"What's Old is New Again" Art Beads design partners piece

Typically I complete my Art Beads pieces about three weeks after the themes are announced.  I got the initial e-mail for the spring theme at the very end of March and didn't complete my piece until this past Sunday.  The size for one of my bead sets was mislabeled on the Art Beads site.  It took a couple weeks to get a new set of something similar in the right size.  I've also been busy with custom orders (no complaints there!) and all of the moving and graduation stuff.  But I finished it and am really happy with the result.

The theme for the Art Beads design partners is "What's Old is New Again."  We were supposed to use any old or vintage inspired components with or without new components to create a brand new piece.  I didn't have any initial idea for the theme.  I started browsing the suggested site categories and came across these patina daggers in the glass beads category.  I'm sure that it's no surprise that I was immediately drawn to them.  I've been eying some similar ones in Shannon's shop for a while, but hadn't bought any yet.  This was the perfect opportunity to use them.  The whole set with orange, lime, turquoise, and purple reminded me of the 70's, which fit perfectly for this theme, so I decided to go with it.

Once I was set on the patinas, I hunted through my own bead stash for cube and seed beads in coordinating colors.  I supplied all of these myself, although three of the cube bead sets were ones that I'd purchased from Art Beads on my own.  You can see my sneak peak post about this here.  I filled in the patina daggers with orange, lime, and transparent green daggers.  I love the dagger beads on Art Beads, but as I've posted about here before, it's cheaper to buy them in bulk elsewhere.  Usually I get a few unusual designs from Art Beads and fill them in with bulk solid colors.

This is the first dagger bracelet that I've made with side fringe.  I used coordinating orange and lime pressed Czech glass beads, along with the seed beads, with the same technique that I use for my other skinny fringed/embellished bracelets.  If you want links for the specific Czech glass that I used in this piece, let me know.

Art Beads has several awesome triangle clasps in their clasp category.  I choose this one because it was vintage inspired and has the circles on it, which mirror the ones on the patinas.  Normally I would have used a button from my own collection, but we need two product categories for our pieces, so this was a perfect way to make that happen.

I decided to name the piece after That '70s Show.  I thought that this would be appropriate as I grew up in the 80's and got my inspiration for this retro color combination from my own generation's pop culture.

I love the way the colors came together in this piece.  I also love the side fringe.  I think that the size and shape of the beads that I chose worked really well as a little border.  I may experiment with similar fringe in the future.

It's available here.  I collected some new green daggers in the process of making this bracelet so I'm planning an all green dagger bracelet in the future.  That's the only dagger piece that I have in the works right now, but as always I'm open to other suggestions.

Disclosure - I received my ArtBead's products free of charge through their blogging program. I am honestly reviewing their products and have not been paid for my endorsement as it pertains to the products I received.

what's on the beading board this week

Check out this awesome set of Shannon's beads that I'm going to be using for a custom order this week.

If you'd like a set for yourself, they're available here.  I'll be branching out from my usual work and making a multistranded necklace and bracelet with them.  I'll have more details about that later this week.  The customer needs them by the 15th!

Also, if anyone's curious what's happening with my Art Beads blogging project, I finally got the last set of beads that I needed this past week.  Art Beads mislabeled the size on one of their dagger bead sets, and it took a couple weeks to get it straightened out.  I have this set now to finish out my daggers.  Obviously, I will finish the custom order first, but then I will finally start the actual beading for my Art Beads project.

in the works and other creative endeavors

I was very excited to get my Art Beads blogging package at the end of the week and start of my new piece this weekend.  Unfortunately, even though all of the daggers that I selected are supposed to be the same size, they're not.

I should have realized this when I looked at the picture for the green daggers.  Going back to it when I e-mailed the Art Beads coordinator, I could see it.  But the listing clearly states 15x6, and I believed that.  I might have enough daggers to complete the piece without those.  It doesn't change the fact that I was planning on using them, though, or that the listing is wrong.  I'm still waiting to hear back from Art Beads.

But the patina daggers are just as awesome, if not more so, than they look on the web site.  I'm still very excited for my piece.

Instead I've been working on my new neutral skinny fringed cuff.  I love this neutral partially metallic palette.  It's coming together even better than I'd hoped.  And I've picked out a metal button for the clasp.

Finally, I joined HubPages this weekend.  I'm planning to do a lot more with this once we've moved to Milwaukee and I'm not working full time.  But while we have a little uneventful time here before the graduation and moving craziness, I'm getting it started.  I'll mostly be writing about education/special education stuff as well as some DIY craft projects (most of which I've posted here before), recipes, travel, music, books, and anything else that inspires me.  I took new pictures of my process for making spinach calzones this weekend (Jake and I did photograph this a few years ago).

