Bead Soup Blog Party

Finally the day has arrived to reveal the lovely beads my generous Bead Soup Blog Party partner Stefanie Teufel of http://stefaniessammelsurium.blogspot.com/ sent me. They were a lovely mix of oceany blues and greens in lots of different materials and textures with coordinating sari silk fabric. Stefanie does such a beautiful job with these materials that I was thrilled to have the opportunity to work with them. I love this necklace and plan to add to it and wear it very soon. (The candy from Germany was also a big hit with everyone here!)
To see the list of bead soup blog partners and their creations visit Lori Anderson's blog:http://www.prettythingsblog.com/
This has been a great experience! Stefanie did an awesome job with the polymer clay beads I sent to Germany. Now I'm off to check out what everyone else has done. Join me....

A Matter of Preference

Beadmaking is my passion and my delight. When I started to make what I like instead of what I think other people might like, beadmaking progressed into jewelrymaking. Here's today's question: shiny or mattte?
I like matte finished beads. The colors do not pop quite as much, but individual colors tend to blend with things you wouldn't normally choose when the finish is unglazed. The beads have a more earthy feel and are smooth as silk after sanding.

Glazed beads, on the other hand, have that great light-reflecting quality that makes you notice jewelry. Glaze deepens the colors and makes them stand out more. Glaze also fills in and strengthens the surface of a bead.

Designing a piece of jewelry using both glazed and unglazed beads works in most compositions, but most of my newest work cries out for diversity and a large variety of beads from which to choose. I envy people who have huge bead stashes to pick from when designing. I want to create all of the beads in a piece myself. Perhaps years from now I will have built up a backlog of beads. Perhaps I'll be making something else altogether. Robots, maybe.

Wunderbar!

I have exciting news to report: for the first time I signed up for the Bead Soup Blog Party and I have received an absolutely wonderful partner. She is Stefanie Teufel in Germany. Many years ago in university I took enough courses to receive a minor in German. I didn't learn how to speak it well as we mostly watched videos of a student's daily life in German and memorized phrases. She kindly provides both German and English translations on her blog http://stefaniessammelsurium.blogspot.com/
Wait till you see the vibrant colors of her work in her etsy shop:
http://www.etsy.com/shop/steufel
I tend to work with a lot of muted earthy tones, but am so excited to think about working with the color combinations she creates like the pictures here. I can't wait to exchange beads and see what our creations will be!

To Bead or Not to Bead-That is the Question

Things are happening rapidly for me right now. Back to school time means back to work and less time for studio work/play. I'm trying to list as much as possible on etsy for the times ahead when I'll be too busy. Here's the thing: when I make a few beads that I really like, it's difficult to decide whether to make something out of them or list them for someone else with more jewelry-making skill to enjoy. I'm taking apart some bracelets to make necklaces to increase the number of beads I have to work with. Still love the stretchy bracelets best of all, but necklaces are quite fun now that the secrets are revealing themselves. Will just have to take my cue from Scarlett. Tomorrow IS another day after all.

The Color of August

I adore the colors in this month's ABS Challenge. Most of the walls in my home are painted the lovely ochre of the model's dress. It's a perfect backdrop for the brick reds,burnt sienna,olive and cobalt blues I like to use in decorating. As usual, I got out the clays and played around with mixing my colors. I decided to use some different polymer clay techniques so that the beads would have some pizzazz: caning, extrusion, and mosaic. I made an ochre, a soft yellow, some coppery sienna and some green-grayish mud to work with the black and white I saw in the original. I wanted the necklace to be long like women wore during this time period so I made lots of beads. The necklace hangs beautifully but does not photograph on my necklace display as it is 31 inches long. How perfect this challenge was for August, the weeds and trees are starting to take on that thirsty ochre hue before the fall rains begin.(If you click the necklace picture you can see the detail better.)

Smoky Mountain Memories

Part of my growing-up years were in the Smoky Mountains. I love all of Tennessee, but the eastern part holds a special place in my heart. I love the way you can see that misty blue gray outline from miles and miles away as you approach. I love the way the trees seem to shade and shelter you from the heat. I love the way a smidgen of sunlight peeks through a hole in the leaves. Last year our loved ones took us to see a production about the original inhabitants leaving the mountains to make way for the park. It was heart-wrenching to realize that people lost their homes and their traditions so that we could make roads that snake slowly up the mountainsides for tourists to visit. Say hello to the Smokies for me, you'ns.

Twilight Zone Web Beads

These beads have a mysterious spooky feel to them. While trying to achieve a soft-edged design using the mokume gane technique, a web appeared. Was it an accident or have we entered (insert music we all know here: dee,dee,Dee,dee) ....THE TWILIGHT ZONE?
There are eight 12-14 mm matte-finished polymer clay beads for your stringing pleasure...if you dare. There's something weird about these beads. I just tried to make this post and the computer went bleep and published it with only the title.
(Been watching too many old shows on Netflix lately, can you tell?)

