Some recent tidbits

I haven't made too much new jewelry, except for the recent collaboration items, but I did manage to finish a few necklaces. Looking at them you might wonder what took me so long. I can't really explain, other than to say it's been a tough year so far.

This is one of my first enameled beads. The hole on one side was very rough, so, bead cap to the rescue! And the bead cap's design sort of mimics the pattern on the bead. The bead spins! So, if I'm wearing it, and need to keep my hands busy for some reason, I can spin it!

 This is the other side. I kinda like the non-bead cap side best.

 

 I picked up this fabulous old rhinestone component last year at Bead Fest, at the April Melody booth. They carry TONS of Czech glass beads, but also some interesting odds and ends! This component (it's not an old pin or pendant) is so old looking, but still fabulous. I stumbled across the rhinestone chain links in my stash. They match perfectly. I refrained from adding anything else. I chose a bigger chain (Vintaj), to match the size of the piece.

 

 This is an antique mother of pearl button I got from a friend with a ridiculous button collection (thank you Leslie!!). I hesitated to glue the vintage flower cabochon on the button. It looked fine with out it, but I really liked the flower, so I went with it. I can always make another one with out it (different button, of course). It will kill me to sell this one, but I'm gonna do it - I put it in the gallery this weekend!

 

Thanks for stopping by my blog!

3rd annual Challenge of Color

Erin Prais-Hintz of Tesori Trovati hosts challenges throughout the year. November is traditionally the challenge of color. I always love this challenge, because it forces me to create out of my comfort zone, and I usually like what I've created for this challenge. I tend to design monochromatic jewelry, maybe because I feel it's more wearable, but also because I'm not good at pairing colors together. This challenge leaves me no choice.
The palettes are very special. Please see Erin's blog for a full explanation, so it's not repeated here.

My palettes this year (she gave each us two to choose from) were opposite each other. One is yellows and deep reds and browns, the other icy blues and greys. Erin asked us to pick one of the palettes, so she knew how to list us for the blog hop. I had told Erin I chose "Greenland Coast" for my palette, but when I sat down to make jewelry, "Erongo Massif" came out first. So, I have pieces for both palettes.

 

 

 

Erongo Massif:

It just so happened that I made this enameled focal and matching enameled beads BEFORE I got my palettes! The red beads are much darker in real life. They are those "Red Velvet" crystal beads that were all the rage a while back. (I have tried to retouch them, to simulate the deep rich red color)

 I created the focal using a vintage copper art deco stamping. It's quite heavy (gilding weight) and has little indentations to glue chatons in. I made a hole in the center indentation, and wired my "flower" to it. The larger red crystal was just barely bigger than the opening in the center of the flower, so I used 2 smaller crystals under it, for support (I don't want it to go inside the flower). The focal is heavier than it looks, but it lays ok when worn. Maybe I should glue some red chatons in all those little indentations.


This is a good look at the art deco base.

 I am in love with this enameled piece! Yummy!!

 

 

Greenland Coast:

This one took a bit longer, just because I had to make all the wire wrapped dangles. This is loosely  inspired by Barbara Lewis' Floral Cascade necklace. In fact, many of the enameled beads were made for my own floral cascade necklace, but did not get used. It just so happens, they matched my palette. I made all the dangles, and had them laid out to go onto a chain, but going around the neck (like a charm bracelet). Then I thought "What if I made it into a lariat type necklace?"

So, that's what I did.

Materials include my enameled beads, Vintaj chain, hematite crystal rounds, silvered crystal rounds,  crystals rondelles and smaller AB crystal rondelles.

 The necklace does not have a clasp and is one long length (maybe 28"?). One end is brought over the other in whatever position you want. This allows the wearer to "tie" it as long or short as they like. It can be "tied" in the center, or to one side. It's a lot of necklace, and is not for everyone, but I really like it.

 Once tied, it's a luxurious amount of beads in the middle - I love it!

 

Earrings to match. My enameled beads and the same silvered and AB crystals that were used in the necklace.

And another pair. They look like Art Deco hot air balloons to me. Up, up, and away!

A big thank you to Erin for organizing this challenge again, and Brandi for the fabulous color palettes. They both put a lot in to it, and we all get a lot out of it!

Thank you Miss Erin and Miss Brandi!

 

Please visit the other blogs (it is a blog hop, after all!)

Rather than copy and paste the long list of blog hop participants here (there are 80 of us!!), click here, to go to Erin's blog post.

 

WTF WTF ?

OK, I do not mean to offend. And, if it helps, you could say it stands for "Wed Thurs Fri" ;-)

I **WON** these charms from, none other than, Barbara Lewis, during the book blog tour of Lori Anderson's new book, Bead Soup.
To win, you just needed to leave a comment, saying which charm you would choose, if you won. Obviously, I chose these! And then I won!

