Tuesday Tidbits - Halloween Necklace

Owl graphic from Graphics Fairy

Some time ago I did a Friday Pick from Rings & Things with a Halloween necklace in mind. I've finally gotten around to making it, and I thought I'd share the process.

First off I tidied up and set out all my stuff. I've left the bags on the mat for these pictures. I do leave stuff in the original bags (or save the labels) so I know what to re-order if I run out - and so I can identify what I've made stuff with - I didn't always and learned better over time. I don't usually line them up like this on the mat, they're normally on the right side of the work area, since I'm right handed.


Here's a close up of the rubber tubing I'm using, wooden cat charms and rubber tube ends. The cat charms come in left facing and right facing and are plain wood. I am considering some sort of decor on the charms, just not sure what quite yet. Those experiments come later.

I was enticed to try using rubber tubing by Margot Potter - she features it in crafts on her blog, in her Beyond the Bead and there are also pieces with it in Bead and Wire Jewelry Exposed which she co-authored with Katie Hacker and Fernando DaSilva.

I've put the tools I'm going to use in this nifty holder right in front of me so they're easy to swap out as I need different ones. You'll note the Baby Wubber flat nose pliers - those are from Blue Buddha Boutique and simply wonderful - they fit my small-ish hands perfectly, the grip is soft and non-slip, and the very smooth finish on the pliers doesn't mar the rather delicate matte finish on the jump rings at all. I'm also using a flush cutter, bent nose full sized Wubbers pliers (everything except the 'fit my small-ish hands' above applies to these, too), and round nose pliers, to make the simple loops.

I have these great 7/8" gunmetal headpins from Rings & Things. Great because there's so little wastage when I make a dangle with tiny beads, because the finish does not chip or flake, even when I'm less than extra cautious, and because the finish color is true gunmetal. I also liked the matte black jump rings from the Black Lace (from Michael's) assortment for this necklace because they practically disappear on the black rubber tubing, so I used them instead of gunmetal. However, the black headpin/eye pin coating will chip and flake when you use them for a wrapped loop, if you don't treat it with the utmost care, and even then it might anyway, which is the ultimate reason I used the gunmetal ones from Rings & Things, instead. The matte black jump rings didn't have the flaking/chipping issue when I opened them, although they were easily marred if my tools (yes even Wubbers) slipped - which with such tiny rings happened. I used a Sharpie to color in the flaws. Unfortunately, as you'll see further on, it turns out the idea I had for them didn't work out so well.

Ok, so now you know what's going to be on the necklace, on to how I assembled it.

First, I put one Swarovski 4mm bicone from the Rings & Things Kokomo assortment and one gunmetal bead (I am not exactly sure where I got them - I have the bag, but there's no supplier logo or name printed on it!) on a headpin.



I trimmed the head pin by about a quarter inch. I don't actually measure that with a ruler, I use the distance between my fingernail and base of my left index finger as a gauge for the length I cut off, but I decided to actually measure it for this post. Then I made a simple loop, hung it from a Black Lace matte black jump ring and moved on to the next color Swarovski to do the same again.

As you can see from above, I'm making all the dangles first, then I'll "string" them on the rubber tubing.



I also made a couple "black cats on a wall" beads using two oval wooden beads, Ranger jet black archival ink and black embossing powder (purchased at Michael's). I used just the top part of a rubber stamp from Alpha Stamps (Feline Expo) by covering the bottom half with tape before I inked it.

These oval beads plus the round wood beads are recycled from a beaded belt I've had in a 'junk bag' for years. I really don't remember how I ended up with a wooden bead and faux leather string belt. Must have been some fashion delusion I had in the 80s when I had a waistline...

Anyway, I was not happy with the way the crystal dangles looked because of the way they were clumping together when I held the necklace up as if hanging from my neck. I had hoped for a cool, swinging type of attachment, but that was not to be. So I un-strung the whole thing and took the dangles off the jumprings. All that careful effort for naught. Such is life.

Here's where I am now - dangles hanging directly from the tubing. It's definitely not finished. I just haven't been hit by the right particle of inspiration for what I'm going to do next.

Any ideas? I did consider embellishing the wooden cat/moon pendants, but I'm kind of liking the folksy bare wood look. By the way, the "line" on the pendant that creates the cat's leg - it's carved straight through the wood, not drawn on or burned in. Nice touch. I have a lot of these, I plan on making some earrings soon and listing them on ArtFire.

