BSBP Reveal

Hi everyone, sorry I'm a little late to the party ... had some technical glitches.

My partner for this years BSBP is the lovely Sarah Strover of Beaupepys who sent me a beautiful bead soup. Unfortunately in my eagerness to play with beads I forgot to take a picture of it in its entirety lol.

I have to apologize in advance for the somewhat crappy pictures - we've had a lot of rain here and my indoor lighting is terrible ... actually you can see the raindrops on the display bust in the pics lol.

I only got a chance to make the necklace out of the set that I had planned - sadly allergy season hit me hard this year and the new meds keep sending me to sleep, but hopefully when I figure out a decent routine on these things I can finish up the rest of my ideas  =)

I love the focal Sarah sent - the bead weaver in me sort of wanted to bezel it but I do that all the time and wanted to use the BSBP to try new stuff so I went with an illusion cord necklace (never done one in my life before). I only added some little O bead spacers to the lovely selection of vintage glass and gemstone beads Sarah sent.

Here you can see the gold pearl accented box clasp and the vintage glass coffee bean beads also from the soup ... and the raindrops that made photographing anything a pain lol  ;)


Sarah also sent some lovely pairs of lampwork glass beads, carved bone beads and lampworked chillies that I planned (still do) to make into earrings ... sorry I'll have to come back and add some pics of those since the rain was coming down too heavy - the poor things would have been swimming lol.

Thanks to Sarah for the great bead soup and to our fantastic hostess Lori Anderson  =)
Head over to Pretty Things for a list of all the participants and links to their bead soup reveals.

Design Challenge

Hey everyone sorry I've been AWOL - went back to film school for a couple of short courses to brush up on some stuff (it's my dream job) but I'm back and signed up for this years BSBP  =)

Also check out this great design challenge hosted by the gossiping goddess, blueberri beads and smitten beads: http://thegossipinggoddess.blogspot.co.uk/2014/02/spring-fever-design-challenge.html

Blog Hops Update

Hi everyone .... sorry I've been AWOL - gave myself food poisoning ... the curse of my crappy cooking strikes again lol ... and now I'm waaayyyy behind on everything.

I'll be posting the Octoberfest reveal on Monday (one day late) and the Sequintastic September reveal Wednesday (very late).

Sorry for the delays - I just have to catch up on the paid work first (yeah ughhh I know)  =(

Lo  xx

Giveaways & Updates

Morning all, The Gossiping Goddess is having a giveaway to celebrate breaking the 2000 sales mark  =)

So be sure to stop by and enter - some great prizes up for grabs!


 ... Also I've signed up for the Halloween/Day of the Dead Blog hop hosted by the very talented Suburban Girl Studio, with the big reveal on October 28th.

Happy beading - Lo  =)

Creating with cabochons Reveal

Hi, sorry for being a little late posting the reveal for The Studio Sublime's Creating with Cabochons blog hop - we had a nice big powercut in my neighbourhood and I can honestly say attempting to bead by torch light is HARD lol ... and then Blogger decided to be awkward about posting pics and rain made it hard to get outside in the good light to take any.

I originally planned to make a polymer clay cab to work with but none of my clay attempts came out any good so I started working on a freeform bead embroidery piece but when the powercut hit that had to go out the window - I couldn't see the needle in the felt backing and kept stabbing myself, so I put it aside while I could still feel my fingers  ;)

On the upside the powercut led to a very interesting effect when I decided to bezel up some little crystal cabs instead - I miscounted seedies while I was beading and ended up with a really nice flower pattern on the back.

I ended up liking the bezelled crystal bits so I decided to carry on working with them instead and wound up with a bracelet  =)
Although I'm not sure about the lilac bicone/pearl connector bits - I had no matching stash to work with (I know right - no gold shade pearls?! ... must fix that very soon).

Here's a close-up of the tiny crystal butterfly I added to each one (thought they went well with the whole flower theme)  =)

Hopefully I'll get a chance to finish the bead embroidery piece I started, especially as I was working with a rectangular cab - a shape I've never attempted before ... for now I'm still associating it with needle stabs and a lot of cursing lol  ;)

Big thanks to our great host Sally Russick  =)

And here's the list of the participants for the hop:
Your Host:  Sally Russick
D Lynne  Bowland
Alicia Marinache           
Lynn  Jobber           

Jenny Davies-Reazor           

 

Jo-Ann  Woolverton           

Marde Lowe           
Dawn Doucette           
Mary K McGraw           
Gloria Allen           

Cheri  Reed           
Sonya Stille           
Elizabeth Owens Dwy           
Veralynne   Malone           
Tania Hagen           
Lynsey  Brooks           
Christina Miles           
Holly  Westfall           
Kathy  Lindemer           
Patti Vanderbloemen           

Therese Frank           
Adrienne Berry           
Liz   E 
Tanty  Sri Hartanti           
Ginger Bishop
Renetha Stanziano           
Marlene  Cupo           
Sandi Volpe           
Sharyl McMillian-Nelson           
Niky  Sayers

Mischelle Fanucchi           
Tracy  Stillman           
Skylar Bre'z           
Ann Schroeder           
Paula Kramer
Jess Green           
Susan Kennedy           
Stacie  Florer           
Cathie  Carroll           
Susan F.  


Michelle Caballero       
Sabine Dittrich           
Kristina Johansson           
Kimberly Sturrup-Roberts           
Melissa  Meman           
Cheryl McCloud         
Michelle  Timms           
Cindy  Pack           
Lynda  Carson
Cynthia  Machata           
Julia  Harris           
Karin  Slaton
Ingrid  Anderson           
Karin Grosset Grange
Jasvanti  Patel  
Inge  von Roos
Molly Alexander

Toltec Jewels  

BeadFest Pity Party

Evening all  =)

HumbleBeads is hosting a BeadFest Pity Party for those of us who unfortunately can't attend the real thing - I live in the UK so sadly it's out of bounds for me.

Today's pity party theme was about going out and finding inspiration which as a keen albeit amateur photographer, I was really looking forward to - but wouldn't you know it after a lovely week of pretty decent weather it decides to absolutely pour with rain all day long! LOL

Now I'm not one to shy away from a little rain - I actually like an occasional amble in a light shower but this was bordering on torrential. I did venture out into the garden late this afternoon hoping I could catch something but I got just one shot of my hydrangeas before accepting I was getting soaked and beating a hasty retreat to the kitchen where the dogs looked at me like I was mad for even trying  ;)

Oh well at least the rain's good for the plants I guess  =)

So I thought I'd post some of my favourite pictures taken in my own garden from earlier in the summer instead ..... who knows maybe someone will find some inspiration right here on my little blog  ;)

A Great Giveaway

Ooooh check out this great giveaway going on over at The Beading Gems Journal - a $75 gift certificate for Shaktipaj wirework tutorials!!   =D

I just LOVE these designs so I'm keeping everything crossed  ;)