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Monday, September 23, 2013

Something Fun From Grammy's Sewing Box...

Received package in the mail from Christine at OneKissCreations and I just had to show you.


I will be using these wooden spools and beads in her blog hop later next month. What a sweet note and I was so surprised to see wooden sewing spools!! Have never worked with anything like this before and am certainly looking forward to giving it a try...





Enjoy Your Monday!!


Friday, September 20, 2013

Sunday, September 15, 2013

Pearls! Pearls!! Pearls!!!...

Welcome to the Pearls! Pearls!! Pearls!!! Blog Hop brought to you by Michelle over at MiShel Designs. She is our resident expert on all things pearls, GIA certified in fact, so make sure to stop by her site and investigate all the great information she makes available in addition to links to all the fabulous designs you will see while touring today's blog hop. Enjoy all this wonderful inspiration!

I always think about pearls in their most classic sense, a simple strand of genuine knotted pearls to be given and worn for important occasions. Always elegant and very appropriate. But lately that idea has begun to change for me...expand so to speak, and I have started to experiment using them with definitely more casual earrings and bead woven necklaces; genuine, color treated, glass, plastic you name it. Whatever fits for the occasion. ;)

With the first project I used graduated sizes of some lovely pink faux glass pearls from Cousin Corporation. The largest of these pearly beauties measure a whopping 18 mm and they are very easy on the budget. At this point I can't help thinking how going faux has liberated the design options available to me.

I hope you like the addition of the patinated metal spacers and bead caps mentioned in my last blog post. And as far as future design options, there is still a long, long way to go with big pearls here...
 
 
 
 
Next up comes a fall bracelet made with freshwater rice pearls and biwah tubes I found online at Fusion Beads a few months ago. The pearls are lovely warm shades of gold, red and deep orange, perfect for fall. I had to add a few bits and pieces of Czech glass -don't you love the little cats?
 
 
Hope you enjoyed my portion of the pearl tour. 
Please click the button below for more great pearl design!
 
 
 
Pearls! Pearls!! Pearls!!! Blog Hop




Saturday, September 14, 2013

Patinated Components...

I am getting ready and all excited for MiShel's fabulous pearl blog hop on Sunday.  And since the hop tomorrow is supposed to be all about the pearls, I thought it would be fun to give you a sneak peak at some of the components I am using with a new (for me!) patination technique. Here is the before and after shot:


The colors are actually painted on in three layers of different colored inks specially made for painting on metal. I used a very small brush to paint with and then used swatch of cotton cloth to blot some of the color off . After the ink dried, I used two coats of glaze to help preserve the finish. Kind of a labor intensive process.  It will be interesting to see, and hope the finish lasts.

Be sure and stop by tomorrow to visit the hop! Then you can see how I used these colorful bead caps and spacers in my pearl jewelry piece.


Also stop by MiShel's blog right now for more advise and an awesome collection of information on
working with pearls at her link I posted up top!
 
 
Have a Great Saturday!
 
 

Friday, September 13, 2013

Random 5



First Love, Cunningham

1. I have had the family room to myself to watch television this week for some odd reason.  The dog jumps on my lap and promptly falls asleep. The cat sits on the arm of the chair, glares at the dog, and nudges me for attention. And then I get this maddening urge to get up and get a drink or turn a light off.  But I can't of course.

2.  Sometimes its nice to be trapped (see #1).

3. Found a baby tarantula in the house yesterday. He was kind-a cute for a hairy spider. Guess who was designated for pest removal...

4.  Am amazed at the number of photos I took for a necklace today. What did people do before digital  cameras?

5. I actually found 2 old 35mm cameras in the back of a cupboard this week. One was still in the box, a free gift from a subscription to Time magazine. Why am I saving this, a white elephant gift?


Wednesday, September 11, 2013

Getting Crafty for the Holidays!

O.K., yes I know it seems like we just made it through the Labor Day weekend...but it's never too early to plan for snow and holidays!  Here are a few fun and easy projects I put together with "Tis the Season" products from Cousin that will soon be available at A.C. Moore.

Let's start with some cute little zipper pulls for the kiddo's* winter jackets and snowsuits. Cousin's new "Tis the Season" products include a great selection of charms that you can check out here. For my project, I used the gingerbread house and holiday glazed donuts. I connected each charm to a metal lanyard using bright silver split jump rings. Then topped it off with a little red bow. Hint, hint: These zipper pulls also make great embellishments with ribbons and bows on gift wrap.





Next I made tree topper ornaments using Cousin's "Tis the Season" wine charm rings. It was easy adding acrylic bicones onto the rings and accenting them with some of the new beads and charms. Easy as connecting jump rings to jump rings with needle nose pliers - and finishing it off with 3/16 wide ribbon.



 
Here is a red one too!
 


 
 
 
Hope you like my frosty window affects on the photos. Can you tell I am getting excited for cooler temperatures?
 
 

More crafts to come later this month.
 
 



*For children over age 3.

Saturday, September 7, 2013

I Heart Macro Week 17

A petroglyph found near Cave Creek Arizona.

Desert Awareness Park, Cave Creek Arizona

 
Artistic renderings carved in natural stone by people who lived over 700 years ago.

 
 
 
 




Hohokam - Those who came before.
 


 
 
Shine the Divine
 


 
 
For more Information on petroglyphs go to:

Sunday, September 1, 2013

Love That Chenille Stitch!

Just finished this golden tubular chenille stitch necklace using 6/0 gold and matte rainbow seed beads. This was my first time using the larger seed beads and I am hooked.  I really liked the way it turned out.


The weave is so much more flexible then tubular peyote stitch. This necklace really lays nice and has a lot of movement.


And the ends finish off so nice.  There is no need for end caps.


 
 
Stop by here for a great chenille tutorial by Sara Spoltore.