Come back tomorrow and read about some magazine contest stuff I've participated/am thinking about participating in.

FTC compliance disclosure notice of material connections: All items referenced in this post, with the exception of the Kokomo mix Swarovski crystals and Baby Wubbers, were personally purchased for the express purpose of creating this necklace.

Tuesday Tidbits - My Workspace - Almost Done

Well, I took Friday and Monday off so I'd have a 4-day weekend to get organized, take pictures of my work that's ready for Art Fire, and maybe even make a thing or two if I had time left over. On Friday my DH surprised me by also taking the day off and treating me to a movie I told him I'd like to see (The Informant with Matt Damon and Scott Bakula).

Thus, a big chunk of Friday was unavailable. It turned out to be more than just the movie time, unfortunately, as the hot dogs or popcorn I had at the theatre didn't agree with me very well and I didn't feel up to much work the rest of the day.

Saturday was very productive, though, and I did the bulk of the clean up then. Here's a shot of my worktable (it's 6' long by 3' wide). Down to the far right is a little wheeled shelf unit that has my polymer clay toaster oven (still unused, alas) sitting on it, under a Bead Buddy lap desk and another Bead Buddy 'briefcase' that's great for traveling with beading stuff. I've got lots of various kinds of bead storage containers, desktop drawers, etc., crammed full of beady bits. I just ordered a Beadalon beading station and a table top work bench from Great Craft Works (who also had the Beadalon square knot links I've been wanting!) so I can get my beading wire and tools better organized.

for a clearer, larger picture, please click!

The boxes at the bottom left side of the table, just past the Ott lamp, are my 'sorting' boxes - bits and beads and stuff that needs to be sorted back into their proper places. That's what most of Saturday was about. As a result of my re-sorting and consolidating I freed up five or six of the divided plastic storage boxes and got a lot of stuff out of bags and box lids into proper bins. The boxes on the table hold the metal beads, bead caps, findings and components I've managed to collect. Several of them also have Swarovski, since there's no more shelf space and I don't want to mix them in the other bins by color and mix them up with the other glass.

Here's the stuff further along the wall to the right of the table. The bins in the bookshelf are beads sorted by color. That pink bit at the bottom right of the picture is a nifty cushion thing from Bead and Button Show 2009 on-line souvenir sale, called a Krafters Komfycush that I've got on my worktable chair. It has handy pocketed flaps that hang over the side of the chair and a seat cushion. The whole thing folds up into a tote with a shoulder strap. I thought it'd be handy for conventions and other shows whether I'm selling or just sitting in a seminar/panel discussion.

for a clearer, larger picture, please click!

And here's a bit further to the right - this is the hutch that still hasn't been worked on yet. When I first started beading it was my work surface. Eventually I had to get some carts with drawers to hold my beads, then after a while I needed two more. And all the shelves in the hutch were full of bead bins. Finally I bought the long table and moved stuff over to it. No way I'm going to pan further around the room - it's still a work in progress and there's still a lot of clutter over thataway. The wall is rather short as that side of the room has the sliding glass doors to the back patio in it.

for a clearer, larger picture, please click!

The other 180° of the room has my printer, computer desk and bookshelf. It's a major mess that's next on the list of things to do. Someday. When I'm not busy beading or blogging about beading.

That's the Tueday Tidbit. See you tomorrow when I go back to sharing about some new pieces I've done post-cleaning frenzy.

P.S. - can you see the one Star Trek item I've got in my beading area? Tell me in the comments if you can and know what it is.

Going to be Working Hard This Weekend!

I mentioned the other day that I gave myself a challenge to list one new thing each day on Art Fire. This week I've put up four new pairs of earrings. I haven't made any new ones lately, so I'll need to get busy with that soon, but first I have to get my workroom in order (again).

It's a complete disaster waiting to happen area. My goal for the weekend is to have it so wonderful by Sunday that I can take pictures and proudly post them as my Monday Miscellany post. Since I'm announcing it here, I'll have to do it because you all will be my motivation!

Because I'm working on that, I don't have anything of my own to share, but I can point you to some other great pieces being worked on by a couple of my Twitter friends and from some blogs I follow.

Wendy at Craft Dinner has a darling necklace in progress using Vintage Lucite Moonglow Heishi rondells from The Beadin' Path.

Tish at Just A Tish shows off a heap of shiny earrings.

