My Beads Arrived!

Actually - My beads have been in the post office while I was in Chicago with my daughter and son-in-law.  Today it was a wonderful surprise to receive them and see all the goodies.  Look at that flower - it's a button and it's going to make a great closure.  And the colors - Whoa, what a great combination....I'd of never thought of it, but I love it! 

When I wrote to Raida about how much I love this set I had to tell her that my Grandfather grew sunflowers in the yard.  I didn't explain that he loved the birds and sunflower seeds and every year we'd cook and salt them and then dry them in the oven.   He'd keep unsalted ones for the birds and we'd nosh on the cooked ones all winter ourselves.

This is the soup I sent to Raida.  She said she felt "spoiled".  Frankly, I think we both do!  I sure hope I can do her beads justice and don't forget - We'll be having that Blog Hop on July 28th so you'll be able to see what Raida and I did with our exchange.

Bead Soup Blog Party

I can hardly believe it’s been so long since the last Bead Soup Blog Party.  This time Lori Anderson put together a list of 400 participants and 3 separate reveal dates.  My reveal date is July 28^th.

This time around my partner is Raida Disbrow of Havanna Beads.  I’m jealous – Raida lives in beautiful Florida and I live in beautiful Michigan.  Except for the seasonal stuff/ uh, snow! We’ve been exchanging emails and getting to know one another.   It’s good to be able to communicate a head of time – You wouldn’t want to send green beads to someone who absolutely hates green, would you? 

This is information I pulled from Raida's profile I thought you'd enjoy and the two photos are from her Etsy site - Gentle Wind Designs: "My name is Raida Disbrow and I live in beautiful Stuart, Florida. I have been making creative items my entire life. Several of my lampwork beads and jewelry designs have been published in Step by Step Wire, Beads 2011, and Bead Trends Magazines. I love to create unique lampwork glass and ceramic pieces for others to enjoy and create with."  Already we have so much in common since we both work in metal, glass, and ceramics.

I’ve been playing at the torch and getting just the right combination together to surprise Raida now that I understand her likes and dislikes.  She’s a very open artist and easy to talk to.  I’m just a little afraid my request was a bit of a shocker for her.  You see although I create holiday themed beads I rarely work with any and I asked if she might include those in her Bead Soup Mix.  It is challenging to me since it is definitely not my usual fare but I’m hoping I can really do this justice.  Now what kind of holiday beads (there are lots of holidays you know) I’ll leave the exact nature of those beads up to Raida.  I hope she doesn’t think I’m too crazy.

Hopefully, my bead soup will be ready to send on Monday/Tuesday – My plan is to work diligently on it over this heat spell.  It is one of the areas I truly luck out in.  My torch is in the dungeon (basement) and my home is blissfully air conditioned.  Since I don’t plan on any long trips in this heat wave, except maybe the beach, I’m hoping my early reveal date will keep me moving.

Saturday Night Beader and Bead Dreams

Saturday nights at Bead and Button used to be reserved for the ISGB party.  The Glass Bead Guild would have a drink and dessert bar gathering in the Polaris room at the Hyatt.  Alas, they have abandoned that get together.

That get together was where I met Mallory Hoffman several years ago.  She was at the next table and I overheard someone refer to her as Rosebud – her nickname – and I just had to introduce myself.  We’ve been friends ever since. 

Mallory suggested a fun replacement for Saturday night – Lori Anderson’s Bead Soup Blog Party Dinner at the Doubletree.  Lori had been planning it on Facebook (unfortunately I haven’t been available on Facebook lately and missed it.) She had made all of these great arrangements with a little help from her friends (do you hear a song there?)  For a salad bar dinner and round table for all of us “anonymous” Bead Soup participants.  By anonymous I mean we might know one another by our blog handles or via .  Facebook but most of us have never met in person.

There must have been 30 or so of us there at the dinner – who knew we were all at Bead and Button!

I was able to meet Heather Powers – someone I have long admired – not only for her beautiful work but for her extraordinary blogs.  Cassie Donlen was there, Lorelei Eurto, and Marianne of MAKU Studio too.  Whoopee that Raku heart with the nails in it is beautiful.  So much talent and so little time to get to everyone.

There were gifts from Lori (from her personal stash) a few fun games and conversation.  What a great time and all courtesy of Lori Anderson, Bead Soup maven and all around wonderful person.  Thanks Lori – for ALL that you do.

These are someof the photos I was able to take of the Bead Dreams competition at Bead and Button.  I didn't get many because they were in glass cases that reflect easily but I think you'll see the quality of the beautiful work there.  I tried to get the artists name in where I could.  Enjoy!

Bead Soup Sale

I was supposed to get these earring listed on Monday and the past couple of days have just gotten away from me as I'm been rolling beads and glazing little things.

I've posted them on Etsy at the bargain price of $23.95. They're light on the ear but still tend to make a statement. Just over two inches in length from top to bottom and the disc is 1" round.

Back to the bead making....

