BSBP Soup Teaser

Well, I finally had some time to play with my fun bead soup from my bead partner Christine.  I though I would share a little teaser...  Now, this is just one piece and I still have a whole lot more to make..Christine gave me a ton of beautiful beads..  Im still undecided on one of the pendents as to if I like what I made or if I need to take it all apart and do it over again...  I like the pendent a whole lot, but I am having a difficult time making it shine....  I still have a week to go...wish me luck!!  :-)

Into the Forest Blog Hop Reveal!

Ok, so here it is...finally got all of my designs made.  Lisa Lodge, an awesome jewelry designer, offered this challenge to all us other designers. She gave us some beautiful beads to work with...below are my creations. I will admit, I had a bit of a difficult time figuring out something different with these beads.  I didn't want a typical necklace or even a typical bracelet.  I guess that's the fun of creating...LOL  

Here are my two pieces I created with the yummy beads...

I found these fun metal leaves at Joann fabrics.  I really like that I was able to add a little dangle of beads on the bottom.  I used Tim Holtz metal patina to add some fun to the leaves...

I used some sari silk strips and braided them and wrapped them around the loops.  I then used the seed beads to make simple rings around the wire which I wrapped to hold the sari silk on the loop.  I used copper wire through out to hold all of the beads together.

I didn't really have enough of the larger beads to create what I was thinking of doing, so I decided to do a crazy kumihimo bracelet instead.  I mixed in some black glass beads to add more depth to both my pieces...

THANK YOU LISA.....

Your hostess:  Lisa Lodge, A Grateful Artist

Melissa Trudinger, Bead Recipes

Kathy Zeigler Lindemer, Bay Moon Design

Eleanor Burian Moore, The Charmed Life

Jo-Ann Woolverton, It's a Beadiful Creation

Chris Eisenberg, Wanderware

Christine Stonefield, Sweet Girl Design

Carolyn Lawson, Carolyn's Creations

Janine Lucas, Esfera Travel Blog

Jasvanti Patel, Jewelry by Jasvanti

Shaiha Williams,   Shaiha's Ramblings

Kay Thomerson, Kayz Kreationz

Karla Morgan, Texas Pepper Jams

Veralynne Malone, Designed by Vera

Toltec  Jewels, Jewel School Friends

Christie Searle Murrow, Charis Designs Jewelry

Molly Alexander, Beautifully Broken Me

Monique Urquhart, A Half-Baked Notion

Janet Bocciardi, Honey from the Bee

Dini Bruinsma, Angaza by Changes

Heather Richter, Desert Jewelry Designs

Christina Miles, Wings n Scales

Elizabeth Engriser, Bead Contagion

Alice Peterson, Alice Dreaming

Alicia Marinache, All the Pretty Things

Catherine Yvonne King, Catherine's Musings

Alice Craddick, Alice's Beads and Baubles

Ema Kilroy, Ema K Designs

My Newest bundle of joy!

I love it when I get that call from Beads On Main to remind me when they are having their awesome sale.  How often do you get to go to a local bead store and get a nice yummy discount?  Yes, and yummy I mean a whopping 40% of ALL items in the store other than the already marked down items.  Beads On Main does this about 3 times a year and I just love their store.  They have lots of fun metals that I cant find in other bead stores or even online!  They carry a large variety of bead which are different than my other favorite bead store, The Bead Gallery.  So, today, after work, driving in stop and go traffic off and on, I headed on down to Beads On Main.  Jessica was there chatting away with her customers while I walked in.  I was in AWE...they had totally reorganized the little shop.  It was beautiful...all set up for the holiday season..and lots of new stuff!  Normally I walk into a bead store with an agenda, but today I wanted to just look around and see what I could find.  I dont NEED any more beads...I just WANTED some new fun stuff to play with.  I probably spent an whole hour plus wandering around.  As you see in the photo below...I really had a great time...

I will take more pictures soon and show you more of what I bought...and perhaps a few finished pieces too once I dig in...

Artisan Whimsy Bead Chat...Awesome Magazine

Click to view July 2013 BEAD Chat Magazine by Artisan Whimsy on GLOSSI.COM

This is a beautiful Magazine and is worth checking out...

June Inspiration - THE BEACH - ZnetShow Challenge begins..OH YEA!!

Good morning...

Yesterday I was quite excited when I checked the mail and my box of goodies was there.  Before opening my other mail, I quickly grabbed a pair of scissors and opened my box.  BUT, before I tell you what I got, I want a little about the challenge and who my partner is.

This months  "THE BEACH" challenge is to have beading partners. Znetshow has a Pinterest page and one of the boards has some wonderful photos for inspiration.  We could either chose a photo from this board or choose our own. I decided to choose my own, which I posted below. Your partner picks out beads from this HUGE list of beads to choose from which is provided by Znetshows.   We dont know what each other is getting until we our box in the mail.  Bill, from ZnetShows is so generous when he fills up our box with beads so that we can make multiple designs.