And here are some really cute and clever soda bottle beads from Jan at Wire My Soul that she's made stitch markers with.

Don't forget that tomorrow is Wandering Around the Beadosphere Day - I'll have a lot more great links to creative blogs for you to check out.

P.S. Today's new listing at Art Fire:

Dawno

Buy Handmade

"Excuse me, have you seen my mind? I seem to have lost it somewhere along the way."

Before I go into anecdote-mode, thought I'd share my latest attempt at making something with the technique Katie Hacker teaches at the Beadalon site, using loops of beading wire to space the beads instead of crimps, and then attaching dangly things on the loops. I made the end-caps out of some large hole beads and crimp-beads glued into the holes to secure the strands - I'm kind of proud at how those turned out. I'd started out thinking I'd just use the red beads with some pewter butterfly and flower charms added as dangles, but then decided to add one more strand with more pewter butterflies and red bead dangles. Maybe I went overboard just a bit, but I like it.

I had "one of those days" today - lots of things just seemed harder to do than usual because I just couldn't focus. For example, have you ever truly believed you've made something, know you haven't sold it, and yet can't find it anywhere? I would have sworn I made a bracelet to match a tiger eye and turquoise nugget necklace. There's the necklace, there's the earrings...where's the bracelet?

Now I'm not so sure that I didn't just imagine having made it - after all, it was way back in October (imagine me rolling my eyes here). I know my memory isn't as sharp as it used to be, but typically it's forgetting where I left something real, not a false memory of having it in the first place. Oh well, guess I'll just have to make one. Once I'm finished, I'm sure the one I thought I'd made will turn up someplace obvious.

Then, as I was changing my calendar to May, I realized that Memorial Day weekend was a week earlier than I'd thought...oops! Yep, the mind is definitely going soft on me. I have a lot to do to get ready for Bay Con, and one less week to do it in.

I'm still playing around with the brown lava stones I got from Rings & Things - here's the latest (unfinished) piece with red coral, red ceramic beads in the necklace, and a lava stone, branch coral, red India glass bead, and brass wire pendant. A few more round stones at the top and a clasp and I'm done :

(Please click picture to enlarge if you'd like to see more detail)

Right at the top of the square where the hole had been drilled there was a very large pit. I wasn't really happy with how that looked and was wondering how to fill it in or cover it up. I eventually took a stone that I had put aside because it was lopsided from the way some of the cuts were along the axis of the holes in the stone (they looked like trenches instead of craters), and took a file to it and gathered the filings. I put a blob of Aleen's glue in the hole and covered it with the filings. Covered it right up - and darn near invisibly, if you ask me.

There have been a couple more posts about lava stone designs around the beadosphere - I really like what Melanie at Earthenwork Studios did with the lava stones and a beautiful "Openwork Escutcheons" piece.

Two others I've seen and not mentioned here before, are:

Margot Potter's wire wrapped earrings

Cindy Gimbrone "The Lampwork Diva" provides some product details and asks "Hmmm what sort of designs would you use these light weight beads for? Do they inspire you to create something "hot?"

I'll leave you to ponder that question (and if you have an answer - please visit Cindy's blog and leave her a comment).

Getting Ready for a Crafty Weekend!

Because it's one of those "you had to be there" kind of things, I won't explain why, but I'm going to be making something for my daughter and me featuring these:

Whatever gets made won't be identical because, while I found two packs of charms with the lobsters, I wasn't able to find more than one pack that had the starfish and scallop - so other charms will have to go on the second creation. I was thinking bracelet for me, but daughter doesn't wear them, so she'll get either earrings or a pendant. Or some kind of dangly thing she can use on a purse or hook to her keychain or a zipper...still working all this out in my head.

Tidied up my workspace a bit and did some minimal sorting, in order to be more focused about what I'm going to work on tonight and this weekend. I had a vague idea of the things I wanted to work on, while I was doing this, but I've decided to do something new to help increase my odds of actually ending up on Sunday with a sense of accomplishment.

As in real progress rather than sitting surrounded by piles of beads and findings, more piles of partly finished things, and the occasional running-out-to-the-store-for-something-new-because-I-got-a-wild-idea progress. Not that there's anything wrong with that sometimes.

