Tag: bead soup blog party

Bead Soup Blog Party Reveal!

Bead Soup Focal Bead Piece

I admit when Sam, my partner, sent me the focal I was not sure what to do with it. It’s way more freeform than what I work with. I tend to make very graphic, straightforward beads and my designs tend to go from those. I asked my much trendier kiddo what she thought of the bead and she was surprised I hadn’t seen it was obviously a sea bead and needed a lovely sea treasure theme. I decided to go with that and wired up a very simple chain necklace with a few of the pale stone nuggets from the bead soup to go along with the pendant. I added a handful of tiny turquoise rounds here and there.

If I end up taking this apart and redoing it, as happens a lot with my more complicated jewellery, I’ll do a little fuller multi-strand piece I think. The barrel orientation of the focal had me flummoxed but I’m catching on. You could go full shipwreck treasure with this bead.

Bead Soup Necklace in Action

I convinced Chloe to model the necklace for me. She made the suggestions for the design that I eventually went with so it was only fair. The very serious face lead to me telling her to smile which got me the frowny face and then, finally, the smiley one. Thus is life with family modeling my stuff.

I am posting this Friday night my time with just the one piece. There were a few other pieces from the accent beads on my studio table half done and, if I make it to the shop on Saturday, I’ll finish a few others up and add them to this post. In particular I want to turn the quartz nuggets into earrings at least.

You can get a look at what Sam Waghorn, my partner in the Bead Soup Blog Party this year, made on her blog or maybe her Facebook. Want to see the other blog hoppers? The whole list is on Lori’s Pretty Things blog.

Bead Soup, Bead Hoarder’s Edition

Pretty Packages

I have to preface this with just how ridiculously tired of this winter season I am. I have caught every cold that went by and it has slowed me down. They’ve none of them been serious but for someone who doesn’t have allergies… I am much better friends with tissue and decongestants than I ever wanted to be! Sheesh.

What this means is that Sam’s cutely wrapped package arrived from over the pond at some point last week, our fabulous mail person put it in the shop’s box and then… I didn’t even look for days. So! There were adorable beads in my mail and I didn’t even know it. How very sad is that?

The Hoarded Bead Bead Soup

I quickly remedied that issue and found lovely, shiny beads. Fun glass and stone. There’s a pretty sort of free form focal bead – the hoarded bead in this case! – by Lorna Johnston of Pink Blue Sky.

I can cheerfully say I have no idea what I’ll make yet but I have ideas. The kind of creative and dangerous types. The blog hop and reveal of everyone’s lovelies is slated for March 25th. If I’m on the ball I’ll set it to auto-post for midnight.

And I get to share what I sent along to Sam, my partner, since she’s just let me know it arrived! Glass flowers from Fran Davis of Dragonfire Studio, lampwork from Cheryl Harris, and a last, hoarded bead from a previous swap mate – Michaela Pabeschitz. I poured a lot of soup.

My Soup

The Bead Soup is Back

A few years ago I participated (several times actually!) in Lori Anderson’s Bead Soup Blog Party and when I found there would be another one this year I signed me right up. I found out I got Sam Waghorn, of Pale Moon Creations, for my swap partner. Sam is much more on the ball than I am and regularly posts delightful things on her blog and Facebook page.

Part of the whole bead swap process is posting a really artsy teaser of what you’ve sent your partner so I took a photo of the little monsters I’d rounded up from my hoard (my horde of hoards?) before they rolled away again and photoshopped it. Sometimes the weirder filters in there come in handy.

Bead Soup Blog Party Teaser

This is to be the bead hoarder edition of the bead soup blog hop so I made sure to tuck in a couple beads I have from over the years that I love but for some reason or the other have not used. Before I really settled down and started cranking out masses of my own beads I bought many more focal or fancy other beads. I still do when I go places: buy local rocks, local artisan lampwork if I find it. Or do swaps and trades.