Tiger Lilies

This week's challenge for Humblebead's "Inspired by Nature" series is tiger lilies. They grow wild around here. One summer my oldest and I picked up a friend and drove to the next town where driver's education classes were held. The road to her house was covered with tiger lilies. A sea of orange. Almost like driving through Knoxville on a football weekend. I wanted to incorporate the orange with a little black for the speckles on a real tiger lily. The disk beads at the base of the necklace were caned with black and white spirals, some of the pendants use the watercolor mosaic technique. Not visible at the upper part of the necklace are tiny rondelles in shades of orange. To get the pendant collection to hang properly I strung everything on leather. All beads are polymer clay and handmade by me.

Fading Through the Door Into Summer

And he thought he heard the echo of a pennywhistle band...and the laughter from a distant caravan...and the brightly colored line of circus wagons in the sand...fading through the door into summer.
This is a song from an old Monkees album. I know, I know, but I still have two copies of Pisces, Aquarius, Capricorn and Jones.
Summer is fading slowly as the heat lingers on. The trees are still green, but everything looks dusty and tired. Let's start fall early, shall we?

The Plight of the Bumblebee-Inspired by Nature

I don't know if I got this necklace finished in time for the challenge deadline, but it was wonderful to get so wrapped up in creating. The theme was bees. Right outside my studio window is a crepe myrtle bush visited daily by bees. I was so excited to use them as models. I started by making a bunch of black beads layered with silver foil and yellow alcohol ink with a translucent overlay. These were my base layer interspersed with glass seed beads in black and yellow stacks. Then I mixed translucent and burnt sienna to get my beehive color and extruded strings to get the hive effect. I needed a dark pearlex powder for the shadows between layers, but didn't have any. A quick trip to the drugstore and some black eyeshadow worked perfectly. The bees were simply tranlucent with a bit of yellow and extruded black for the stripes,stinger and antennae. Tiny translucent wings sort of disappear, but are there. I then made some rectangular tubes in a bit stronger yellow with white flower cane overlays. I have some left over and hope to have enough for a bracelet and earrings as well. A honey of a challenge! Thanks!

Brave New World

Once again I am amazed at the possibilities of beading now that I've finally learned to use the jewelery pliers. These are book thongs made with little abstract heartlight beads on one end that seemed too special to include in a bracelet or necklace but needed a setting where the melting colors could be contemplated a bit more. The bead on the other end is an experiment with flattened disks, stamping and pearlex powders that I could never get to fit into a bracelet but feels the perfect weight for book thongs. I made some with leather and some with this nice cording. Need to decide which works best because I want to make lots. Such a nice little giftie for readers.You can leave it in your book and don't have to lay it aside to get lost while you read. Don't know what to do about the Kindle crowd; what can I bead for you?

Good Things Come to Those Who Wait

I made this little mermaid back in the spring, listed her on etsy and waited. Nothing happened. The listing expired and I put her away. Just this week I made some experimental beads with the new Premo white translucent and had no idea what to do with them. Today I cleaned out my workspace and found lots of unrelated things: pirate coins I'd made while playing with pearlex powders, a bit of chain bought on sale, silver seed beads. Everything seemed to come together to make this necklace that I just adore. This time I won't mind if the etsy listing expires before it sells, I'll keep it just for me.

ABS July Challenge

I must admit that the July challenge painting for ABS had me bumfuzzled. I just couldn't get the colors to jibe. My first attempt was a dismal failure. I was determined this month to use all the colors: red, yellow-green,yellow-orange, pink,forest green, crimson, periwinkle and blue-purple (my own labels-not the official names). The epiphany came when I looked at the new style of bead I'd been working on this week based on fifties fabrics and grouped the colors to make miniature abstract tropical flowers using the periwinkle as background. The forest green provided a leafy color and the other colors combined to make some splendid spiky flowers that Lucie Hessel might have added to her garden. I decided to make a very simple bracelet to showcase these beads and matching spacers. Quite a challenge!

Fifties Fashion

I've been making polymer clay beads lately with muted abstract designs in the colors of summer dresses from my childhood. I remember the fabrics of the fifties. All of the ladies I knew then wore cotton dresses made with yards and yards of fabric. There were shirtwaists and sailor style dresses and A-line and scoop neck styles. The fabric had a tropical feel. The colors were muted and soft, but the art was flamboyant and abstract. Flowers, birds and leaves were mere suggestions. You could look at a skirt and see all kinds of pictures just like when you saw images in the clouds. I didn't appreciate the dresses then, but as I grow older there's a certain nostalgia for things from the past, and I see how beautiful those dresses really were.

