New Pretties

I was lucky enough to go to a Bead And Gem Fair today. I had a wonderful time meeting up with some fellow OTTBS members. We had a fabulous swap meet and then hit the stalls.

Swapsies


New stash


Looking forward to tackling these beauties!

Happy beading!

Sarahx

Winter Light - Progress 1

While sorting out my stash on Monday, I came across a cuff blank that I had bought a while ago and forgotten about. I have never made a cuff so thought I would give it a go. I pulled out The Art of Bead Embroidery to see how I put the cuff together and off I went. I started with the lovely orphan lampwork bead and have used some of those lovely pearls too. It doesn't look like much yet, but am hoping it will improve!


Happy beading!

Sarahx

Winter Light - Stash Search

I really enjoyed the process of making Earth Song, both the new approach that I tried and blogging the progress, so I thought I would try it again. This time the theme that came to me as I searched through my stash was Winter Light.

Here are the results of my stash search, not quite as much as for Earth Song, but still plenty to inspire me, I think.


A close up of a few possible focal beads, including the gorgeous blue round from Lush Lampwork.


I was lucky enough to win this gorgeous sparkly selection of beads from Spellbound Beads for being featured in Bead Magazines Readers Challenge in the Winter Sparkle issue.


And finally, I am hoping to use these lovely pearls.


I tidied up my bead box while searching and discovered 2 packs of needles that I didn't know I had. I am usually desperate for needles, so it will be a nice change to not be down to my last one & hoping that I don't snap it before I get a new delivery.

Happy beading!

Sarahx

Earth Song Progress

The Jasper ovals called to me to be the focal pieces of Earth Song. I am embroidering them onto heavy interfacing with galvanised gold and matte bronze AB Miyuki seed beads. I think I have discarded the idea of freeform in this piece. Next step is to decide how to join them together.



Happy beading!

Sarahx

Earth Song - A Successful Search through Stash

This year I would like to make some more adventurous pieces than I have been doing recently, some of my favourite pieces have been bigger, multi stitch designs and I haven't done for a while as I have been concentrating on smaller and quicker pieces to build up stock in my Etsy shop. So this morning I picked up and flicked through Margie Deeb's Beader's Colour Palette, a book which always inspires me to want to try something a bit different.

As I put the book down and went stash diving, I kept hearing two words in my head, Earth Song, so decided that that would be the theme of my next piece. I must have a serious case of denial about my stash, because I can remember thinking that I wouldn't have much that would fit that theme. As you can see below, I was very wrong there!

I juts pulled out everything that I felt fit with the theme, as you can see I have quite a selection to choose from, semi precious, lampwork, crystals, Vintaj components and lots of seed beads.


Here is a closer shot of the lampwork, I don't remember who made what, but pretty sure at least some of them are by Debbie Dew & Ray Skene.


I am hoping to use these large ovals, they are so pretty!


Next job is to refine my choices and decide what stitches to use, I am thinking there may be a freeform element.

Happy beading!

Sarahx

A Bit of Stashbusting.

Those of you who also follow Operation Tackle That Bead Stash will already know about our stashbusting beadalong. A few of us from the OTTBS Facebook group have set goals to finish a project by Christmas and just by chance, we have all chosen Laura McCabe projects.

I have had Laura's Embellished Beadweaving for a while but have not made anything yet, so I have chosen her April Showers Necklace. I am not a big fan of working with size 15's but so far it is going okay. Here is a photo of my progress so far.



I am using fewer colours than Laura suggests, I am kind of making up that part as I go along, next up I need to make the Pagoda embellishments before Friday so that I can update my progress over on OTTBS.

Happy Beading!
Sarahx

Bubble Flower Earrings

Last weekend I made it my mission to bust my stash of Miyuki drop beads. These are one of my favourite types of beads, but I rarely use them for anything other than spiral ropes bracelets. I decided that it was time to rectify that and came up with this pretty textured flower earring design. They are so tactile. The tutorial is fairly easy t o follow, though I probably wouldn't recommend for an absolute beginner to beadwork as the work is pretty dense toward the end so someone new to beading may have difficulty with weaving in the ends.



Happy Beading!

Sarahx

My Summer of Rings - Stags Head

I have decided to focus on making and blogging about rings for the summer. I love rings, they are fun and fairly quick to make, you can go as over the top as you want with them and I do wear them quite a lot. I am aiming to make at least two rings a week while trying some new techniques and pushing my skills set.

I am not going to worry too much about wearability, instead I'm just going to have fun!

Everywhere I look lately I seem to see the Stags Head, on cushions, in cross stitch etc, so why not in beads?



I drafted the silhouette for square stitch, it was good practise for increasing and decreasing, the ring band is in 2 drop peyote.

Happy Beading!

Sarahx

Quick Project Idea - Teal Blossom Headband

I am growing out my hair at the moment and have been looking for ideas on how to dress it up a bit, particularly headbands. I wanted something right now though, so have been ransacking my craft supplies to come up with something that I could make myself. I found a length of black grosgrain ribbon and wondered how I could dress that up a little bit.

I eventually remembered that I had a spare teal blossom motif left over from when I was making up the kits and thought that would look pretty, so I gathered up some supplies. I used approx 42 inches of ribbon, a blossom motif, some size 11 seed beads and nymo beading thread.