Anyway, I got to thinking about how haphazardly I go about this whole jewelry obsession I have. I'm moving from "hobby" to "part time business" and maybe, in the not too distant future, full time business. At the conclusion of this ponderment, I decided that in order to be successful, I have to apply some of the project management skills (btw, that's a big part of what I do in my day job in the techie world) I've picked up along the way. Especially right now, if only to put some structured goals around what I need to do to prepare for Bay Con at the end of May.

For example, I will have a pretty small space so that sets one parameter - how much room I'll have to display, which limits what I can bring for sale pre-made. I am going to be sitting out in Artist's Alley again, so I need to be working on something all the time. That sets another parameter - what supplies to bring. The type of con, theme of con, typical con-goers, etc., help set the parameters for what kind of things might sell best. The easy parameter is "days left until show".

From all those parameters, I'll create a task list, maybe using Google Spreadsheets - if this is a successful trial-run, maybe someone will want me to share what I did, and it's very easy to share with Google. The task spreadsheet will include how many, and what kinds, of prepared bags of things to make at the table and put due dates for completion of those. Other tasks would be things like "what new items do I want to display" "complete pricing and tagging" "create inventory list".

Once the task list is created, dates assigned and priorities established, I can focus on getting the things I need to do for Bay Con done. If I get the tasks done before their due dates, then I can do whatever I want for the rest of the time, or move on to other tasks and move ahead of schedule. I'm actually liking this idea a lot, the more I write about it.

I first started using some of these techniques back in college, when I over-scheduled myself one quarter in my 2nd year. I found a book (title long forgotten) that saved me from dropping out in abject failure - and I'm not kidding, it was a really grim time. The key was breaking my days into 15 minute increments, setting achievable goals for those increments and rewarding myself periodically for success. Also dropping one class.

The organizational tips it gave were very much like a project management how-to, but written for students. Also like the time management stuff Franklin-Covey, Day-Timer, etc., have made their fortunes by providing seminars and supplies for. Me, I used Mead 4-subject 5x8 sized notebooks with graph paper pages and colored pens.

By organizing, setting goals and managing my time better, using the techniques in the book, I got thru that quarter, and subsequent quarters, graduated in 3 years and did it cum laude as well. I apply many of those same tools to my day-job. So why not my jewelry work, too? As I begin to approach this more as a part-time business than a hobby, it's essential!

I Finally Made Something Else for the Gluable Challenge - Rectangular Frame

Finally, a sunny day! Got out the MagicGlos and one of my Rings & Things Gluable Challenge frames.

I used the Rectangular frame (Stock#: 49-440-0 Approx. 52x13mm rectangle brass picture-frame charms, 3.5-3.8 inner diameter loop. 1.3-1.7mm thick. Fits 48x9mm image. Back is textured.)

I cut out a piece of the label from my favorite drink, Arizona Diet Green Tea, and glued it to the frame with Mod Podge, smoothed to remove air bubbles underneath. Then I took some 26 gauge brass wire, bent it around the picture, hammered it lightly and set on top of the picture. The reason for the wire is that I plan to use cloisonne beads in the necklace, so now the picture has a cloisonne-like look, too.

Coated it with a thin layer of MagicGlos, took it outside. Learned how quickly Magic Glos sets in sunlight, had to sand with a fine grit sandpaper under water to remove the lump I created, put another coat of MagicGlos on. Needs work, but it's a start. (click to enlarge for detail)

Thanks to Carmi's Art/Life World blog for her post about using MagicGlos - gave me the nudge I needed.

One of the Twitter-folk I follow, mySA_beading, mentioned a contest - Step by Step Beads Colorworks Challenge.

Enter the first Colorworks Challenge!

Tertiary Colors

The orange-purple-green tertiary triad presents a challenge of bold and striking contrasts. Create a piece of bead jewelry (or a bead in any medium: polymer, beads, glass, etc.) using the triad from the color wheel. Black, white, or clear are welcome, but the predominant colors must be the orange-purple-green triad (any shades of those colors).

As it happens, I'd begun work some time ago on a strung piece using those colors and copper. I won't show the whole piece, just in case I decide to enter, but here's a bit of it:

The workspace is a wreck, so I'm going to listen to City Arts and Lectures with Ted Danson and Mary Steenburgen as I tidy up.

Exotic Tiger's Eye and Yellow Jade

Just finished and listed a new necklace on Art Fire, made of tiger's eye stone beads and nuggets and yellow jade. I really love this combination - the shimmer and dimensionality of the tiger's eye has always fascinated me, even as a young child it was my favorite stone.