The calzone hub is up here.  Also, check out my first two hubs that I wrote yesterday: 10 Beadweaving Books to Check Out and Beaded Peyote Triangle Step by Step Instructions.

Art Beads sneak peak

The Art Beads blog design team got details this week about our newest challenge: "What's Old is New Again!"  Of course my mind immediately went to work because I can never resist placing my blog order with them as soon as possible.  I have a lot of the cube and seed beads that I need for my idea.

As you can see, I'm using an orange, lime green, turquoise, and purple color palette.  I'm actually going to substitute the purple cubes for some darker matte finish ones from Art Beads.  And yes, this is going to be another dagger piece.  I'm going to use the wasabi and orange daggers on the right as well as some transparent green and patina daggers that I'm ordering.

Some of you may remember that I made a dagger piece for the last Art Bead challenge.  The color palette and theme will be totally different for this.  I'm also going to add some side embellishment and substitute a metal clasp for my typical button clasp.  Yep, I have about a couple hundred vintage buttons in my own collection and could easily pick out something awesome, but we need 2 main product categories for our piece so the metal clasp is a perfect way to make that happen.  I found a neat retro one.  I love how it has the circles in it, which will coordinate perfectly with the patina daggers.  I won't have any true vintage components, but I will have vintage inspired components, which is okay for this challenge, and the piece will have a definite retro feel.

I should have my order within the next week and will have more news about this piece soon.

winter Art Beads piece

For the winter Art Beads piece for the design partner program, we were allowed to choose any components that we wanted from the Art Beads site for a winter piece.  An idea came to mind for a winter piece about 24 hours after I got my e-mail.  I ordered my beads right away.  You can see the components that I used here.

As I mentioned in my post with the components, this piece is part of my new line.  I have to be honest: I am keeping this one.  But I am starting to list other pieces from the line in my shop.  I'll have a post about that and the pattern for the line later this week (or you can go to my shop now if you can't wait to see what's already available).  And as always, if anyone wants one with this particular color scheme, please let me know.  I'm always happy to do custom orders.

All of the beads that I selected for this piece are from the glass beads section of Art Beads.  I used Toho cube beads and Czech dagger beads.  The majority of the beads in the piece are from Art Beads with a few others from my personal collection thrown into the mix.  If you want to know any of the specific colors that I used, please let me know.  I'll be honest again: I DO order a lot of my Toho cubes from Art Beads.  I normally DON'T order my dagger beads from Art Beads.  I order them elsewhere in bulk.  But I watch for sales on Art Beads.  Throwing a few of their patterned daggers into a mix with solid color opaques and AB finishes can add a wonderful hint of detail.

I selected two "special" components for this piece.  Most of my dagger fringed bracelets won't have these, but I thought it would be a neat touch with this mix.  The first component is a button from their Swarovski collection.  As you know, I love all buttons.  The Swarovski buttons are pretty cool.  The second component is a sterling silver charm from their charm collection.  You can find that charm right here.  I normally order silver plated charms because they're considerably cheaper.  However, sometimes I like to splurge on some higher end pieces through the design program.  I'm a sucker for heart jewelry (such a cliche I know).  I don't go overboard with floral themes in my life because that would be pretty corny for obvious reasons, but I thought the rose here would be a subtle touch for this piece.

I love how the color theme came together for this piece.  I didn't make this at the same time as my winter leafy bracelet, but it has a very similar feel.  I still have a lot of the cubes left so I will most likely make something else with a similar color scheme at some point.

Here's a posed shot with the clasp showing so you can see how that comes together.

And here's a shot with it turned the way that you would normally wear it so you can see how the daggers will hang.

I am currently in the middle of writing the pattern for my dagger design with the cube base.  I'm hoping to release it around the same time that I start rolling out the new line on Etsy.

Disclosure - I received my ArtBead's products free of charge through their blogging program. I am honestly reviewing their products and have not been paid for my endorsement as it pertains to the products I received. 

in the right season

As I'm sure a lot of you already know, I don't always make jewelry pieces that coordinate with the current season.  So I'm really proud that I'm getting all of this together in the winter!

I got my newest stash from Art Beads through their blogging design program this week.  We were allowed to pick any items that we wanted to create a winter piece.

It will be part of my new line that I blogged about earlier this month.  I'm very excited about it.  I used to maximize my number of choices for the blogging program and get lots of smaller items.  Lately I've been trying to splurge on some nicer pieces.  Thus, I chose to include the Swarovski button and sterling silver charm on the left.  I'll have more details about all of that in the near future.

