Humblebeads

I was one of the lucky buyers to snaffle up one of Heather Humblebead's Groupon-style vouchers a few months back. Here are some of the fab goodies I treated myself to. Can you tell what my favourite colour is...??! 

Heather is a fabulous artist. I'm only a recent 'convert' to polymer clay but I absolutely love it now. Heather is one of my favourite bead artists, full stop. I also adore Barbara of Floridity's work, particularly her cute birdies. 

Who are your favourite bead artists? Is there a medium you were unsure of that you've now come around to and if so, what made you change your mind? I'd love to know!

Cupcake Challenge

Here are the results of my muffin tin or cupcake (for me!) challenge.

The idea was to fill your muffin tin (or selection of cups in my case) with a selection of co-ordinating beads. Your job was then to make jewellery from the selected beads. No tricky bead decisions to make, just put them together in a pretty manner! 

I did a couple of switches after making up these cups - the central row, two furthest left. Bead choices made in the dark, when I checked again in the morning, they just didn't quite go....

I was surprised at just how much I liked this method of working - I'll definitely be using it again. There were quite a few benefits. 

1) I used quite a few beads that I'd been hoarding and either not been able to quite bring myself to use them, or hadn't been quite sure how to use them (such as the SummersStudios heart bead).

2) It was great way to focus on creating. On quite a few occasions, I was more than happy with exactly the beads I had selected and could see immediately how I wanted to them to go together. 

3) Putting all the pieces together has created a bit of a snapshot of my style and particularly my love of colour! And brilliantly, although there was a lot of turquoise (only to be expected where I'm concerned) I did branch out into some other colour schemes.

So I think I'll try working this way again - very productive and instructive.

Here's a collage of the art beads I used in some of these pieces. 

In no particular order, they are

turquoise egg and nest charm: Humblebeads

red heart ceramic charm: SummersStudioEtc

green polymer bird bead: Floridity

polymer roses: Elise Canning

purple willow teardrop charm: Humblebeads

lily pad patinated charm: MissFickleMedia

polymer egg charm: Humblebeads

red polka dot lampwork beads: BeadsByLaura

pink and purple lily bead: Humblebeads
Teardrop leaf clasp - DaisyChainDesigns
pale peach lamowork - Moogin

I also used hand dyed ribbon by Sowzere Designs but forgot to snap a close up. Photos not the best....the light was doing me no favours and I knew I had to get this post done quickly....looking forward to seeing what others have done!I've created:

4 pairs of earrings

1 necklace

1 pendant 

6 bracelets

Hurrah! A very productive few days. Thanks Heather!

Jade Wisdom, design process and a giveaway

The lovely Barbara of Floridity left me a comment on my last post saying that she does in fact take custom orders for her sweet owls. Hurrah! I was swithering over whether to sell this bracelet or not but I've decided now that I will put it in the shop at least as I know I can get more owls when I want need them. I made this bracelet in Skye a few weeks back and I absolutely love it - the colours for me are just perfect. Pyrite is one of my favourite stones to work with but it can be in danger of looking a bit gaudy - I think I've balanced it nicely here. 

I've been reading a lot recently about folks' design process which I admit totally fascinates me; Jamberry Song hosted a song based blog hop at the weekend and although a lot of beautiful jewellery was created based on one song the thing that interested me most about hopping was reading how different people approached designing. For this bracelet I did what I often do - pulled out an art bead or focal (Barbara's owl) 

and designed around that. The pyrite gives respite from and adds a richness to the vivid green and the green in turn softens the pyrite, blending it in with the patinated brass. A simple design I'm really pleased with!

Jade Wisdom is for sale here

So here's a question, and I'll open it up into a giveaway of beads and bits and bobs - how do you design? What's your starting point or is it different every time? Do you start with colour, theme or beads? I'm fascinated by the process behind the jewellery, I hope you will share yours with me!

Some new jewellery...

Today has been a really lovely Saturday; for once neither myself nor Helen have had any work on and no hen-do or similar to set off to! A miracle, quite frankly. We've caught up with some of our friends who we've not seen for a woefully long time (months....we're bad friends!) and then went down to one of our local pubs which has lovely old weather-beaten benches - perfect for snapping jewellery in the summer - and took some pictures. Some new pieces - like this sweet bracelet featuring Gaea Cannaday clay, Humblebeads and some beautiful gemstones from PreciousSparkleBeads in beautiful Perth - deep purple amethyst and some highly unusual (and gorgeous!) Cape Amethyst smooth rondelles. 

