Bead Soup Blog Party 7 - First Reveal

It is March 30, first reveal day of the 7th Bead Soup Blog Party. Here are all the first revealers. Join the party and bounce around to see the amazing creations of my fellow particiapants.

Come back next week when I will be revealing my creation using the soup that I got from my partner Cheryl. Update - our reveal have been changed to April 13 and the 3rd reveal will be on April 20.

Deco Pagoda & Tomcat Boxes

I recently posted about having finally made one of every box in Julia Pretl's book "Little Bead Boxes". Looking back over my blog tonight I realized that I had not posted about each of the last two boxes.

The Deco Pagoda has some interested design features. Each tier created by stepping in like doing the hem. The little roofs on each tier are added later in the beading of the box.

I changed the colours to blue & silver with red accents

The Tomcat box was the last box I needed to make from the book.

I have a few cat fans among friends and families, but I am allergic. So a beaded cat box works well in my house. Of course this box will likely make its way to the home of a cat fan.

I worked the box with the colours listed in the book. I may make more use colours to match my niece and nephew's cats in the future.

Poppy vase

Yesterday I almost gave up on finishing this project. I broke two needles and over a dozen beads trying to do the hem at the top. I have had similar issues with boxes before but never so many beads on one project. But I want to give this to a friend to put in her new (but small) office I could not drop it, so I plowed on. I did not totally work back everytime a bead broke as I have done in the past. I followed Julia's tip for replacing a broken bead in her book Little Bead Boxes.

This poppy vase is a pattern from Julia Pretl's website. I love the way that the lower section is shaped. It creates a very bowl like shape for that section of the vase. The gradual decreasing then give it a beautiful almost teardrop shape. I can see some idea for creating other vases or bowls in the future.

Going to start working on the Scarab box next. Its lid is shaped like a pryamid.

Have a great weekend and happy beading!!

Little Bead Boxes

Wow I have finally made at least one of every design in Julia Pretl's book Little Bead Boxes.

It started back in July of 2008 when Julia was teaching at Bead Junction in Toronto.

My very first box

Second box where I made it taller by repeating pattern

My variations of the triangle boxes in the book

My variations of the square boxes in the book

My variations of the pentagon boxes in the book

My variations of the hexagon boxes in the book

Here are some additional finished projects from patterns purchased on Julia's website.

Owl box with no lid, great for pens and pencils

Olive box with Swarovski crystal finial that look like an olive pit

Fir tree without the decorations for Christmas

I have truly enjoyed making the many boxes in the book. It came along in my beading life just when I was craving to make something more that jewellry.

Thanks Julia you have truly broaden my beading world.

ABC's of Creativity - February Review

Here is my monthly review of the ABC's of Creativity series that I am contibuting to on Rypan Designs' blog.

February covers C is Color and D is Design Decisions.

Maria's post about color gives you a little color theory and some amazing eye candy. My favourite is this amazing collaborative piece - The rainbow.

My post about design decision is about the what if question you may ask yourself during the creative process. Also includes eye candy (including my favourite bridal piece) and some design process pictures of two Rypan Designs kits.

This bridal necklace was created to meet the requested of the bride and our asking what if --- we used pearls instead.

Only 22 letters to go. So many more ways to spark your creativity.

Happy Beading

Beading with Elizabeth

This past weekend I got to spend the weekend with my youngest niece Elizabeth.

It started with our sleepover at the ROM. We made masks with feathers and explore our favourite part of the museum, the Shad Gallery.

Once we were back at my place on Saturday, Elizabeth decided that we should make something to put in this box we had bought for her grandmother's birthday.

Earrings were the perfect choice. Looking in my drawer of Swarovski she found beautiful little butterflies. Here are the earrings that she designed.

We selected these earrings made with furnace glass from my inventory of earrings.

In the Swarovski drawer she found some Palace Green Opal round crystals which she wanted to use to make a bracelet for her mom. We decided to use some of the butterflies leftover from Grandma's earrings.

She then decided that it need a box. So Sandra gets the Grandma Fifi box.

On Sunday morning, after a good night's sleep in my bed, she selected a necklace from my inventory. I shortened it the perfect length, with an extender chain so she could grow into it.

Of course her next question was did I have a box for it. Luckily I had the perfect blue box.

I decided that we could not leave out making something for Elizabeth's dad and brother. I thought that keychains would be great. I pulled out the raku beads from my Tucson Treasures that Maria had given me.

Elizabeth selected the lizard for her brother, Mackenzie and a fish for her dad, Les. We found some fire polished rondelles to accent each.

She then wanted to make one for herself and her mom. Using the round celtic knots we designed these.

Here is the whole family of keychains.

Elizabeth, it was so much fun the spend the weekend together. We made some beautiful things as a team.

Soup Arrival

I had only expected to find bills in my mail box when I checked it yesterday, but I was surprised to find a small box from Alberta there.

Once I was back upstairs I opened it to find a well packed trio of packages.

Each was carefully wrapped in red and white tissue.

The largest contained a great variety of ingredients including pearls, an assortment of copper findings and beads, beautiful handmade toggle and lampwork beads.

The smallest held a wise and colourful lampwork owl.

The third package was long and narrow, I was very curious as to what it held. Inside were handmade headpins.

Here is a final picture of the complete soup send to my by my amazing partner, Cheryl Brown of Dragonfly Designs.

Thanks Cheryl.

Stop back on April 6, reveal day, to see what I create with this amazing soup.