Finishing Your Disc Earrings

On to the front of my BSBP earrings. Here is where you can go wild. You can finish your earrings off with a stamped piece of metal on the front (such as a round) – or just about anything that will cover the earring nut. In the case of these earrings I wanted to use the wonderful butterflies I was given. To do this I needed to make a loop to hold the butterfly charm in place. I wanted it in front of the earring nut and to swing freely.

Since I always want the earrings to hang at the same height I measure and mark where I’m going to bend the earring wire. You can also see in these photos where I have bent the catch in the back.

Bend the earring wire with bail forming pliers or across a dowel (ink pen, etc.) at your lines. Put the wire under the catch and adjust as necessary. Trim your wire. I usually go about 3/8” – ½” below the catch. File or use a cup burr on your trimmed ends, polish, and antique.

I hope you enjoyed how I made these earrings. The discs are ceramic and very light weight. And from the butterfly hang some nice pearls and antique glass beads. Now that the BSBP is over I’ll be putting these up for sale on Etsy, with special pricing. Look for the listing on Monday if you are interested. And be sure to make a bunch for yourself – I wouldn’t have put this tutorial on the web site if you couldn’t feel free to use it. Enjoy!

Disc Earring Tutorial

This is the first part of the tutorial for making the disc earrings. To make these earrings I used:

Round Nose Pliers
Chain Nose Pliers
Bail Pliers/you can use a 3/8" dowel.
19 gauge full hard sterling silver wire
Files /or a cup burr tool for the earring wire ends
Decorations to hang from your earrings
Discs with a hole of 3mm
White Rubber Earring Nuts.



Bend your wire at a 90 degree angle. Grasp with your round nose pliers and make your first spiral.



Change to your chain nose pliers and grasp the wire as shown in the photo. Spiral your wire around several times tightly. Note: For each earring since I wanted the backs to be a mirror image of one another I spirled each wire coil in the opposite direction. Also, I am using full hard wire - this wire is not easy to bend - this helps the earring keep it's intended shape. You can use a soft wire but then you will have to hammer or harden you earring wire when you get to that point.



This is the secret I alluded to when I was writing about the Bead Soup Party. If you purchase or create a disc with approximately a 3mm hole. Into that hole you wedge (and it wil fit very tightly, they should fit tightly or or use a different size nut) a rubber earring nut. These nuts are the type you purchase to keep your french hook earrings from getting nudged out of your ears. That always seems to happen with me when I'm wearing my favorite coat.

Tomorrow I'll continue on with this tutorial and we'll finish off these earrings. It's a very useful way to make these types of earrings if you want the disc to remain in a specific position and centered in your design.

Enjoy!

A Little More Necklace Symbolism

Yesterday I talked about the process for the Talisman of the necklace. To me it makes even more sense when you consider it with the necklace top.

A speckled ceramic bead seemed, at first, to round out the top of the design…but as these things go one new addition leads to the thought of the next. Speckled? – why that brings to mind a bird. A perfect possible addition to the large ring I was sent.


My usual bird of choice is the Raven. A Raven did not seem to suit my theme but I knew what would. Again, I am a Michigander (LOL – don’t you just love that unique reference to my state of origin?). Robin’s are our state bird. But, better yet, they are a very spiritual bird. Native Plains Tribes attribute the return of the sun (the inception of Spring) with Robins. Now if that isn’t how I feel when the first robin of Spring shows up around here nothing is. Omaha Tribes believed the sun rose and set on the wings of the Robin. Iroquois and Shoshone lore indicates that the white ring around the Robin’s eye was a symbol of prophetic vision, clarity and great wisdom. Yup, that’s me! (wink, wink).

Now that I have the bird – what about the feather? Well, hell yes feathers. I pick feathers up all over the place…my grandfather and I used to do that in the yard. I have them tucked here and there around the house so finding some evening winter was easy. They represent new beginnings to the Celtic. It invokes the sky god. In Christianity feathers represent the three virtues and there are many rings and signs with three feathers for faith, charity, and hope. Dreaming of feathers can represent a desire to move more freely in life. Again, for me, all of the above struck a definite heart string. I stacked three symbolic feathers together for extra strength before I began the tether for them.


And all of that brought me back around to the leaf and the general theme of what I was doing. Another look at the top of the necklace brought about the solution. The leaf, the tree, the branch. I work with sticks quite a bit. I cast them into silver all of the time. This wasn’t the place for a cast branch. My branches are in a small wash tub on top of my bead stashes. Perfect! An oak twig. Robin’s make their nests in the oak trees around the yard. The oak in the yard I grew up in takes three people to circle…all kind of like the red wool thread. It’s all interrelated – past, present, future.

Thank You Lori – It’s like Bead Soup was my own little personal coming back party and thank you Rebecca for providing the stimulus for the fruitfulness of all of it.

Don't forget - coming up in the next posts: Where to find your personal symbolism/and tailsman meanings. Plus, a tutorial on how to make the Bead Soup disc earrings and how to do that without the discs slopping around. And, "New Work Wednesday".

Still Bead Soup Blog Hopping...