I knew I wanted to make them into earrings, but what to dangle below the charm?? As I looked through my enameled beads, I found these. These were white enamel, that I tried to "over fire" to bring out other colors, like Barbara does in her book. What my experiments yielded were beads that barely had any enamel left on them at all!! I burned the enamel right off! So, it's kind of an inside enameling joke:
"WTF happened to the enamel on these poor burnt beads??"
(the truth: I kinda like 'em anyway)

Any enamelers out there??
Who else has had experiments turn out "surprising"?
BTW - Barbara (Painting with Fire) has some enamels on sale right now! I don't really need more, but I got some new colors to experiment with - look out!

Floral Cascade is up to interpretation

By now, if you're a jewelry designer, you've bought, or read, or at least heard about Barbara Lewis' book Torch-Fired Enamel Jewelry: A Workshop in Painting with Fire. After all, it was the #1 craft book on Amazon last year. I have definitely been bitten by the enameling bug, as you already know if you've read previous posts here on the blog. In her book, she has a necklace design called "Floral Cascade". The following is my interpretation of it, sort of. I must also give a shout out to my friend Cynthia Johnsrud of Ornamental Style, because she also did her own take on the design, which is really what gave me the inspiration to try this design. Thank you Cyndi and Barbara for all the inspiration you've given me.


I used cotton cord instead of wire for the "tendrils".

I made beads in various shades of aqua and blue. I think Barbara's necklace was multi-colored and has the bigger beads at the top and the smaller beads at the bottom....but I gotta be me ;-)

Come back on Saturday to see my Bead Soup creations for the third reveal of the Bead Soup Blog Party hosted by Lori Anderson!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

O-rings to the rescue!

I took my niece to a small but nice bead show a couple weeks ago. We shopped and brought home a few treasures.
The one item I knew I wanted to get was rubber O-rings. Here's why I needed them.

If you look in between the layers of the enameled flower, you can seewhere I used the little O-rings. They act as cushions for the enameled flowers, so I can tighten the layers a bit more than I've been able to. My earlier flower layers were not super tight. If you over tighten them, the enamel will crack off. So, I left them a tad loose, which is fine. The flowers can spin and move. But sometimes, I'd like to line up petals a certain way, so the O-rings will allow me to do that.
The added bonus is it builds a more 3-D look into the flowers! I purchased many colors of O-rings, to coordinate (or contrast) with the flower colors.

The O-rings are from My Elements. They have an etsy shop.

Bead Soup has Landed

My package has arrived from my wonderful partner, Jennifer Justman. SQUEEEE! I still need to take a photo of the soup ingredients! (just waiting to be near the soup, while the sun's still up to take the picture) Wait until you see what I got!!

Here's what I sent Jenn:

Da Soup! Enameled flower focal (made by me), an assortment of enameled beads and key charms (made by me), a Vintaj clasp using the Bead Pod Creative bar, that I filled with red beads, a strand of vintage red beads from Czechoslovakia, some furnace glass, some modern Czech glass, and some red sari silk.

Da clasp!

Da flower focal - 3 flowers stacked on top of a Vintaj Violet filigree

Da keys! The 2 blue ones are really tiny - so cute!

I hope she makes beautiful soup! Can't wait to see it!

Are you sick of looking at enameled beads?

I'm not!!! I am totally obsessed with enameling anything I can get my hands on.
But if you are, you can totally skip this post - it's all enameled! I'll understand ;-)

I have been enameling beads like it's about to be outlawed (I'd probably keep enameling if it were illegal - it's like crack to me). So, I thought I'd start putting some of my many beads into necklaces. I've been using them sparingly (except for the patriotic necklace I made for my Mom, which she really loved, BTW). I've been putting in one or two at a time. So, I decided to make a simple necklace of all enameled beads. Some of these are some of the first ones I enameled. The round orange one in the middle has WAY TOO Much enamel on it, when I wasn't sure what I was doing. All the holes are filled! Still pretty though!

 

And, more flowers, because I'm still making them. This one is purple with a little pink flower in the middle, and a bali style spacer (with purple enamel). I wrapped wire around the outside of the flower, and made a wrapped loop, to attach to a chain.

 This one looks like a lily to me. The pictures are a little dark, but it's shades of pink and cranberry. There are little spots and pock marks, but I like them.

This one is black, in case I'm not in a colorful mood. The center bead is a weird reddish peachy beige color. I really should make notes when I'm enameling, so I can re-create colors. But I'm more like a mad scientist when I'm at the torch. I don't have time to take notes!! 

Must. Enamel. (in a Frankenstein-like voice)

That's it. That wasn't too painful, was it?
Have a great weekend!

Cocktail Hour Blog Hop

Well, this was a fun one!!! How could I resist a blog hop inspired by Cocktails?!?
Amy Freeland of CopperDiem fame thought this one up. She assigned everyone a cocktail to draw inspiration from. I'm very curious to see the other cocktails, and jewelry designs. The blog hop is scheduled for Saturday May 26th, but I'm posting a day early, because I won't be able to post tomorrow!