But I wasn't satisfied with a necklace just made of tiger's eye, so I poked around in the bead boxes of my (newly organized- yay me!) work table and tried and rejected a lot of ideas until I found the yellow jade. "Ooooh," I thought, "this looks great!"

I also decided against a lot of extra embellishments, so the nuggets and jade have bead caps but the rest of the necklace is just tiger's eye beads. This one is strung on beading wire, not knotted.

I hope you like it, too!

(click to enlarge)

I've added a lot of beading and jewelry blogs to my "follow" list - I don't know if you can see that I'm following you on your widgets, since I added them manually via the blogger dashboard (it's my old-fashioned, non-Blogger-layouts, hand coded html template's fault but I like what I have and so there).

I try to comment on other blogs I follow as often as I can, because I believe this should be a conversation, not just each of us shouting into cyberspace and wondering if anyone is listening.

Ever wonder about that? I added Site-Meter to my blogs, just so I could see if anyone but the Googlebots were ever checking in. This blog has gone from one or two real visitors a week, to a pretty good daily visit rate of real people. Thank you so much for stopping by, it means the world to me!

Now, for a really random thought:

Do you like pool - you know, 8-ball, billiards? How about precocious toddlers playing grown up games? Check out my other blog, there's a video clip of a toddler who is a pool playing prodigy embedded there today.

And now a word from our sponsor:

Dawno

Buy Handmade

I'm Exhausted - But My Workroom Is Set Up!

Major spring cleaning happened to my office/workroom. Filled up the paper recycle bin with boxes. Went to Target and got a 6'x3' folding banquet' table, put it up and started moving stuff over to it. Now I'm going to little by little organize and re-arrange things, but I am so happy with the new set up! Exhausted, but happy.

So, as far as getting other things done today - that was it. Well, except for one custom order you can see lying there in my "DIY Beading Lap Desk" in the picture above. I'm so very glad I took tomorrow off, I'll need it to recover!

Saw another gluable challenge post today - Lisa at A Bead A Day shares a lovely creation using Swarovski pearls and a gluable bracelet blank with pre-drilled holes for embellishment. I didn't see that on the listing - nor the bubbly texture that appears in the pictures, so I'm wondering if it is a new product that's not listed yet.

I really have to get going on mine and get them posted!

Made Some Earrings While Watching Obama Speech - So, Is It Too Corny to Want to Name Them "Hope"?

I decided to make a pair of earrings that matched a lanyard using teal and aqua glass beads. Started out just putting the beads on a long sterling headpin in the same sequence as the lanyard. Decided it needed a little something more and since I'm on a curlicue kick, I took some wire and made two curls and hung little teal faceted glass beads off of them.

The thing I really like about how they turned out is that the curls move around and the earrings have a very dimensional look, which I try to show in the picture below.

And here's the pair with the matching lanyard.

I think I'm going to put some goals on myself for tomorrow and Thursday night that I won't make any new pieces until I've worked on the things I need to finish for the convention. Things I need to do - put labels and prices on the pieces, finish off the standing displays and get all the other stuff I need to take on Friday out and at least gathered up for packing.

I'm In! Potlatch Convention, Sunnyvale CA, Feb 27 - Mar 1

Got the news early today. Now I'm going to have to figure out what pieces to bring, get them organized and tagged (what kind of tags??), think about display - what sort of room will I have at/around my table? Should I bring my mannequin? I will bring a mirror - it's nice to try stuff on and see how it looks.

Also thinking about making book mark type thingies since it's a convention about SF books. Maybe some St. Patrick's Day theme stuff? *GAH!!*

*mild panic* I really didn't think I'd get in!

And in other news, I've decided to join Art Fire as a place to sell my non-lanyard stuff. Only two things up so far. No idea when I'll be able to put up more, since now my free time is going to be used to get ready for Potlatch.

Now if you like the idea of selling on Art Fire, too, they're having a "verified" user sale right now for $7 a month (vs $20) but it's limited to 5k users and there are about 2400 left. If 10 people click this link and become a registered user on Art Fire.com I get a nice bonus - my account becomes free. Then you can put the same link up at your site and do the same. I don't usually shill this kind of thing, but I figured, what the heck!

No beading to speak of done yesterday or today - much work to do at day job. The night isn't over yet, though. Maybe I'll have something to share tomorrow.