My partner is Karla  Texas Jelly Jams, an awesome jewelry designer and she also has this fantastic business making tasty JAMS.  I recently made her Raspberry Jam Crumb Cake recipe and it was sooooo good! It was gobbled up rather quickly..hehe I need to write up a little review on that...  Funny thing, is our taste in colors is very similar so without even knowing what we liked yet, we chose beads that we perfect!

Ok, so now you have a little idea what this challenge is about and a little about my partner.  Please check out her website, you will absolutely love it!

Here is my photo of inspiration for my Partner..

I found this awesome site through Pinterest that has all of these great color swatches. Design Seeds. I chose this picture because of the beautiful colors and it looks like a place I would like to sit and relax... listen to the ocean waves and birds...I miss the beach!

This is my Beach Mix which I received in the mail yesterday... Very yummy wouldnt you say?  Reminds me of seaweed with some little fish tossed in.  The beads are a bit larger than what I normally work with so this will be my challenge.  Below is the list of beads which you can find on ZnetShows.  

Cultured Sea Glass Beads - Oval - Medium Amethyst

Glass Pearls - Autumn Green

Chinese Crystals Kidney Beads

Sardonyx Twisted Oval Beads - Green

Cultured Sea Glass Nugget - Opaque Oval

Kyanite Tube Beads

Base Metal Alloy Beads - fish

This picture was chosen by my Partner 

As you see, there are lots of colors here to choose from.  I love my bead mix and I need to sit down and start drawing up some designs... 

Check back with my soon to see what I have created with these beautiful beads...my brain is thinking already!!!

Bead Soup Mix Contest

Wow...  I think I have had some good luck vibes passed on by my family and friends...  I had entered in the Blog Soup Mix contest that is on Pinterest presented by Lori Anderson.

Today was the reveal of the contest.  I am so excited, honored and happy to say that I won USE OF COLOR.  Now, I dont know what I am getting yet, its all up to those who voted for me.  You can check out the entire list of winners at Lori's Pretty Things blog.

There were 900 entries...WOW

Congratulations to Kris Lanae Cherish Designs Grand Prize Winner

A SPECIAL "THANK YOU" TO MY SOUP PARTNER - KELLY FOR GIVING ME THE BEST BEADS.....

Bead Soup Mix 7

Dont forget to check out Bead Soup Mix on Pinterest   There are a ton of pictures there of all the beautiful pieces and soup mixes....

Here is what I sent to my partner. She has received her soup already and I hope she has lots to play with now.

Pinterest Bead Soup Blog Hop

Steel wire V.S. oxidized Copper

I love black wire, and have been interested in how to make my wire change colors with oxidizing.  For a long time I could only find nasty steel wire, and great copper wire.  But copper wire of coarse is not black.  The bead stores here only carry the real shiny black wire and its not quite the look I have been looking for.

Recently I went to OSH and found this really nice black steel wire in 2 different sizes.  It worked great to do some wire wrapping but it left my hand black...nasty smelling too!  So I used Allergy Jewelry Shield to seal the wire.  I am sure there are other types of sealers I could use but it was handy and it worked.  I like the look of the wire, its not too shiny and the black does not rub off now.

Now, I finally got my Liver of Sulfur and played with it a little today to see what it does.  I have done lots of hunting on line to learn about this product.  I do agree that it stinks but it works...  I tried eggs and I wasnt impressed. I took a picture of both items to show you the difference.  I have not put on any of the Jewelry Sheild yet on the oxidized copper so it is dull.  I like both wires.  Copper is easy to find, and now for me steel is too.  Both are fairly easy to work with, and you really should seal both wires once you get the affect you want.

I still need...notice I used the word NEED...LOL...to explore more with oxidizing copper.

As you can see here, they look quite similar.  I think the oxidized copper is a better look myself, and copper is more user friendly.  You can solder it, where as steel you can not.  So it all depends on what your goal is.  For just doing wire wrapping, it may be cheaper and easier to use the steel wire.  But to be more creative, go with the copper and deal with the stink of the Liver of Sulfur.  I dont think it was all that bad.  Less smelly than resin...hehehehe...I hope you like this comparison and let me know if it helps you any at all....

Matzu Sea Goddess

Wow...this is my very first fully hand sculpted doll using Super Sculpey clay, I think she turned out pretty darn good. Only thing is her eyes look like they are bulging out of her head...LOL I thought she looked a little asian so I named her Matzu and the sea goddess from China. I learned how to do the peyote stitch on Friday and I cant seem to get enough of it...so fun! Much easier than I thought it would be. After I took the class, I knew I wanted to make this doll face. She is made on a 1 " wooden plug. I have made faces before but only with using push molds, so this was a little more fun and a lot more challenging. I need to make a small investment in the proper tools though...I think if I had a few more tiny tools it would have been easier to make. I am definately going to make more of these.... OH, and I painted her with Genesis Oil paints, much better to work with than acrylics in this case I thought!