Seascape -- revised!

I finished the rework last night.



Adding the fringe took about 4 hours, but I think the results are well worth it!

While I was working on this I was thinking about some new ideas to finishing a piece I've been working on for about a year now....I may have finally figured out how to finish up the piece I call Let the River Run. That will probably be the next piece I work on -- after this long, I'd like to get it off the "to do" list!

another piece finished

As a result of my taking a day on Sunday to play, I have this lovely piece of jewelry complete.

Using the two new techniques I taught myself, I finished up this piece last night.

The stone is a really nice piece of mahogany tiger eye (it measures about 3/4 inch in diameter), and the "chain" is all worked in size 11 delicas using Right Angle Weave (aka: RAW).

The RAW is the most amazing stitch. Most of the instructions have you actually working around and around, but I just couldn't "get it" that way, so I did a flat piece the size I wanted the outside to be then "zipped" it by working the last row between the two edges of the flat piece. In a way the structure reminds me of when we would use those 4 pieces of plastic to "weave" lanyards when we were kids (it is based on 4 beads -- thus the Right Angle name), but it moves and flows like some of those serpentine chains...a very interesting feel.

I'm sure I'll be doing more with this stitch!


Meantime, I've decided to rework a piece that I've had for a while.

I originally did this piece in 2003, and it was the first one where I started thinking about beads as a painting medium, as well as the first one that really was a multi media piece.

At the show in Springfield it got a lot of looks, but I think the main issue is that it looks unfinished.

For one thing, its not quite square, and for another, I think it can be improved with some sea themed fringe.

I've pulled out a lot of blue/green materials and some shaped beads and we'll see where this all goes.

teaching the old dog new tricks.....

Usually when I work on projects that I'm going to sell, I don't take time to teach myself new stitches.

Since I have just acquired some new materials that I want to put into designs that don't have something behind them (because I want the light to shine through), I figured it was worth while to learn a couple of new things.

For a while I had been trying to figure out how to put a "bezel" or frame around a stone without attaching it to a backing, and yesterday morning I found an instruction on the web to do this.

This is the front of the tiger eye cab......


and this is the back!

Way cool!!!

From here this could be attached into a larger woven piece, or it could just have a bail and a cord.....



And this is the other technique I spent time on. This is called Right Angle Weave, and eventually I will be able to make this into a long tube that can be used as a cord for a necklace.

I still have several other techniques I want to learn, so I will be doing some more "play days" soon. Possibly next Sunday as I have requested books from the library and hope to pick up some more things from them......

new materials to work with

While I was in Springfield last weekend, one of the "sales" I made was to another artist.

She very much wanted a necklace that we had put together (a beautiful piece of pink tourmaline set in sterling silver), but hadn't done so well that she could justify the price.

Her question to me was would I trade some of her work for that piece.

Well, the answer was "yes indeed!!"

These are all pieces of her glass work. She makes some beautiful glass beads that she strings into wonderful pieces of jewelry, and she creates her own glass cabs to use for wirewrapping.

These pieces were what she had on her workbench that had not yet been used for jewelry and I might add that she let me go through an entire tray to pick out whatever pieces I liked.

She uses real silver in with her glass and that is part of what creates the amazing "swirly" look to the bigger pieces.

Now I just need to start working up some designs to use these in!

Another new necklace

I finished it last night, just in time to pack it up and take it with us to Springfield, MO for this coming weekend's Cider Fest on Walnut Street.

This is the first show I've done where I'm taking NO BEARS (nope, not even a little teeny one -- there are a couple of frogs in the tub tho' since those are covered with beads)

I admit to being a little nervous about that decision, but I am convinced because of our recent success with the bears that "Less IS More" when talking about art on the table.

We got the paperwork on where our booth will be and we were given what I believe to be a excellent location -- experience will tell on that front.