A Master Class in Stringing

Last year Kate Richbourg of the Beadshop ran a six-session master class in bead stringing based on the style and techniques of Helen Dietze; of course I jumped all over that.  The result:

The photo does not do it justice

This was a lot of fun to do. Kate's project centered around a large stone donut, but I did not have one in a color I liked. I did, however, have a giant brass replica of a Chinese coin, so that became the core around which everything else was built. I rooted through my stash and pulled every purple, burgundy, brass, and gold-colored bead I had and got to stringing. Some progress pictures:

This is not the first time I've done a Helen Dietze project; decades ago the late, lamented (by me at least) Bead & Button magazine featured her and a version of one of her ambassador necklaces. I made it but I never wore it -- it called for long dangles at the back to counterbalance the weight of the front. However, those strands were uncomfortable and set off my sensory issues. When I began this project, I knew I'd need to keep the front from getting too big and heavy so that I would not have to have too much hanging off the clasp. This necklace is much easier for me to wear.

The fun in a project like this is that it is completely improv; when I started, I had no idea what it would look like, just what colors I wanted and the fact that it should be a little smaller than Kate's to fit me proportionately. Playing with what was functionally a giant "bead soup" was a blast, and I'll want to do something like this again. It's a great artistic exercise.

Jewelry Round-Up: I Can't Stop Edition

Months and months ago I received a newsletter from a bead shop (no idea which) that featured a beautiful project.  I could not afford the kit but I loved the mix of colors and finishes, so I dug through my stash, put a bunch of beads together in a tin, and promptly forgot about it. When I pulled out the tin in late June, I realized I never saved the email and had no recollection of the original project; I needed to figure out my own thing. I've been on a knotting kick and I wanted to try a knotted necklace made with a wide range of bead types like Candie Cooper often makes, so that's what I did. I'm very pleased with it.

The jewelry designer Danielle Wickes designed these nifty circular discs with holes to create beaded fringe, and Kate Richbourg of the The Beadshop did a tutorial on how to make tassel earrings with them.  The seed bead mix I used, "Mardi Gras," came from the bead store I worked at part-time in college; I had originally made a daisy chain necklace with it, but the thread was showing it's age. These earrings are so much fun to wear.

I bought these beautiful, deep purple crystal rounds but I wasn't sure what to do with them. I also had a tiny jar of shimmery raspberry chalottes for which I had not yet found a pattern. By pure chance I put the two next to each other while I was sorting through my work area, and I fell in love with the combination. To make the earrings I basically reversed engineered the pattern from lunasulmare1's cipollotti earrings (she and her tutorials have vanished from the internet).

I'd been wanting to make earrings to commemorate one of my favorite shows, Pushing Daisies, for years. I finally put them together: pie charms, bee charms, and daisy flowers made by me.

The Bead Place came up with a cute decorative project, attaching beaded charms to chicken wire in an embroidery hoop (really). My first thought was to make the wire base myself because why buy a kit when I don't have to? But I quickly realized chicken wire is sold by the yard and super hard to work with. So the kit it was! I had fun using all sorts of flower beads from my stash.

And finally, a simple necklace with an inexpensive locket from Michaels strung with pink tourmaline and lepidolite in quartz (that's a mouthful).

I need to start selling some of my jewelry again.

Jewelry Round-Up: I-Keep-Forgetting-to-Post Edition

I participated in a bead swap way back in March (I swear I'll do that post some day), and the very first thing I made was a cute pair of earrings with lilac-colored flowers:

Cheap but colorful beads from Michael's + silver charms that had been languishing = an easy, fun necklace:

I'm such a dork I bought not one but two Middle Earth-themed candles. The second, by North Ave Candles, was their Shire Sweetgrass candle with a cute little mushroom charm. I made a bracelet with it:

(The first candle had The One Ring in it. My 10-year-old is mad I didn't give it to him, but it fits my fingers, not his!)