New Etsy Listings and Photo Setups

Pretty much spent the day photographing jewelry. Cropping the pictures. Then writing the Etsy copy and uploading the pictures to the site. 14 new listings are up ( 3 on the 31st and the rest today), many of them you've seen here recently on the blog. My office is downstairs, my photography "studio" is upstairs where there's good natural light, so I've been up and down a lot today and I'm tired.

Hope you'll take a moment to look at the Etsy listings and give me your input - I still need to figure out how to do a good "teaser" photo as the ones I'm using now don't stand out amongst all the other thumbnails that well.

Weekend Beading Update

Between watching all 17 episodes of the 1960s series The Prisoner online on AMC and listening to Man in the Dark on audiobook, while I beaded, and other non-beading distractions, I again didn't get to posting about my works in progress over the last few days...so here are some pictures.

Friday night and some of Saturday, I worked on some knotted strands with peach beads on white Silkon thread. The rice beads have a soft feel to them, definitely not glass, maybe resin or acrylic? I liked the color and sheen when I saw them at Global beads, so I bought a bunch. On the top strand I used them, two shades of glass and two light peach shades in seed beads size 11/0 and 6/0 from Dyna-Mites. The second strand is just the rice beads and the third strand is just the seed beads.

Then, on Saturday, I worked on this necklace with aventurine beads, gold plated bead caps and disk spacers on black FFF Gudebrod silk.

And today, I strung this extra long strand (about 116 inches total) with all kinds of glass beads, including Swarovski bicones, and copper on white Silkon thread. (click for larger image to see details). Because of its length, it can be worn a number of ways, included twisted with an 'S' clasp to fasten.

My workspace is slowly getting organized, but I still have a long way to go.

Another Knotted Necklace, Reorganizing, Looking Forward to Learning New Things

I spent the day organizing and arranging my workspace in preparation for bringing in some additional shelving tomorrow, along with creating a new knotted necklace while listening to an audio book reading of Jane Eyre. As mentioned before, I find knotting relaxing, so I used it as a break now and then from the tidying efforts. The total length of the Czech glass tigereye druk beads, with small matte gold colored glass seed beads, is 56".

I only have brown and black silk right now, but I've ordered some additional colors and look forward to making more knotted necklaces when they arrive.

I also finished a linked necklace earlier this morning, before I started on the knotted one above. I used ivory and white glass druk beads, amber shell beads and ivory tablet cut beads linked with gold plated eyepins and jump rings.

Once I have my space reorgainized, I look forward to setting up an area to start working with art clay - a late Christmas gift arrived the other day that will be very helpful, a pasta machine. I also asked for some books, which did come before Christmas and were under the tree. I will be reading up on the other materials and tools I need to get started, then I'll start experimenting. I truly look forward to it.

Happy Holidays - Christmas Eve Post

I began my long holiday break after work today, won't be back in the office until Jan 5th.

Both of my adult children are here, with their respective significant others, for Christmas. Fortunately for me, their SO's families live near by. The gifts are wrapped and under the tree, which still needs to be decorated - my daughter and I will do it today. We've a very, um, eclectic selection of ornaments including strange sequined animals, Star Trek, delicate hand painted glass, and billiards themed. It will be a special tree...to say the least.

I have a couple things I want to accomplish over the break, one is to figure out my California Sales Tax return (due at the end of January) and get it filed and paid. I didn't make that many sales this year, unfortunately, but I want to establish the part time business as legitimate since I do deduct expenses on my federal tax return. I am hopeful that I'll have the opportunity to do 3 or 4 conventions next year - I've gotten an email from the dealer's room coordinator for the World Fantasy Convention that will be local that I'm on the mailing list. I know to keep an eye open for LosCon much earlier this year and I'll check out BayCon again, which was a lot of fun last May. The other con I had hoped to sell at is Potlatch coming up in February, and I haven't gotten any response from the dealer's room coordinator yet, so I'm worried I might not get a space, again...oh well, keeping my fingers crossed!

The other thing is to try and get my workspace sorted out - the room I use for beading is also my home office and prior to getting into beading served as a "library" of sorts for my books (I am a voracious reader and my collection is probably over a thousand books as I can't seem to part with any of them - although a lot are in the garage and in storage). There are also bins of office supplies and other stuff that came home with me when I was moved out of a closed office into a cubicle and then just miscellaneous stuff that I can't find a place for elsewhere in the house and don't want to put in the garage. I'd really like to move out all the books, set up a fairly long and deep table surface for a beading workspace, get some shelving for all the supplies and maybe a pegboard for tools. If I can get a start on it next week, I can do the rest in phases over the weekends. Of course, it's been rainy and if the weather stays that way, it will mean moving stuff outside, prior to deciding if it goes to the garage or elsewhere, will be a problem.

