Bead Peeps Swap 'n' Hop - The Creamsicle Conundrum

Bead swaps and design challenges are a great way to get the creative juices flowing, so when I saw a call on the Facebook group Bead Peeps for a swap, I was all in. And I lucked out, too, getting the lovely Lori Alainn Blanchard of Alainn Jewelry as my partner.  She sent me the delicious beads below for me to work with:



and the handcrafted focal:

Lori had asked me what colors I find most challenging to work with, and then, as any good swap partner would, she sent me that exact thing -- flourescent creamsicle orange.

  

I could almost hear her laughing from several hundred miles away.....;-

The first thing I worked on was the right way to highlight the focal, and I hoped to use the tilas to do so. But after banging my head against the wall trying several different unsuccessful configurations, I decided the tilas wanted to work elsewhere, and concentrated on the focal. Here's what happened:

All I added from my stash was some merlot and dark gold seed beads, the lapis rounds in the neckstrap, and my own fabricated gold clasp. And if you look really closely in the first round of beads around the focal, you'll see that I used some of the creamsicle seeds there.

Next up was a bracelet:

Then I wanted to use the faceted Czech glass Lori had sent.  Initially, I thought those would go with the focal, but once I'd finished the centerpiece, the greens and blues of the Czech glass just didn't work with the reds and turquoises, so I set them aside on the worktable.  They ended up near a piece I'd done several months ago and called Iris - the blues and greens worked really well together! Serendipity worked in my favor this time!

There were other colors of seed beads that I hadn't yet used, so a pair of freeform peyote earrings seemed to be in order:

And a ring:

And, finally, something to celebrate that challenging creamsicle color!  I call these earrings Creamsicle Conundrum:

Here's a family picture:

Thanks for reading all the way down, thanks to Lori for being a fun and generous partner, and thanks to Linda Anderson for hosting the swap!

Now, go look at all the creations from others who've taken part in the swap challenge -- get ready for some serious eye candy!

Linda Anderson - Hostess - http://fromTheBeadBoard.blogspot.com
Linda	Anderson	http://fromTheBeadBoard.blogspot.com
Natalie	Davidson	http://www.northshoredays.com
Marcy	Lamberson	http://www.studiomarcy.blogspot.com
Kathy	Lindemer	http://bay-moon-design.blogspot.com/
Dita	Basu	Http://www.alankarshilpa.blogspot.com
Andrea	Glick	http://zenithjade.blogspot.com/
Kristina	Peck	http://tealeavesandtinyhats.blogspot.com/
Shai	Williams	http://www.shaihasramblings.com/
Catherine	La Vite	http://www.drygulchbeadsandjewelry.blogspot.com/
Christina	Hickman	http://vintagetreasuresjewelry.blogspot.com/
gloria	allen	http://wingsandbeads.blogspot.com
Teresa	Schurter	http://treezstreazurs.com/
Maria Rosa	Sharrow	http://willowstreetshops.blogspot.com
Susan	Kelly	http://mimismilesdesigns.blogspot.com
Jenny	Kyrlach	http://anafiassa.blogspot.com/
Michelle	McCarthy	http://www.fireflydesignstudio.blogspot.com
Terry Jeanette	Carter	http://tappingflamingo.blogspot.com
Lee	Koopman	http://stregajewellry.wordpress.com
Laurie	Vyselaar	https://lefthandjewelry.wordpress.com
Marianne	Baxter	http://simplyseablimejewelry.blogspot.com
Divya	N	http://www.jewelsofsayuri.com
Kelly	Hosford Patterson	http://travelingsideshow.blogspot.com/
Johana	Nunez	http://www.artincendi.com
Kari	Asbury	http://hippiechickjewelrydesign.com/blog
ROBIN	REED	http://www.willowdragon.blogspot.com
Kristina	Hahn Eleniak	http://www.peacockandlime.wordpress.com
Robin Lynne	Showstack	http://heartsdesiresjewelryforyou.blogspot.com/
Rosantia	Petkova	http://bairozan.blogspot.com/
Claire	Fabian	http://saraccino.blogspot.de/
Inge	von Roos	https://ingetraud.wordpress.com
Rachel	Mallis	http://mintmonarch.com
Sam	Waghron	http://palemooncreation.blogspot.co.uk
Lori	Schneider	http://beadaddicted.blogspot.com
Fay	Wolfenden	http://torchfairy.blogspot.com
SEEDERS
Suse	Stelljes	http://pearlify.blogspot.de
Ginger	Bishop	http://www.lilmummylikes.blogspot.com
Nelly	May	http://www.smellynelly.blogspot.com
REbecca	White	http://morganafeycreations.121hub.com/
sheila	Prosterman	http://catswithbeads.blogspot.com
Catherine	King	http://catherines-musings.blogspot.com
PALLAVI	ASHER	http://kalaabhushan.blogspot.in/
Krafty	Max	http://kraftymax.net
Renetha	Stanziano	http://lamplightcrafts.blogspot.com/
Becky	Pancake	http://beckypancakebeaddesigns.blogspot.com
Katy	Heider	http://onthepondcreations.blogspot.com/
Deborah	Apodaca	http://deborahapodacadesigns.blogspot.com/
Heather	Richter	http://desertjewelrydesigns.blogspot.com/
Tami	Norris	https://tamisdesigns.wordpress.com
Brandy	Scozzari	http://bhjewelry.wordpress.com
Catherine	King	http://catherines-musings.blogspot.com
Kathleen	Breeding	https://www.facebook.com/99BOBOTW/
Veralynne	Malone	http://veradesigns.blogspot.com
Bobbie	Rafferty	http://beadsong.blogspot.com  (You are here!)
Lori	Blanchard	http://alainnjewelry.wordpress.com