I love, love, love the fringe charm earrings I made from Susan LeGuyader's pattern in the spring issue of Belle Armoire Jewelry:

The "popcorn padre" beads at Beadshop.com have been calling to me. I finally succumbed and bought them, then made the shop's Tahoe wrap bracelet: 

I originally paired these silver charms with burnt umber beads; pretty, but I never wore them. Turquoise chips and ruby beads are much more my style:

Shell necklaces are in. I happened to have a shell with a hole right where it should be (a lucky beachcombing find), so I cleaned it to remove calcification, rubbed some mineral oil in it to bring back some color, and edged it with gold paint. Brass beads from who-knows-where completed the look:

Emily Wilde's Map of the Otherlands by Heather Fawcett

 The second in Fawcett's series was just as delightful as the first. The fairies in this novel are enchanting, dangerous, and illogical, just as in the old stories, and as a result humans take different approaches to dealing with them: some try to bargain with them, some placate them, some do their very best to ignore them. 

And then there are people like Emily Wilde, who want to study them. Emily makes for an unusual protagonist: she's a brilliant academic but a terrible people person, and often has to rely on her friend (and fairy prince in exile) Wendell to smooth things over. She's very good at getting herself into and out of danger, but she's no warrior princess and sometimes she needs to be rescued. She's dorky and prickly, and some of the funniest scenes are because of her own obliviousness. 

Emily is not the only scholar this time around (Wendell doesn't count, he's too lazy to actually learn anything); she's joined on her adventures by professor Rose, who is a welcome addition to the story. He is more experienced than she is but also more conservative and old-fashioned in his approach, making him a good antagonist who is nonetheless an ally when it counts. I don't think we will see him in the concluding novel, but maybe I'll be pleasantly surprised.

The covers of the American editions are gorgeous, and having embroidered a pendant based on the first novel, earrings made sense for this one:

Maybe a pin for the last one? Or a bookmark.

Annual Late Winter Jewelry Photo Dump

 My mom bought me a Riverstone bracelet for Christmas. It was lonely so I made two more:

Humblebeads had a cute, Spring-y necklace made with waxed linen and assorted charms and beads; I used dyed hemp cord (so rough, my poor hands) and beads and charms from my stash, making it the perfect easy project.

 

I bought this lovely Anne Choi bead decades ago and made it into a necklace that I really liked but never wore:

So I remade it as a chunky bracelet. I hadn't intended a Valentine theme but that's how it worked out; fitting, given the inscription on the bead: lux et umbra vicissim sed semper amor.

 I've been telling myself for two years to make a pair of small brass earrings to wear with brass necklaces. I finally did!

Leaf Earrings, or Maybe a Bracelet

 Having impulsively purchased a bunch of fall-hued Czech glass leaves, I realized they would make a great pair of earrings, especially if I allowed them to dangle from lengths of chain:

But the resulting pair was way too heavy to wear for more than a few minutes. I thought about replacing a few of the glass leaves with acrylic ones, but that might also be too heavy. Instead I reconnected the two lengths of chain and added a bit more, to make a bracelet:

This had the advantage of needing even more leaves, too! Now I just need to get a copper clasp.

Jewelry Photo Dump

 I've made a lot of jewelry over the past few months that I forgot to document on the blog, so here it is.

A gorgeous strand of amazonite from Allegory Gallery inspired me to do some knotting again. I added rose quartz, beryl, and faceted moonstone to make a very long necklace that can also be wrapped around my wrist. I don't wear pastel colors much, but this is a lovely combination:

 I don't know how I got it into my head that I needed a Prince necklace, but who am I to turn down an excuse for purple jewelry? The silver charm is one of a pair of earrings, and the beads are a strand of amethyst I got for free from Lima Beads's delightful annual Easter egg hunt on their website.

 While spending hours on the Lima Beads website I found a cute project for necklaces to wear together, so I made two to create a set of sorts with some other necklaces:

 Emily Wilde's Encyclopaedia of Faeries was a fun book with a beautiful cover that inspired me to embroider a pendant with wintry flowers and a sinister hand:

 

 

 Many years ago at a needlecraft store I picked up two knotwork pendant kits by Teresa Layman. One I made for my mom right away, and the other languished in a box until recently. Soooo many knots. French knots, colonial knots, knots where I lost control of the thread ...

 

 I haven't made brick stitch earrings with fringe in decades, so that had to be remedied. I've included a picture of the first "draft," too wide and with the wrong size thread. More fringe earrings are in my future.