I wanted my motif to be asymmetrical, so I measured 16 inches from one end of the ribbon and stitched on the motif using doubled nymo. I then back stitched on some seed beads for add emphasis.

And that was it, done! Easy peasy, now all I need to do is make sure I get my roots done before I take another close up of the barnet!

Happy Beading!

Sarahx

Challenges aplenty.

I was listening to episode 1 of the Bead Circle podcast earlier today and Mandi was interviewing Nancy Zellers. One of the things they discussed was participating in beading challenges/competitions in order to grow as a beader. As a member of Operation Tackle That Bead Stash, I participate in a monthly colour challenge and I know how fun it can be to work with a palette that you may not choose yourself, I thought that I may spread my wings a bit in the next few months and try a few other challenges and as if by magic, 2 came up in my blog feed today, so I thought I would post about them and have a little look around the web for any others I could find.

Ottbs April Moodboard Colour Challenge http://tacklethatbeadstash.blogspot.com/2011/04/april-moodboard.html

Art Bead Scene's April Monthly Challenge http://artbeadscene.blogspot.com/2011/04/april-monthly-challenge.html

Andrew Thornton's Weekly Word http://andrew-thornton.blogspot.com/2011/04/weekly-word-reflect.html

Bead Maven's Bead Soup Mixer http://beadmavens.blogspot.com/2011/04/bead-mavens-bead-soup-mixer.html

Margie & Me Colour Challenge http://labellajoya.blogspot.com/2011/04/margie-and-me-hollywood-glamour-and.html

I think that is probably enough to choose from right now! I am particularly drawn to Andrew's weekly word challenge as I find it harder to bead to a theme than colours, so I think that will challenge me more, I'm not promising anything mind as I am not even halfway through my OTTBS April challenge yet!

Happy beading!

Sarahx

My First Pattern for Sale!

I am very excited to announce that after many years of wanting to design patterns for sale, I have just listed my 1st one on Etsy!
http://www.etsy.com/listing/70723662/pdf-beading-tutorial-spring-blossom I am sure it won't be my last! It was a lot of fun to design and write the pattern, although the technical issues drove me nuts!

Happy beading!

Sarahx

Happy Valentines Day to Me!

The husbeast and I aren't very romantic but today we did have the day together while the small one was in school and popped to Cardiff. We had lunch in Jamie Olivers which I have been really wanting to go to, the queues are usually huge but today we were lucky!

I also popped into Crystals and Ice and bought some lovely new seed beads! I do have quite a stash already but lately I have been making lots of patterned peyote cuffs and really wanted to expand my colour palette. I'm especially loving the zingy chartreuse green on the end, I always seem to buy that colour at this time of year, I think it reminds me of spring!

Sarahx

In the mood for Purple & Gold.

The January moodboard challenge on OTTBS was purple and gold. Wonderful, I thought, no problem, I have loads of purple and gold seed beads in different sizes. I know, I thought, I'll make lots of lovely peyote circles, using gold for the outside beads and different purples on the inside and then I'll sew them all up and make a lovely necklace. Simple.

Well, it may not have escaped your notice that the piece above is not in fact a circular peyote necklace but a bracelet using netting and right angle weave. I sewed up one of the circles in the wrong colour order and because of the way I constructed it I couldn't rip it out without frogging the whole necklace! Grr!

I sulked for a week but finally bucked myself up and made this bracelet using metallic size 4mm firepolish beads and size 11 gold seed beads.

Thinking Ahead to Christmas.

I am currently in full on making mode as I have a jewellery party this Friday, a sale in my work's coffee shop and two craft fairs before Christmas. I have quite a lot of stock already but it's always nice to have new stuff.

I made this bracelet using some of the lovely chunky, black and silver beads that I bought at the fair last week. I think it's perfect for the party season.


I had a few beads left over, so I made this trapeze style chain necklace.



While I was working, my 6 year old son asked if he could do some wirework! So I cut up some lengths of copper wire, handed him a pair of round nose pliers and he dug through his bead box (yes, he has his own) and he decided to make some Christmas decorations for the tree. I think he did a pretty good job as I did not tell him what to do (other than not to poke himself in the eye with the wire) but left him alone to freestyle.

Sarahx

The Welsh Bead Fair.

Well, I know I am supposed to be tackling the bead stash, but bead fairs don't come around that often here and I have got a lot of events to show at before Christmas, so I needed new stock, honest ;-)

The Welsh Bead Fair was held today st the Village Hotel in Cardiff and I was lucky enough to meet up with an online beading buddy, the lovely CraftyCarol. The event is quite small but enough to do some damage at, I purposefully left the plastic at home. The only thing I was disappointed at was the lack of chains and sterling silver findings but I did keep some of my budget back so I can stock up online this week.I left my camera at home so could not take photo's at the fair but I thought you might like to see the goodies I brought home.

First up are these lovely ceramic beads from Moon Beads,


I bought some beautiful and funky focal beads from The Beads Nest,


The stall I did most damage to my Budget at was Anita's Beads, I got some fabulous glass pearls,



Some lovely glass including some honkingly big black rondelles,


More glass beads and some fantastic pendants,

These beautiful lampwork beads are from Debbie Dew,

I tried to contain the seed bead buying but could not resist these three tubes,

And last but not least are two Stringing magazines and a fabulous book by Laura McCabe.

That lot should keep busy for a while!

Happy Sunday everyone!

Sarahx