So, before I finish this post, which might be the last one for a few days, here's my most recent finished project.

I started this in Fayetteville last week, it's a bit labor intensive so I didn't finish it there. I thought it was a fun use of the two different sized circle spacers from Bead Gallery.

I used red and green roundel beads inside the larger circle spacer bead, like a bead frame, and smaller glass beads with silver linings in the small circle spacers along with a solid silver metal disk between them, all on silver plated eye pins joined with Beadalon EZLinks. A larger EZLink attaches the final loop to the eyeglass holders. Finished length is 30"

I Should Be Beading

I feel like I should be beading, but I just finished up another 12 hr work day and my enthusiasm for just about everything is very low. If I didn't have to clean up my office/workroom in order to be able to find anything, I'd probably get to work - but there's a small disaster area behind me where boxes of beads and findings and design boards with miscellaneous beads are piled up 3 and 4 deep...I just don't think I'm going to work up the enthusiasm tonight to tidy up.

Since I don't have any WIP to write about, I will put in a plug for Elise's Shiny Sale - she's listed a great huge lot of lovely jewelry on sale - get your Christmas shopping done early! And feel free, of course, to check out my Etsy store, too.

Mostly Miscellaneous

I've finally put hardware on all the lanyards I'd had hanging around in "nearly finished" status today. Also made a new one using clear faceted crystal rondelles. Puttering around with different bead combos and trying to find one I like to start a new piece.

I was at the store today and saw a bin that was made for putting up in the shower, probably to hold a loofa or a few small containers of shower gel and shampoo - had two suction cups on the back. I thought it would be a great holder for my most used tools - round nose pliers, clippers, etc., and if I put some cup hooks on the little left hand extension to my desk, it could hang there and free up some desktop space.

Of course I forgot the cup hooks, but it holds the tools just great and I'll pick up some hooks next time I'm out. I've been meaning to get a leather mallet, so maybe I'll go to a hardware store and get both those items.

I've been procrastinating on my photography and as a result very few of my new items are up on Etsy. I really need to get my Etsy store updated. Then I have to figure out how to get some traffic in there!

Working now on a pendant necklace with faceted light sapphire blue glass - will post a pic when it's further along.

Dawno's Do It Yourself Portable Beading "Lap Desk"

I thought I'd do something a bit different and start off by sharing a simple, portable, lap sized stringing set up I use from time to time. I love my Bead Buddy lap desk, but it is a bit bulky, and I primarily use it when I'm trying to figure out design. Once I have that accomplished I continue my stringing with the lap desk for its portability, but sometimes my work is simple enough that I'm ready to go without having to 'draft' it on the design board. For example, the "Chateau Picard" lanyard I mentioned last night, for that I'm just using two types of beads and one type of spacer and the pattern isn't complex, so there's not much need for the whole design board/lap desk kit.

I've taken a wide shoebox lid and fit an 8"x8" bead mat inside of it. By the way, bead mats are just a square of vellux material - you could probably find it at a fabric store and cut your own - in my googling I found a cute one at Etsy with edging, a sewn in tape measure and tie strings at the ends so the whole thing could be rolled up - probably not a good idea to try it with beads still inside, though *grin*.

Where there's space left over in the box top, I've put some small plastic containers and the spool of stringing wire. I used the box top, initially, to sort the lighter colored faceted roundel beads from the darker ones, and darker pinched oval beads from the lighter ones, so my finished lanyard necklace would be uniform in color - thus the tiny spoon lying there, which I used to help sort and set aside the unneeded beads.

The bead mat keeps the beads from rolling all over the place and makes it easy to pick them up on the wire since they stay pretty well put, the plastic holders keep the smaller spacers from finding their way under the mat. Since the box top is just 8" x 12", it fits very nicely on the lap.

By the way, here's the finished necklace lanyard, tentatively named "Chateau Picard"

(click image to enlarge)

More Sorting Beads than Beading Accomplished this Weekend

As I mentioned, I did go out looking for briolettes, didn't find what I wanted, but I still didn't come home empty handed, picked up some copper and antique gold colored spacers and bead caps, and a few new beads (lovely peridot green ones) at Global Beads yesterday.