My cocktail is the Mai Tai. I was happy to get the Mai Tai, because there's a lot of imagery associated with it, although I've never actually drank one:
Tiki lounges, grass skirts and lei's, little umbrellas and fruit, Elvis' Blue Hawaii,....Anything tropical, really.

Elvis looking very dreamy in Blue Hawaii

Looks cool and refreshing, doesn't it?

a scene from Mad Men

 My enameled flowers fit the Mai Tai theme quite nicely. I layered a large orange flower with bitter green, orange and turquoise flowers. I added a "grass skirt" made of silk ribbons in coordinating colors, and put this on a length of orange faux suede. I found some beads with big enough holes to slide onto the faux suede. Little carved bone flowers, and some glass tubes that remind me of a tiki torch. For the clasp, I used one of my enameled vintage buttons.

 Here's a closer look at the button I enameled. The button has a spiral rope design.

 And, while I had everything out, I made a pair of earrings. The little enameled flowers are actually headpins I made with wire, enamel and a little flower bead cap.

My parrot bracelet from the button swap blog hop fits this theme too! Polly want a Mai Tai?

A BIG thank you to Amy, our hostess. Great idea Amy!! Thanks for the inspiration!
The Blog Hop is Saturday May 26th!
Here's the list of participants:

Copper Diem (our hostess!) 

Stefanies Sammelsurium
Lorelei's Blog
My Bead Journey
Adventures with Kelly
Mama's Got To Doodle
Sadafulee
Wait Just One More Bead
Cynth's Blog (****YOU ARE HERE****)
Palm Coast Art
Green Shoot Jewellery Designs
Cianci Blue
Dreamin Of Beads / SAS Jewelry Designs
Beads for Busy Gals
Oregon Made Jewelry
My Addictions...Handcrafted Jewelry by Patti
Moods by Mari
Soul of Mine Embodiment
Uniquely Yunikua
Fabric of My Life
Firefly Visions
Indigo Heart
The Peaceful Bead
Casa de Everly
Heaven Lane Creations
Sue Beads
Durga Jewelry
Honey Bijou
A Bird in the Hand Art
SilverNikNats
Rainy Day Designs
Tell Your Girlfriends

Feeling Patriotic

With Memorial Day coming up, I just HAD to buy this fabulous red, white, and blue lampwork focal from StudioJuls (aka Julsbeads). I mean, how is a red-blooded American gal suppose to pass it up??? I do intend to give this to my Mom, but I might wear it once before I do ;-)

As soon as I got the package from Juli, I enameled up some red beads, and blue beads, and white beads (they're really off white, to match the silvered ivory glass of the lampwork bead.

 Just look at that focal. No really - look at it!!!!

I think I'm seriously in love with this one!

April showers....we need rain!

Well, I thought (for half a second) that maybe my camera had "healed thyself". But a closer look at the photos on the computer screen reveals it was wishful thinking. You know, on the tiny screen on the camera, all the photos looked pretty good, but almost all are fuzzy.
But heck, I'm not gonna let that stop me from showing you some more of my flowers. I apologize in advance if they give you a headache, trying to bring them in focus.
I must find the time to shop for and buy a new camera! Does anyone out there LOVE their camera? I'm seeking your advice....

This photo is the "straight on" shot. It shows the pretty little flower in the center. These flowers I'm making are in layers. Bottom layer is a piece of Vintaj filigree, then a large enameled daisy, then an enameled cage-like thing, then the small flower, and topped with a pale blue Swarovski.

But the "side shot" tells another side of the story. I bent some starburst type flowers to try to replicate some sort of tropical flower (the "cage-like" thing). I don't know what it's supposed to be, but I like it! They are slightly irregular and funky. And I like the dimension it gives my flowers.

Then I took it one step further. These are more like a 3-D objects that resemble a flower. They sort of remind me of Fuchsia, or a Japanese lantern. The purple and green one really has that lantern shape!

I bent more of the starburst flowers straight up from the center, to make them look like something you might find in the center of a flower. I was thinking of a Stamen. These don't really look like that, but that's what I was going for.

I wish I had the words to express how much I love enameling all the components, and how much I love assembling the components, and how much I love the results. I love that every time I turn on the torch, I'm never quite sure what I'll get. I guess if I wanted to make 10 things the same I'd be cursing. But I love the imperfections, and the surprises.

Other topics:
I am going to Beadfest Spring this Friday. I know the ONE booth I MUST visit is Barbara Lewis' Painting with Fire. I am actually starting to run out a couple colors of enamel already. Plus, I want to add some colors to my collection, and pick someone's brain about a couple things I haven't figured out yet.

I'm also participating in Cindy Wimmer's Button Swap. I think I'm more excited to send my buttons to my partner than I am to receive the package from her. Of course, all that will all change when I actually get my package and squeal with excitement! Can't wait!!!!