I finally took pictures of my newest leafy bracelet: Beaded Bracelet - The Leafy Series - Winter.  It's available in two different sizes.  They're very similar and both awesome.  Both of these pictures are of the smaller version.

The clear blue and silver leaf beads that I used in this design are from Shannon (beadsandbabble).  I've mentioned her here before, but if you haven't checked out her shop yet, please go over there.  Also, the pattern for my leafy bracelet is available here.

Disclosure - I received my ArtBead's products free of charge through their blogging program. I am honestly reviewing their products and have not been paid for my endorsement as it pertains to the products I received. 

Art Beads fall piece

For the fall Art Beads design partner program, we were asked to create a piece of jewelry that utilized colors from the Fall 2010 Pantone Fashion Color Report.  I'd been wanting to make a new version of my Natural Sparkle design for a while.  Some of the more neutral shades from the report fit into this design perfectly.

I used two different kinds of Swarovski beads and gorgeous tiger's eye beads from the Art Beads Gemstone section.  I normally don't spring for larger/more expensive items when it comes to beads, even when it's through the blog program because I still like to make my money go as far as possible, but I decided that it would be worth it with the tiger's eye.  It definitely was.  I have a handful left, which I'm sure will go to good use at some point.

I also used some of my free sample beads from Shannon (beadsandbabble) including a few from this lovely Czech mix and this other neat Czech mix that she offers as well as some of her seed bead strands (if you want specific information for those, let me know).  Thanks Shannon!

The drilled sea glass pieces are from Kristina (akkricket).  I'm a little embarrassed that it's taken me this long to use them, but I'm so glad that I finally did.  I have some single drilled pieces, too, that I'm planning to use for another Natural Sparkle bracelet.

I'm sure that some of you know this by now, but the ceramic button is from Lisa (LisaPetersArt).  This is the fifth bracelet that I've made with one of Lisa's buttons.  I've sold three with her buttons.  The only one that's left besides this is my Fall Autumn Explosion piece.  I'm planning to use another Lisa button for my next Natural Sparkle bracelet.  I have a few other buttons in my stash, too (not that that will stop me from buying more in the future, too, of course).

This piece is available in my Etsy shop.  You can view it by clicking here.  As always, if you're interested in something similar but in a different size or with slightly different colors, etc. please let me know.

Disclosure - I received my ArtBead's products free of charge through their blogging program. I am honestly reviewing their products and have not been paid for my endorsement as it pertains to the products I received.

Art Beads summer piece

As promised, here it is, pictures ready in the morning!  Enjoy!

I am pretty proud of how quickly the final stages of this piece came together!  Nothing like a deadline to keep you moving. :) I'm also excited about how each square stitch cuff comes together more quickly than the last one.

For the Art Beads summer piece, we had three main section to choose from.  I pulled components from the glass beads section and the charms section.  I used eight different kinds of 8/0 Round Toho Seed Beads in a variety of shades and finishes for the base of the cuff.

The top embellishment includes a variety of pressed Czech glass, including glass buttons, glass pillows, glass heart beads, and glass leaf beads.  As I'm sure you already know, I love pressed Czech glass and have never been disappointed with the glass I've gotten from Art Beads.  I also incorporated a few fire polished pieces, Toho cube beads, plastic buttons, coral, rose quartz, Swarovski beads, and the charms, which are all TierraCast silver charms.  I always have so much fun with the embellishment for these cuffs (as I do with all jewelry embellishment/fringe), pulling together many more beads and buttons in a given color combination than I end up being able to use in one piece.

This cuff will be available in my Etsy shop in the near future.  If you'd like to reserve it now, please let me know!  I'm also open to other suggestions for color(s) for my next embellished square stitch cuff.  You can view all of the cuffs that are currently available here.

I will be MIA until Wednesday or Thursday next week.  Jake and I are taking a little trip during part of his week off.  Until then. :)

Disclosure - I received my ArtBead's products free of charge through their blogging program. I am honestly reviewing their products and have not been paid for my endorsement as it pertains to the products I received.

works in progress

I finally got the mix ready for the base of my summer Art Beads piece.  It will be an embellished square stitch cuff like this one.

I was slow finishing my spring piece so I'm behind where a lot of people are with their summer pieces, but I will start beading it this week.

I also took a shot today of one of my button trays with magnets and earrings in progress.