Spent a great deal of time yesterday and today organizing and cleaning my work space and various bead storage bins - I can only go so long with it all splayed out around me - eventually I don't have room to walk around if I don't. Last night and this morning I played around some olive colored glass beads using inexpensive silver colored wire wrapped loops, but I didn't like how it was turning out, so disassembled it. I like the idea I had, so I'll give it another try.

Tonight I decided that I need to make more earrings, so I got started with these glass bead earrings from some beads out of a glass bead mix batch (not attached to earwires yet):

...and began work on this lanyard necklace tentatively named "Chateau Picard" - may add a vintage year, will have to do some fact checking - because the citron colored glass made me think of champagne. I think it's not just the lighting of the photograph that makes some of the faceted roundels look a bit darker than the others, so tomorrow when I have some daylight I'm going to sort the roundels and make sure I'm using just one shade.

LosCon Disappointment "All filled up, sorry..."

A lot of today's beading time went to going out to grab some stuff at Global Beads and Michael's then organizing what I bought. I did finish the garnet and amber piece I wrote about in this morning's untitled post.

(click for larger image)

It's 29" with 24k gold vermeil disks, 14k gold filled beads and donut spacers. I wasn't able to find large enough lobster claw clasps in gold filled or vermeil on my shopping trip, but I did find 1micron gold plate over copper clasps in a good size, so I've finished this and the other two pieces with those.

I heard back from the LosCon folk today, they say the dealer room is filled and asked if I'd like to be on the waitlist, I said ok, but I'm not going to get my hopes up again. I must say I'm pretty disappointed and it's harder having had to wait for nearly a month to get the bad news.

I'll just have to look for another convention to go to - not sure I'll find anything this year, though. It's been mostly a year of spending and not much return. I'll be better prepared for next year, though.

Love, in Lavender

Well, I played around with the design I mentioned last night and just couldn't get it to look the way I want. I will have to poke around at the bead stores this weekend and see if I can find just the right aquamarine stones or colored glass something(s).

That decision out of the way, I now needed to figure out what I wanted to make tonight.

"Hmmm," I said to myself, "you haven't done anything purple in a while."

So I pulled out the purple drawer - oh, that one's the purple drawer with the gray beads, hematite and pearls. See, early on when I was getting my beading area set up, I bought this 10 drawer thing I saw at JoAnn's for my beads, every two drawers is a different color: red, purple, blue, green, orange. The drawers are just the right height and width for a single plastic organizer box with a couple inches in the front and about one inch on the side for other stuff that didn't fit in the box. So in every other drawer the bead color matches the beads inside. Well, except for the red drawers at the top - I have clear beads in the top and white beads and pearls in the second one. At the time I didn't have many red beads. And the orange ones at the bottom - those have pink beads in them. I have a lot of pink beads.

So, back to the story, I pulled out the other purple drawer, and looked at my purple beads. I had bought two strings of tiny, opaque lavender glass heart beads ages and ages ago. I'd used, or thought about using, some of them at one point, because a number of them were loose in the storage box, but I had lots and lots left. Decided I wanted to do something with them.

Poured them out on the BeadBuddy lapdesk bead design board. Stared at it for a considerable bit of time. Lots of little hearts - enough for two long lanyards. I'll just do one for now, I thought.

"What else needs to go into this?" I mumbled. Then I decided on the tiny, dark amethyst purple glass bicone beads between the hearts - nice contrast.

For the center focal, I used a glass bead I've used before as the main detail bead on a lanyard, which has light lavender leaves over a milky opaque color that is just a blush of lavender, put two small amethyst druk beads, and two larger iridescent amethyst glass beads, on either side of it. There, ready to go.

I merrily strung the hearts so the points would face the focal. I finished it, put on the hardware, and realized as I held up the "finished" piece, that worn as a badge lanyard the hearts would all be upside down. As an eyeglass leash, they would be right side up as they ascend to the glasses, that's good, and worn as a necklace, the hearts would all be fine since that's how I designed it on the board. Conundrum. Do I re-string the whole thing and alternate the orientation of the hearts (point-bicone-point, bumps-bicone-bumps, and so on) so it works as a badge lanyard?

I'm putting that decision off for tomorrow. Here's what it looks like now, with the hearts all oriented points toward the focal.