ABC's of Creativity - April Review

It is May and spring is finally here to stay in southern Ontario. April was a crazy month but here is my review of the ABC's of Creativity.

I wrote both posts in April, G was Gems and H was Herringbone.

Here are some of my favourite images from G is Gems.

Turquoise Mosiac Bead with turquoise chips and copper, beaded by M. Rypan

Turquoise Necklace inspired by piece @ ROM, beadwoven by Christina Dufrene from 2010 TBS calender

Lampwork beads accented with amber, glass beads, beaded by J. Woolverton

From H is Herringbone I enjoyed show the variety of herringbone, flat, tubular and Maria's variation.

Flat Herringbone - Ribbon bracelets, designed by Kathleen Kimball-Baker, beadwoven by J. Woolverton

Tubular Herringbone - Flowers on twisted herringbone rope, designed by Kerrie Slade, beadwoven by J. Woolverton

Maria's variation - Beaded Soutache Necklace with Fluorite pendant

Only 18 more letters to go. Hop over to Rypan Designs blog to see more.

Happy Beading!

Bead Soup Blog Party 7 - Second Reveal

It is April 13 and the postponed second reveal day for the 7th Bead Soup Blog Party.

Here is what I received from my partner, Cheryl Brown.

Bead Soup from Cheryl

The combination of the copper, cream, blues and purples are beautiful.

I wanted to do more that just string the components into a necklace. I had just purchased  Mastering Peyote Stitch by Melinda Barta. 

I really liked the leaves on the cover piece. I played with some different copper and bronze coloured beads before decided on the final combination. It is edged with some purple charlottes and centres of ivory.

Once the leaves were made it was a challenge to figure out how to work them into the necklace. Using knottable beadwire I secured the lowest leaf in the centre of the length of wire. I strung a few copper daisy spacers over both ends of the wire. I secured the next leaf on one of the wires, brought them together again and added a few more daisy spacers. The third leaf was secured to the other wire and the ends were brought together again. A few more daisy spacers completed the branch that would hang below the owl.

In progress, forming the branch below the owl

I then finished the necklace with small round pearls, large copper daisy spacers and lampwork beads from Cheryl, to which I add fire polished beads, paper beads and more small copper daisy spacers.

Once I had everything strung I had the challenge of what to use for a closure. The one that Cheryl sent was not going to work for me, it was much to big for the necklace. I did not have any smaller copper clasps in my stash. Wanting to have it finish so I could wear it, I took apart an older piece that needed to be reworked anyways.

Completed necklace

Detail of focal

With the necklace finished I had to now make something that used the amazing toggle that Cheryl sent. It is perfect to be the centre piece of a bracelet. I used some of the flat disc shaped lampwork beads, to which I added more paper beads, Swarovski crystals, copper wavy discs (similar to the silver ones I sent Cheryl), fire polished beads and some of the purple charlottes used on the leaves.

Completed bracelet

The last thing that I wanted to do was to figure out what to do with the lampwork headpins. I have never used headpins like this before.

Lampwork headpins

As I browsed thru my various drawers of stash I came across these very large white lucite trillums. I placed one of the headpins thru the centre of the trillum and relized that it would make an amazing ring. I then had to find my ring mandel in the chaos of my work area. Once I found it, it was just a matter of wrapping around the mandel to form the correct size ring and the securing the end of the headpin at the base of the flower.

Lampwork studded trillum rings

Ring on my hand

I have enjoyed wearing the necklace and bracelet since I finished them last month. The rings may have to wait for a special event to make their debut.

Collage of soup and finished pieces

Thanks go out to our amazing host Lori Anderson and my partner Cheryl Brown.

Now take sometime to hop around to the other amazing beaders and see what they have made. Here is the link to the complete list. I know that will be hopping around over the course of the weekend.

Happy Beading!!

Bead Soup Blog Party 7 - 2nd reveal tease

It is April 6 and original today would be reveal day for my creations using the bead soup from my partner Cheryl Brown. But our fearless leader and hostess, Lori Anderson,  has not been well and asked that we postpone for one week our reveal.

So, of course we will be back again next week with the full reveal of my creations. But just to give you a little taste here is a pixelated photo of one of my pieces.

Please come back again April 13 for the full reveal .

ABC's of Creativity - March Review

March is coming to an end and I hope that some April showers will bring May flowers. Here is a review of the ABC's of Creativity posts from March.

We started with Maria's post about Embroidery. There are images of many things including shirts, jackets and shoes.

Embroidered fabric shoes by Roger Vivier, France @ Bata Shoe Museum

Santee Dakota Northern Plains men's jacket, about 1870's @ Museum of Civilization

Then I did a post about Freeform. This is a form of beadwork which I find a challenge to do (I like order and pattern) but many amazing beadweavers create beautiful work. Here are two of my favourites.

Maria's Window on the Sonoran Desert using the 2006 TBS Bag of Beads

Susan Hood's Dragonfly Moon has a lampwork dragonfly encircled with freeform beading

Only 20 letters to go. So many more ways to spark your creativity.

Happy Beading

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!!