As you can see on the far left edge of the tray, there will be a bunch more green earring studs since they were so popular at the Arts Festival.  I'm also starting to work on some Christmas button magnets.  I may use some larger Christmas button stacks for pins as well.

the newest leafy design

I'm posting my spring Art Beads piece later than most people have been, but it's here! I've been wanting to make another spring version of my leafy design, and this was the perfect opportunity to do that. I have had a couple components for this bracelet for quite a while and pulled them together with some pressed Czech glass beads, specifically the leaf beads. It's no secret that I love Czech glass. These beads did not disappoint! Although I did not use any other Czech glass from Art Beads in this piece, in the past I have used Czech glass from their Limited Edition Glass Beads section. Some of the corner drilled cubes from the leafy series - modern that I posted yesterday are from one of the glass mixes in that section.

The other really neat thing about this piece is that I used one of Lisa Peters's ceramic leaf beads for the clasp. I still have one more leaf like this. I think it would be neat to use the other leaf as the clasp for a peyote cuff. I've been pondering what embellishment would work for a cuff like that all weekend.

I don't have my new leafy piece listed on Etsy yet, but here are the pictures of it. Enjoy! If anyone wants to reserve it now, please let me know. The original sale version of the leafy series - spring (the original not for sale version is mine) is also still available on Etsy here.




Disclosure - I received my ArtBead's products free of charge through their blogging program. I am honestly reviewing their products and have not been paid for my endorsement as it pertains to the products I received.

couple new listings, Saturday progress

I actually put this first listing up yesterday, but it totally slipped my mind to post about it here.


I took pictures of these beads at two different times, and both times they came out really dark. They have the same purples that I used in my purple beaded leaf earrings. I know that those photographs also turned out pretty dark. However, if you look at the third photo in that listing, you'll get a better idea what the beads really look like. They would work wonderfully for earrings, a bracelet, or necklace. They also make neat jewelry toggles.

I listed this new pair of earrings just a few hours ago.

Believe it or not, this was the first time that I attempted single drop peyote stitch with delicas. I had mixed single and double and done single with larger beads like size 8 Tohos, but never done a straight single with delicas. I am really pleased with the overall look of these earrings. I may make something similar again the future, but I don't have any specific colors in mind at this point.

I got all of the beads in the earrings through the Art Beads blogging program. These are actually from my Valentine's Day stash. I still haven't gotten to a project with my spring stash! These earrings include beads from the Swarovski section and the seed beads section, specifically the Miyuki delicas.

Jake and I got a new washing machine today. (We actually bought it last weekend but waited to have it delivered until today so I wouldn't have to take off work.) I've only done one load in the last two weeks so I've been playing catch up! While that's been going on, I did some gluing work for new earring studs, magnets, and tacks before it started raining this afternoon. I also finished the second of two pendants in my color explosion scheme that are currently listed as "made to order" items in my Etsy shop. I thought it was worth restocking them. Finally, I started working with Sharla (BeadedTail) on a custom bracelet to coordinate with her raspberry filled peyote triangle earrings! It will be a skinny fringed cuff like this one. She just okayed the beads that I picked out so I'll share them here.

I'm excited to start working on that this week. :)

Disclosure - I received my ArtBead's products free of charge through their blogging program. I am honestly reviewing their products and have not been paid for my endorsement as it pertains to the products I received.

packages

We awoke this morning to a blanket of fresh SNOW. Predicted, yes. Still upsetting.


Thankfully, as you can see in the photo, the roads were not frozen so the driving conditions were good today. Also, I took that picture a little over five hours ago, and most of it has melted since then. It's still a little depressing in mid/late March. Hopefully the weather forecast will stay true and it will warm right up again. It was 60 on Thursday!

I received several packages in the mail this week. The first was my latest set of beads from ArtBeads through their blogging program. We were allowed to pick anything from their site this time with the intention of making at least one spring piece from it. With this current order, I now have way more than enough beads to put together another leafy spring piece like my original version.


Besides the leaves, my newest stash includes delicas and Tohos. When I lined up my delicas, I realized how much I love the opaque espresso pearls with lime. The color possibilities never end!

I also got my newest selection of ceramic buttons from Lisa (LisaPetersArt) (all paid for through jewelry sales!). I purchased several from her Etsy site, and then she was kind of enough to photograph some of her smaller unlisted pieces and let me choose what I wanted.

I love all of them, but I think that the triangles are especially cool. So unique!

Finally, in unrelated jewelry topics, I got my first shipment of Proactiv.
I just started it today so nothing yet, but I'll let you know how it goes. I'm hopeful. I haven't been to a derm in over 3 years, but if this doesn't do the trick, I will look for one out here this summer.

I hope that everyone's having a good weekend! :)

Disclosure - I received my ArtBead's products free of charge through their blogging program. I am honestly reviewing their products and have not been paid for my endorsement as it pertains to the products I received.