 Finally, a simple necklace I made with the African Christmas beads I can't get enough of:

Phew!

Earrings, Earrings, Earrings!

 I'm on a roll with the jewelry-making.

Sari spiral earrings, inspired by a PBS show that talked about the cultural significances of spirals:

 I took two lengths of recycled sari cord and coiled them, using small tacking stitches to hold them in place. I added a sprinkle of beads for a hint of sparkle.

Frida earrings: 

 Love them, and I want to make more.

Shiva earrings (I got the pattern from an old beading magazine): 

Each earring is composed of three identical sections, each one a rivoli crystal surrounded by peyote and herringbone stitching:

 Doesn't it look like a dragon's eye?

Flower and birdie earrings:

 I actually made these in the winter, but it's only now I feel like wearing them.

Necklaces, Necklaces, Necklaces!

I've made several necklaces over the last couple of months, but I haven't had time to blog about them until now.

A charm necklace:

Michaels had an adorable set of alphabet charms, and I used my sons' initials for this. I interspersed them with colorful cane glass beads. But what to do with the other 23 letters ...

A silver necklace:

I cannibalized two old necklaces I never wore any more to make this one. I like it, and it has a nice weight, but I want to make another, plainer one using Hill Tribe silver; I'm just not sure if I have enough of those beads.

A vintage necklace:

I had two bracelets (one with three-strands) made with vintage plastic beads that fell apart. Since the bracelets were a little too chunky for me, I opted to mix the beads all up into a necklace. It's not really my style though, so I may sell it, if I get around to setting up a Ko-fi site (etsy has become increasingly seller-unfriendly).

A pretty necklace:

This took some time to come together; I had stacked the buttons together quite some time ago, but I didn't know what to do with them (using wire to make a pendant didn't work). Much later I bought some pendant trays, and the buttons seemed like a good fit for one of them; all that I needed to do to make the fit perfect was add a perimeter of teeny seed beads -- which took another two years to actually do. Then I finally came up with a strand, using the leftover "pearl" beads from a necklace that belonged to my grandmother.

Bracelets, Bracelets, Bracelets!

 So glad my stitching obligations are done for now; I can play with beads!

I'm always looking for a way to use African "Christmas" beads, and Janice Parsons's Across Cultures bracelet was a good opportunity.

 

I used some red and green triangle beads to make some simple bracelets with knotting cord. Just in time for next Christmas.

And I finally got around to purchasing the leather cord ends I needed to finish a bracelet with these fun donut/ring beads. I love how they slide around.

How did November Go by so Fast?

 I feel like I have nothing to show for it; my stitching has focused on two Christmas gifts, one of which I'm not entirely sure will be ready in time.

But I did do a little bit more. Like this sugar skull from Kiriki Press:

And these steampunk book charms that of course I had to turn into earrings:

It's Black Friday, and I'm out of black floss which I very much need for one of the gifts. But I don't know if I can bring myself to venture out into the rain and the crowds to get it. If only one could arrange for thread delivery like one can for pizza ...

Earrings, Earrings, Earrings!

 I've been on a jewelry kick again.

The pair on the left started out as just the large faceted bead; I got them long ago as a subtle earring to wear when the rest of my jewelry stands out, but they were too boring. I added a glass bead under each one, and then for fun added smaller faceted beads to the ear wires. Still subtle, by my standards.

The second pair have gorgeous crystal skulls, which I got from a Halloween kit by Candie Cooper. In keeping with both the autumnal palette and the Dia de Muertos theme, I added two different gold vermeil flower beads. I absolutely love them.

The last pair have czech skull beads from yet another Candie Cooper kit. I didn't intend to make more skull earrings (I have three pairs already, including the crystal ones above), but I couldn't resist the kooky details on those beads.

 

These took longer to make; I'd been meaning to try brick-stitching seed beads around a ring, and this seed bead mix (also from the Halloween kit) gave me the opportunity. As you can see, I need more practice, but I've got all sorts of ideas percolating now.

There are lots more fun beads from the kit, but as the needs of my family go up, my crafting time goes down, so I doubt I'll be able to make much more before Halloween.