A Pile O' Earrings

Imagine...a weekend with no obligations, free access to all the past seasons of Game of Thrones, and a collection of twins, tilas, rizos, and other fun shaped beads that you've been wanting to play with....What might happen?

Well, if you're anything like me, you'll end up with a pile o' earrings.

This is just a part of what came off the worktable.

In all, I made over thirty pairs of earrings. And I caught up to date on Game of Thrones. Win/win!

Melting Lakes and A New Bracelet

The weather around here has been absolutely glorious for the past few days.  Temperatures warm enough to go out with fewer than ten layers of clothes on. Actual, honest to goodness sunshine. Ground visible where before there were waist-high piles of snow.  Spring is truly on its way.

So I went out for a stroll yesterday down to a little park on Lake Michigan that's near my place. It's always a little colder next to the lake than it is a few blocks away, so there was snow on the sand, and large shards of ice being pushed up to the shoreline by the waves of the thawing lake.

Those are thin sheets of ice, each about the size of a poster board, piling up on the
shoreline as the lake melts
and the waves push the surface ice to land

The sky was blue, the ice on the water was sparkling, and people were enjoying the promise of spring.

A week or so, when the snow was still deep on the ground, I finished this bracelet, and to me it just screams "spring!!!!" It's a pattern that came from just sitting and playing with the beads.  With the recent thaw, it seems right to show it now.

You'll see it's kind of the next step in the patterns I developed here as part of one of the Time To Stitch challenges.  I was having ninety-three kinds of fits trying to figure out an appropriate clasp, but I found the cute little citrine colored mushroom-shaped beads, and ta da!

Here's a little video I shot on my phone at the lake.  Ignore the sounds of the people who were behind me and enjoy the gentle sound of the waves under the surface of the ice, whispering the promise of warmer days. (That is, if the video works -- it's behaving very strangely for me....)

Triple The Fun - A Time To Stitch Challenge Reveal

Therese and Christine have done it again! This time, a challenge to take a basic bracelet pattern and switch it up for three variations, changing base color, bead size, etc.

I took my jumping off point from one of the pieces I made for the latest Bead Soup Challenge, specifically the lower section of the neck strand of this necklace:

Essentially, it's a herringbone with twin beads, embellished on the side with Czech bricks and triangle beads. Although I doubt I invented it, it was a stitch I developed during the BSBP process, and I was really happy to have an excuse to explore it some more.

Thing is, I didn't have any more bricks (kind of a tila chopped in half) in my stash. (Note to self #1, put bricks on the beady shopping list).  So I chose to use tilas, thinking the translation would be easy.

Not so.  The size was just off enough to make it weird.  Some things I tried were way of in proportion and just flopped around like a beached fish.  Others were just ugly.  So, in the spirit of challenge, I punted (friends, this is the closest I will ever, EVER get to performing a football-related action, aside from those associated with being a rabid spectator).

Here's variation number one: herringbone center with twin beads, edged with tilas and daggers.  I love it.

Variation number two, this time with the tilas turned 90 degrees from the first bracelet, and with drops added, mainly because I didn't have enough of those fabulous red polka dot daggers to do the whole length. (Note to self #2: add sexy red polka dot daggers to beady shopping list, too).  I love this one, too, although it's a little more cha-cha flashy than the first.  It would be perfect to wear to an Alabama football game...

Variation #3 is the most buttoned down, but it's still blingy with the silver twins -- this time a herringbone with twins, tilas, and narrow daggers. While I fabricated the clasps on all three, this is the only one that I made a beaded toggle clasp for.  I wore this one at an art show today, and I can testify that it feels slinky and grand.

All three together, progressing in order of creation from bottom to top:

Thanks, Therese and Christine, for pushing my creativity once again!  Here's the list of everyone participating.

