Pinwheel Challenge - jumping on the bandwagon

Lorelei threw down the gauntlet to her blog readers to enter her Jade Scott pinwheel challenge and if selected to receive one of the colourful enamelled components, create a piece of jewellery to be shown and shared today. Not to be deterred by the fact that I don't live in the USA, I decided to buy a pinwheel component and keep my fingers crossed that it would arrive on time for me to take part. And if it didn't, I would have a gorgeous new art bead to work with anyway!

available here

First things first, I had to work out what a pinwheel actually was....were they just the American term for windmills? My friend Heidi directed me here. Aha. The penny dropped....we do have these in the UK too, I have just never heard them being called pinwheels. Not sure I would have known what to call them before. But I do now!

I had such a great idea with what to do with the pinwheel as soon as I saw Lorelei's blog post (and I knew I wanted to try and get a red one if possible) but my initial plan did not pan out. The fun thing about these in real life is that they spin....I was sure that I could work out how to link it up to a couple of Vintaj blanks with rivets and jump rings, and get it to spin around on the back one. But no....I tried but I just couldn't get it to lie correctly. It kind of sagged....not such a good look! I still like my idea, and if Jade makes any again, I will buy another and definitely try again.

So that idea got junked. I knew I still wanted to capture the fun, child-like mood that the pinwheel creates, especially (for me), in vibrant red. I recently bought some natural yellow jade rondelles from LimaBeads and thought they would be perfect. But it needed some other colours to create more of a riot and less of a scary 'hazard' colour scheme....so I threw in a little lavender, turquoise, all on a bed of antique copper. I wonder whether I could have thrown in a little peach-y pink too but I left it without.

I wanted to use a mixture of shapes and sizes of beads, some chain, a couple of different knotted strands. Flowers, rondelles, rounds, teardrops, fancy daggers...I'm pretty pleased with how it turned out. I love how it feels in my hand and the chunky feel it has when worn. It jangles and moves, which is always a good thing for me. It is colourful and is a continuation of the colour challenge I have set myself this year - push the boundaries, don't play it safe anymore. Of course, you could just see it as an extension of my red/aqua obsession, but that's not how it started, honest! I'm a little bit in love with the two turquoise teardrops with that tiny red flower off to one side....you can't see it (red is such a bugger to photograph, don't you find?) but it is very detailed, with the impression of a tiny flower face on it.

Looking forward to seeing what the official challengees have come up with, and anyone else hitching a ride on the star-spangled bandwagon :-) Check these guys out

SABINE

KATE RICHBOURG

CHARLIE of ClaySpace

SHAWNA TOBIAS

LISA CONE

HEIDI of ExPostFacto

and of course,

Lorelei

I also recommend perusing Jade Scott's etsy shop. Even if there are no pinwheels right now, I guarantee there will be some gorgeous pretties in there, waiting to hit your cart ;-)