the majority of my stash to steer my ship, er, I mean, my bus!  So with reduced budget, but enough money to make the trip itself, I set sail for Wales! In the car.  As the bus was in the garage.  Do keep up!

Pirate Cake

I have to say upfront that I have very few photos from the day itself, when I arrived, super early I thought, the shop was already heaving with customers... apparently they had been queueing outside for half an hour before the shop was due to open!!

Serious business of choosing beads by a collector

So after a chaotic start, I kid ye not, I had to fight my way to the till!  I was able to choose my own beads, take part in the Lucky Dip, pick up a unique and also received my half (lock and silver) of the Good Luck starter bracelet from a Trollbead friend - despite my lowered budget I did come away with quite a haul!

My treasure from the day!

My bracelet was free as part of one of the many promotional offers that Jeffries were running that day as I had bought the Dragon lock from the Easter Collection - buy a lock get a bracelet free.  I also picked up the lovely little Dragon as I had to choose between this and the egg due to budget constraints.

My second lock and silver were from the Good Luck Starter Bracelet that I had split with a friend earlier that month, (pre MOT) but we decided it would be fun to try and meet up to exchange rather than do by post, so glad we did!

Some of the booty... aka the Lucky Dip!

I picked up a black armadillo bead in the Lucky Dip (free Lucky Dip bead with any purchase) and bought a rather nice peacock unique... I'd no intention of buying anything other than what was on my list, but I'd wanted a second peacock bead for a while and this was such a nice example!

Tea anyone?

There was time for tea and lots of chatting, and of course we managed to get in a wrist shot or two, I did mean to borrow some photos from the day, as others were far more efficient at photographing the event, even bloggers sometimes have an off day ;)

Wrist Shot!!

After all that shopping we nipped out for a spot of lunch and managed to catch the Rugby game which the rest of the pub had come out to watch, the group got split up for lunch but this gave me a chance to catch up with Kay, who I've known for years but only "met" in person at Cambridge and ditto Tracy who I was "meeting" in person for the first time, as Tracy and I keep missing each other at previous events (sometimes by minutes) so it was really nice to get the timing right this year!

Time for cake!

Back at the shop it was time for a bit of last minute shopping for some, browsing the beads whilst it had got a bit quieter and of course, it was time for cake and fizz!

I said my goodbyes and ran to catch the train from Newport Station, yes, yes, I drove to Wales, but then got a lift to Newport and the train back... I think I was seeing just how many forms of transport I could shoehorn into one blog post!

I had a fabulous short weekend in Wales, many thanks to Jeffries Jewellers for hosting the event and in particular Liz for all her fab organisation, and of course Scott for opening up early!

Lastly thank you to all the lovely Trollbeads aficionados who were there on the day, it was so nice to meet so many of you and I really enjoyed chatting with you all, especially all the Forum friends from Trollbeads Gallery... so much so, I forgot to take photos for the blog!

I'm curious, is it just me who gets carried away when I'm enjoying myself?

What have you enjoyed so much that you forgot to do the obvious?!