The Aha Moment

It's been at least a year since I bought all of the paraphernalia for wirework. Several times I've picked up the pliers, played around a little and stored them out of sight. Many, many times I've read jewelry-making blogs and tutorials, books and magazine articles. Nothing clicked. The pliers stayed out of sight. Just the other day I decided to clean up my work station. Lo and behold, the pliers and headpins were in my line of sight. I picked them up. I picked up a bead, threaded a headpin through the hole and couldn't figure out what to do with all of the excess wire. The magic measurement of a quarter inch popped into my mind. I marked a quarter inch from the top of my pointer finger with a Sharpie. Now I knew where to make a cut. I picked up the needle nose pliers and found that was the perfect length for a secure loop. I picked up the chain nose pliers and found that the loop could be flattened and centered above the bead easily. Eureka! Bead dangles! What to do with them? Earrings came to mind first. I tried a few and it worked, but it's not much fun making things you can't wear yourself. I know, I know even toddlers get their ears pierced, but I am Chicken. Hear me squawk. Anyway, I tried making a balanced statement necklace with the dangles and the multitude of rondelles I make in a meditative state while I'm thinking of colors and patterns to try. Again Eureka! Lovely necklaces. And to think-it only took a year.

Grandma Beads

I would love to have called these Granny beads, but that's what we called the dirty ring around the neck we got from playing out in the dirt all day. Thus, these are called Grandma beads. I don't sew today. I could, but I don't. Granny taught me how in the front of the store between ringing up bologna on crackers and nickel cokes and dealing with the drummers (salesmen) who came to sell her gimcracks and geegaws for the big glass case in her country store. Granny's penchant for burgundy was famous. I wanted to make a youthful A-line dress in teal and spring green, but Granny insisted on some of the maroonish fabric from her stash. The dress wound up looking like one of the tent dresses Granny always wore because she didn't believe in following patterns. I was never able to wear it, but it would have fit her to a T.

Frida Beads

I have a notecard tacked to my bulletin board with one of Frida Kahlo's many self portraits. It's the one with pink, red , yellow and blue flowers surrounding her head. She looks pensive. Her artwork intrigues me, sometimes disturbs me and sometimes baffles me. Reading about her life can never really explain exactly what she was trying to say. Can we ever know what a piece of art means to the artist? Probably not. Whether you write a poem or brush paint onto a canvas, you are expressing a moment that is so fleeting, so ephemeral that you yourself may not be able to call it forth once it has passed. Right now beads seem to emerge from the clay without forethought. The colors combine in ways I cannot anticipate and I am happy with the results. Months or even years from now will I be able (or even want) to recreate today's work? Or will the work have evolved into a different animal altogether?

Art Bead Scene-What a thrill!

My Ophelia pendant was featured on the Art Bead Scene blog! Absolutely thrilling to see it-I squealed like a kid. I'm so glad I finally got the courage to actually submit something. I know I've got a long way to go. I'm a beadmaker first and foremost; this challenge forces me out of my comfort zone and makes me a jewelry maker as well. I hoped to find a class on wireworking this summer, but so far it's study-on-your-own season. For now it's gajillions of stretchy bracelets so that I can get the beads out in the world. How fine it would be to design a more sophisticated setting for the new beads. Someday....sigh.

Weeping Willow

Today's post is inspired by the challenge on Humblebead's blog. The idea was to create something on the concept of "Willow". Willow to me means the weeping willow trees of my childhood. Granny had one as big as a mountain ( it seemed to me). The branches came all the way to the ground and you could pretend you were in your own private cave of green as far as the eye could see. We had one sorry willow specimen in our yard right on the fence row. The neighbor's mule would mosey up to the fence, bray once just to show he could get away with it, and chomp a few leaves. He finally killed it before it could flourish.
My dad sang an uptempo bluegrassy song that had this verse:"Bury me beneath the willow, Under the weeping willow tree, So she may know where I am sleeping, Then perhaps she'll think of me." It's strange how a snippet of song can bring back a forgotten feeling. I thought everybody grew up with the same songs. When I went to college the girls from the city knew a smouldering jazzy song with this line: "Weeping willow weep for me, You know where I long to be...". Same tree, same sentiment, different worlds.
I pulled out all the green mini beads I'd made from polymer clay from my stash and made a few shades I didn't have to make this willow-inspired fidget bracelet. Thanks for the walk down memory lane, Heather!

Coyote's Quest Beads

Day after day Coyote traveled the roadside. She felt the eyes of the two-legged ones watching from every angle. The roar and vibrations from the traveling machines keeping her wary. A safe place to lie down,a place to prepare was all she sought. A safe place close to water and far from the noise of the machines. "Are the safe places all gone?" she howled, but there were none of her kind to answer.