Hosts:

Therese

Christine

Participants

Kim

Maryanne

Lola

Dagi

Shirley

Alenka

LiliKrist

Amy

Crystie

Sally

Cynthia

Bobbie  (you are here)

Karin

LizE

Becky Pancake

Karin G.

Ana

Wendy

Mary H.

Jasvanti

Echoes of Gee's Bend -- February's She Made/She Made Reveal

Back in October, when I was doing a show in Northport, Alabama, I had the great fortune of reconnecting with the wonderful Therese Frank, who was at the show to visit, shop, and generally spread good cheer. After some shopping, she came back to my booth, handed me a little wrapped bundle, and said, "I just found a bunch of these, and I'm going to open the February She Made/She Made challenge to some extra people.  Wanna play?"  Well, heck yes, I wanna play!

What I found in the little bundle was this lovely, soulful little face, with the most wonderful expression imaginable. Doesn't she just look like she's been around long enough to have the world's wisdom in her heart, and the joy of life bubbling through her smile?

I lived in Alabama for fourteen years, and I got to know and to work with a number of fantastic folk artists from the region.  This little face felt like an embodiment and distillation of some of the African American artists whose work I came to know, particularly the women of Gee's Bend.
Gee's Bend, Alabama is an incredibly remote, tiny little town on a spit of land virtually surrounded by the Alabama River. The town is on land that used to be a cotton plantation, and the 750 or so people who still live there are descendants of the slaves that used to work there. The women of Gee's Bend have, for generations, made quilts from scraps of fabric that they had access to -- old flour sacks, worn out jeans, textiles ends from a nearby factory that upholstered furniture for Sears -- anything they could lay their hands on.

my inspiration quilt

These folk quilts were discovered by collectors and museum curators, and in the past decade or so, collections of the quilts have been shown at major museums around the country.  I saw an exhibition of them here in Louisville several years ago.  The lines are not necessarily straight, and the fabric mix is unorthodox, but the stitching is precise, the patterns are full of energy, and you can almost feel the love and pride each quilter put into a piece radiating from it. Their work is in museums and private collections, and the quilters are still active as the Gee's Bend Collective.

So, in tribute to the incredible ladies of Gee's Bend, I wanted to make my own quilt around the clay face, inspired particularly by the quilt above.

Using Tilas, seed beads, bugles, and a whole lot of improvisation, I created this bracelet, Echoes of Gee's Bend. I tried to mimic the blocks of bordering fabric that surround the squares of colors in the inspiration quilt.  I threw in a little bit of cream just like the quilter did.

I highly recommend that you check out the story and the work of the Pettways, the Youngs, the Bendolfs, and all of the other ladies of Gee's Bend here and here and here.  And you should also check out what the other participants in this She Made/She Made challenge have done with their clay faces.

Therese

Christine

Bobbie (you're here)

Hope

Shirley

Tanya

Cynthia

Alicia

Made Possible By Advil

Y'all, yesterday was one of those days.  What I thought was a mild headache when I woke up turned into something that felt like a small herd of elephants had taken up residence in my skull.

So even though I had planned on spending the day in close and meaningful communication with my beads, I spent it instead piled up on the bed, eagerly awaiting the next dose of Advil.

By the evening, I was able to move both body and head without muttering words that would have made my grandmother blush.  And of course, there's really no better therapy to feel better than to do something you love...so here's what came from my therapeutic beading last night.  Nothing terribly complex, but they made me happy -- I hope they bring a smile to you, too!

Better beading through pharmeceuticals, that's what it was...

The Voice From the Bead Display

So I'm walking through a bead show recently, when I hear this little voice saying, "Psst, hey lady, look over here!"

It was coming from these luscious little purple glass drops with impressionistic blooms of color on them.  They were sitting, inconspicuously waiting to lure me into dropping some dollars in their direction.

What? The beads never speak to you? I see you nodding your head, so don't even try to deny it.

Yes, they came home with me, and we had a lovely play date.  And this is what they told me they wanted to be when they grew up.

Thanks, Nancy, for the clasp, which was left over from the awesome bead soup you sent me!

Tilas Times Two (Say That A Few Times Fast!)

More results from my experiments with tila beads, again in bracelets.

This first one came from playing with creating the diamond shape.  I only had enough of the tiny crystals to make the section you see, which was too short to make a bracelet for anyone over the age of ten.  In another testament to the value of hoarding collecting beads, I found some larger firepolished beads that matched, to make it just long enough.  They really are the same color, but they have a slight AB finish, so it throws off the appearance in the photo.

The clasp is the first time I've fabricated a toggle, but it turned out better than it had any right to.

The second bracelet was a continuation of the courtship of the tila and the twin hole beads. 

I just noticed the honking long piece of fireline that's hanging out on one edge when I was uploading the pictures.  Dammit.  Time to get a stronger pair of reading glasses if I couldn't see that thing waving around without blowing it up to super size on the computer screen!