No matter how I start...this is how I end up

Be Jealous Again

If you've never taken a class from Richard Salley or Martina Stein, you should!  I just spent 3 wonderful days with these two fabulous artists.  I learned a lot, laughed a lot, went home with a loot of new goods made and lots of tips and tricks.  These two know their stuff!

Bead Soup Blog Party Reveal

I can't thank Sabrina Straub enough for the gorgeous beads and other goodies she sent me.  It would be pretty impossible to make anything ugly with them because they are so beautiful.

So, here's what I started with:

And here's what I created with them!

First, the lampwork beads are so beautiful that I really wanted them to stand out and not be cluttered with much of anything else.  So, I made an enameled cuff.  First I cut a copper sheet, ran it through my rolling mill to give it a design, and formed it into a cuff.   Then I torch-fired black enamel onto it, added some little green glass beads I've had for a couple of years, and made a torch-fired enamel headpin to anchor the focal bead onto the cuff.  

Next I decided to go for a bit more elegance.  I did a simple stringing using sterling copper tube beads and black onyx beads that I already had along with one of the gorgeous focal beads Sabrina made, two black lampwork beads that she made, some lovely sterling wire beads she sent in my goodie pouch, and the very cool washer closure she sent.   

This is now my little black dress necklace.  

The last piece I made was inspired by this photo that I took several years ago at the Antique Rose Emporium in Brenham, Texas.  I love this photo so much that it has inspired the color theme in my kitchen.  That's right...I have lime green walls and an eggplant ceiling.  When I saw Sabrina's beautiful green beads, I knew I had to do at least one piece with purple.

From Sabrina's bead soup I used black leather cording, the wonderful lava rock beads, and of course the gorgeous lampwork focal.

From my own stash of things I had previously made that were awaiting a spark of creativity...purple paper beads (using a brown paper bag as my base, I painted and decorated the paper used to create the beads)...a piece of purple quartz that I wrapped with copper foil and soldered on a jump ring...green and purple beads enameled by me...one lampwork bead previously purchased from a local beader (too long ago to remember where it came from) attached with an enameled headpin I made...a few ceramic glazed beads that my son brought to me from China.

I created a slide from copper wire and enameled it for my closure.  Thank you Barbara Lewis for sharing this technique on Ning!

I loved participating in my first bead soup.  Thank you Lori, for all the work that goes into this.  Thank you Sabrina, for the beads that made my heart melt.  Thank you anyone who is hopping!

Now, here's my attempt at putting in the linky tool thing.  Hope it works.

Happy Hopping!

http://www.linkytools.com/thumbnail_linky_include.aspx?id=132965

Be Jealous

I'm spending 3 days with Richard Salley and Martina Stein in an absolutely awesome workshop.  Here's what I made in day one!  Don't look too closely at my bezel cups...they were my first try and I obviously need practice.  I'll get some fine tuning today from the experts.

Barbara Lewis Blogspot Offering

Head over to Barbara Lewis's blog to register to win a spot on her upcoming online workshop.  Barbara is a master torch-fire enameler, teacher, and author of the fabulous book Torch Fired Enamel Jewelry - Painting with Fire.

http://www.paintingwithfireartwear.blogspot.com/

She has a really cool ecourse studio walkthru.  You will love her set up!

Here are few photos of some of her work I love.

Hammered Hearts

Just having a bit of fun with hearts in the studio today.  Happy Valentines Day!

Dreaming of Snow

Beth Millner posted a video on Barbara Lewis's paintingwithfire.ning.com blog of how to do this, so I gave it a try.  Fun fun fun!

Mid week ramblings

No photos yet...don't want to spoil the surprise, but what a wonderful time I have had creating with Sabrina's sweet beads.

Made my very first sale on Etsy this week.  My verdigris patina dragonfly flew away today.  Thank you, Tiffany!

Got a publishing date on my Belle Armoire article.  It will be in their summer issue.  Maybe this will help me welcome summer this year instead of dreading the heat.

Happy jewelry making to you all!

Sabrina sent Sweeeet Beads

My BSBP package arrived today and I was thrilled to find so many lovely items.  The first little bag held lovely silver plated beads and a very very cool clasp from Beadbox.  Next came some wonderfully textured black lava beads from Bali-Beads.  I have never seen lava beads before and I'm thinking hot hot hot - and how appropriate for a torch lover!  Love them.  There were a couple of other little bags with findings and a nice tassel.  The very best package was the one of beads that my partner Sabrina made herself.  Oh my.  What a fabulous lampwork artist she is.  I have never seen such beautiful precision.  I was working with low light when I took these photos.  I'll try to get some better close-ups of these jewels over the weekend.  Please excuse me.  I need to go drool over my beads!  Thank you, Sabrina.

Look at the detail and precision in these beads!  WOW!

In the mail

Here's a sneak peek of the package that will be on its way to my Bead Soup blog party partner tomorrow.  I had so much fun putting this together.  Hope she likes it!

Bead Soup Blog Partner

I'm so excited to be part of the Bead Soup Blog Party.  I got paired with a great lampwork artist from Switzerland named Sabrina Staub. Here are some photos from her blog of some of the beautiful beads she has made.

Aren't these just gorgeous!  They look like ceramic glazes but they are lampwork.  I need to go to Switzerland to take a class from Sabrina!  Here are some more beauties.

Wow!  I've got to get busy this weekend picking out just the right beads to send to her.

Here's a link to her site.  She's even translated lots of it into English.
http://sabrinas-glasswork.blogspot.com/

My very first blog post

Well, it took a bead soup party to get me blogging.  I've had Lori Anderson's bead soup party registration on my calendar for a couple of months.  This morning when I signed on to register I saw that having a blog was a requirement...so here I am.  I guess that gives you some idea how addicted I am to making jewelry.  The bead soup party sounds like so much fun.  I can't wait to get started making and selecting beads to send to whomever I am paired with.