Bead Soup is great stuff! The copper leaf is what immediately struck my fancy and since I know how to fold form I decided to put a little twist to it. It spoke to me of a natural theme and so it grew. First with the ceramic quote I made from William Blake, “Art is the tree of life…”

Once those two pieces were together it began to have a talisman kind of look – and sound. As you walk or move the ceramic and copper make a gentle sound as they move against one another. That is why I began working on a “Natural Talisman” – something that speaks to me softly but succinctly. An initial drawing was made and I kept it rough so it wouldn’t confine any further ideas.


We had large copper mines in the Upper Penninsula of Michigan – copper made sense as a metal to use thoughout.
Second, I have a bit of Sari silk here (another natural product) so I pulled that out. That is where I hit my first design snag. I had pulled out pearls to go with the beautiful bits and goodies and the icy blue of the cat’s eyes that Rebecca had sent. My stash contained not one blue strand of silk in the correct color range….crap! I pulled the blue from the soup and will save it for another piece. In went green and gold. Out came the color wheel. Best color choices according to that – Gold is a tint of yellow orange, so it seems logical we could use kind of a triadic color scheme (add greens/bluish greens and possible touches of reddish purple/purple). Yikes, not much natural coloring there but what the heck. I didn’t want to do all browns.You remember the soup - what my bead soup partner – Rebecca Sirevaag sent me (It’s pictured in the last post and was full of this wonderful icy blue).

So on to the talismans. I had the natural earthy browns - plus silk, copper, pearls, earthenware clay, and glass. That’s when the search began in earnest between design and spiritual meaning. Who knew I wanted back on this designing bike so much….


What to hang the possible talisman from came next and it came easily. I’m Irish and Russian, what a combo. Irish waxed linen. What I have seemed thin and not complicated enough to hold a large talisman so I braided several strands right on to the lovely toggle clasp in my soup.

From there I continued the theme. If it was going to be red or reddish purple it needed to be natural and have meaning. Ah ha, I have some felting wool tucked away and a red wool strand would work. The Kabbalah says a thin red wool string will ward off misfortune brought about by the evil eye. The Chinese belief is that a there is an invisible red thread that connects each of us to those who have been, are currently, or will be in the future important in our lives. I had mixed wool roving and worked up a strand of mixed red and purple.

Tomorrow I will post more about this necklace and some photos of other pieces that were inspired by the soup mix. I hope you’ll join me again.

Back to my blog hopping….the link yesterday’s post is interactive and contains a link to all of the BSBP participants. Enjoy the eye candy and be sure to say Hello and leave a comment. I know everyone will enjoy hearing from you too.

It's Finally Here! - Bead Soup Blog Hop.

Welcome to the Fifth Bead Soup Blog Hop and what I’m turning into “Bead Soup Week”. I decided as I created these pieces that there were many things to talk about while creating them. Everything from a tutorial on how to make those earrings without having your discs slop around to using the symbolism of various objects to your designing advantage. It will be a full week so I hope you’ll hop back here again.

Besides posting all of these photos of what I created I’d also like to introduce my partner in this challenge Rebecca Sirevaag . She sent me some wonderful pieces to work with. I so loved the colors she sent but when I couldn’t find matching additions in my stash I had to drop one of the colors (that beautiful ice blue) and find a different route. (You can hop on over to Becca's blog to see what she made with the stash I sent her.)

From Rebecca’s soup I had plenty to work with despite dropping the blue from the palette. I used the copper stamped leaf, the butterflies went into the earrings, almost all of the brown beads and spacers, all three of the copper beads (two in the smaller necklace, which is meant to wear alone or as a duel piece with the longer necklace and a different one in the large necklace), plus the toggle, and the gold aventurine discs.

To Rebecca’s stash I added a ton of miscellaneous items and went wild. It was her copper leaf that sent me on this earthy combination full of symbolism. You can see the silk, the linen thread, feathers, pearls, seed beads, and several ceramic pieces I made for this piece, my lampwork bird, and many others.

I’m not going to go into what possessed me to go in this direction or what it all means. I’ll save all of that and several close-ups of how I put it together for tomorrow. For now, enjoy the hopping around this list from the Fifth Blog Hop and don’t forget to leave a note or two along the way. Just click below and it will take you to the list. Have Fun.

Lori Anderson's Fifth Bead Soup Blog Hop

Soup's Cooking

It’s the big count down for Bead Soup Blog Hop – One week to go – I’m working like mad on my pieces. Since I don’t do much finished work anymore it’s been a challenge to put my ducks in a row. So what can you expect me to put with Rebecca’s great soup she sent me?

The photo is of waxed linen I used in addition to my bead soup stash…..if you want to know what I did with it you will have to tune in to this blog next Saturday, March 3rd for the big Blog Hop. It’s going to include some awesome eye candy.

Starting on next Saturday I’m going to make it a Bead Soup Week. After the initial hop post I’m going to spend the rest of week talking tutorials, close-ups, design reasoning behind the necklace I created, new internet resources, and some of my blog hop favorites. It’s going to be a whopper of a week to start off March!