Purplicious

I also made another few bracelets using some Floridity owls which I have been hoarding - some of my favourites and I'm pretty sad that Barbara doesn't make them anymore :-) Here's one of them - similar to one I sold round about Christmas. I used one in a necklace recently and I've used another in a cool bracelet I haven't decided whether to keep or sell yet.....I will share it here later on in the week. 

Wee Hootie (the II!)

And of course, the day wouldn't be complete without a turquoise bracelet....

Turquoise Knots

Look at that delicious turquoise faceted round! I brought a strand back from Barcelona two years ago (two years! And I started this blog just after I got back from there. Can't believe it has been two whole years!). Love the mixture of gemstones and Czech beads I've used together here, perfectly complimented (I think!) by the Vintaj brass components. 

How's your weekend going? Sunshine with you? Fun plans? I hope so! x x x

BTW...plus update...

Ugh, I'm off work today with the lurgs....nasty throat (kind of a pain in the bum when you're a singer/singing teacher!), glands up and feeling generally spaced out and grotty. So I'm lying in my bed, watching crappy tv (and for crappy, read awesome 90s detective drama boxed sets....I do love some boxed set action) and thought I'd shoot a few quick pics for Bead Table Wednesday. I've recently discovered the wonders of Picnik and have been enjoying making some collages....so here's another. I've played around with a couple of filters as you can see too....

Pendant(back and front shown) by SwoonDimples

Czech glass beads from BeadandRibbon

And here is a small update....I've had a quick peak in between troughs and here are a couple of things I came up with using gorgeous components from Floridity....

A necklace (available now in my Etsy shop) and a wee bracelet - I want to work out how to hang the bracelet from my mannequin so for now you can only see the front....the back is a double length of chain from MissFickleMedia, sweet and simple. The necklace features Vintaj chain, sea moss Czech rondelles and a lovely fat Green Amethyst briolette from PreciousSparkleBeads. Green Amethyst is a really beautiful stone, such a delicate shade and it has a gorgeous clarity. 

What's on your bead table today?

Tired...

I'm really feeling the impact of going back to college and work all at once this week...I don't know if anyone else is the same but I can totally tell when I'm 'run down' tired, not just 'I've had a late night' tired. My mind starts getting a bit paranoid and I start worrying about every tiny wee thing. I can tell I'm doing it but that doesn't mean I can stop it! I also have full work days both tomorrow and Sunday and then of course my week is always full...I've a feeling something has to give; I can't continue with these mega-long days and still be well at the end of the month! I've been getting really bad headaches, bordering on migraines, which I'm pretty sure is a post-viral thing as I've had them before. 

Another thing that tells me I'm run down is that I just can't make anything. I sit with a load of beads and wire, and cart them around with me in the hope of snatching an hour somewhere in the day to sit down quietly with a cup of tea in the college refectory and make something....I can't quite explain this to folk who don't make things but you guys understand, right?? Nothing more frustrating than sitting down with some beads and not having the mental or creative energy to make a thing. Like tonight - I was scheduled to have a rehearsal 5-7 but my eyes were watering with a headache and I just knew I had to go home. My head cleared up by 8 and I sat in my bed, a bag of fabulous stash in front of me, and nothing happened...so frustrating. Somehow it feels like a waste! Does anyone else experience this too? What a whiny pain in the bum you must all be thinking, if you've made it this far in the post!!

The upshot of this is that I have no new photos to share...and as I've said before, a blog post just isn't a blog post without a photo! So I will share something from last month's creative spree with you.

Wee Hootie

Featuring a gorgeous owl bead from Barbara of Floridity and Second Surf and golden rutilated quartz. I keep saying how I don't generally like polymer and then keep finding big exceptions....like Barbara. I just adore her beads, especially her lovely bird beads. The owls are extra especially cute; I ordered some more as I sold this bracelet just before Christmas and they arrived a couple of days ago. Very exciting package to open! I should take some photos of them really - 4 little owls, 4 tiny pendants and a little coral birdie that Barbara snuck in. I love them - thank you Barbara! If you haven't visited her lovely shop or blog, I suggest you do, posthaste!

Well, hopefully you guys are all in a better creative and mental state than me - hope you all have great weekends ahead of you! x x x