EtsyBloggers Blog Carnival: Summer Colors

One of the topics for this past week's blog carnival was summer colors (yep, I'm a couple days late, but only because I've had so much other stuff scheduled here).  Of course I couldn't pass up an opportunity to talk about color.  This topic also fits in perfectly with the July EBW Challenge theme, which is sizzling sunshine and soothing water.  You can read more about it here.  Yep, I just finished and listed my June piece and I'm already thinking about July.  That's how it goes with these challenges!

I took my time ordering beads for this challenge because I was having trouble tracking down some seashell or fish beads.  I had it in my head that I wanted some really sea tiny beads for part of the embellishment and just couldn't find what I wanted that was in my price range and was in a color palette that fit my piece.  I was going to order some seed beads from Shannon at beadsandbabble anyway, so on a whim, I searched shell beads there.  As you can see from the results, that's what I should have done in the first place.  It was so hard to pick, but I finally settled on this set.

They're a little bigger than my original vision, but that's okay.  I am still not entirely sure how I'm going to structure the embellishment for this piece, but it will have a R.A.W. base that represents sand with the water, shells, and sun layered over it.  Sand is not a requirement for the challenge piece, but I'm a huge fan of sand dunes so I had to include sand in my piece.

I'll be supplementing this new stash with some seed beads in my current collection, but you can get a pretty good idea of the color palette.

In general, I definitely think of bright colors when I think of summer.  Yellow always comes to mind because of the sun.  I'm still stuck on green from the spring and haven't made any new pieces specifically for summer yet.  As I mentioned last week, I will be making some Fourth of July pieces during the next few weeks.  For now, here are some summery pieces from my shop.  Click on the photos to go to the listings.