Make My Monday!

The Beadin' Path sent me some....River Rock Beads! They are huge nuggets of recycled glass! Quite gorgeous in a mythological way! And a challenge to a fresh faced designer like myself! I try not to look at what everybody else has made with similar materials before I add my two cents....or, in this case, a quarter!

 

I have a crazy design in mind that I will get started on today! It involves thinking outside the rocks. Hee hee.

Make My Monday!

 

It's another Beadin' Path Design Partner Project! I started with 20 Vintage Lucite Yellow Moonglow Barrel Beads and Vintage Lucite, Bright Spring Green Moonglow Round Beads, 14mm. There are 15 beads per strand.I used 8 in the actual necklace and held 4 back to make earrings. I used faux leather cord in yellow and green, the exact same shades as the beads and attached crimp endings to each end of cord. I don't tend to measure things because I'm too impatient, so I just kept folding the cords in half and cutting them to get the right size. I was going to use chain but wanted something a little more exciting. The cord is perfect and fits right in with the Woodstock influence trending now due to the music festival's 40th anniversary. You may remember me saying that I am trying to make jewellery that doesn't have clasps. I love being able to throw this over my head and wear it at different lengths. I also used big 9mm jump rings for a contemporary, modern look. The real key to making this design are the silver-plated crimps, 6x2mm tubes with loops,
from Fire Mountain Gems. They finish the ends of the cord beautifully, don't they?  The cord was just the right size, but to make it easier to put the crimp tubes on, I cut the cord on an angle and applied a drop of glue to hold it tight.

Sneak Peak!

Here's what I'm working on this week with my Beadin' Path Vintage Lucite Beads Designer Challenge! I have something simple but spectacular in mind! Stay tuned!

Beadin' Path Design 2B

The beautiful Amanda kindly modeled my necklace. I need to measure it but for now, suffice it to say that I used all 40 of the heishi beads this design was based around! Plus, the necklace, as you can see, comfortably and hiply fits a couple of times around the neck! For more fun, wear it one length and loop it in a knot as I did or try it as a gorgeous bracelet!
Since the last photos, I've added some

Vintage Flexible Plastic Deep Grape Swirl Flower Centers (ridiculously grapey!!! yum!!!) and

some Vintage Lucite Lemon Moonglow Half Round Buttons w/metal Shanks!

I also made matching earrings (dangling off display) and this awesome bracelet with memory wire which I will blog more about later! Its very cool!

Well?

My First Design For Beadin' Path!

Started with a pleather cuff that I got somewhere a while back and using clear beading filament, sort of wove the purple lucite moonglow beads through the holes! You can see the filament on the underside, so if I were going to sell it, I might glue some material over it. I love it!

Cuffs are HUGELY in right now...and I'm a Craft Trends columnist so..... I would know! lol!

Do you like it?

I'm a Beadin' Path Design Partner!!!

One day I was on Twitter.....on one of the many days that I was on Twitter...on Twitter as usual, lol,... when I noticed that The Beadin' Path's Heather was asking for retweets of her post. The 30th retweet would win a $50 bag of vintage Lucite beads. Free beads! Retweeting is a breeze from Tweetdeck or Seesmic Desktop. Anywho, wasn't the 30th tweeter. I read the tweet that said I hadn't won and then went off somewhere to another web page or something, and, more or less, forgot about it.

BUT, when I checked back in to Twitter (compulsively) there was a Direct Message for me, from Heather, asking if she could send me a similar bag of beads. The 'catch' was that she wanted me to make something out of them and mention it in my blog. Can you imagine the nerve!? lol. Well, since this is 'all I have ever wanted'.....I said "Yes please!"

It just seems so fun to have someone else pick the beads and tell you to make something! I can add things out of my own vast stash of course and I already have 2 brilliant ideas for what I am going to make!

Now, you know that I am a firm believer in Vision Boards. When I first found out that there was such a thing as partnering with a bead company this way, I very much wanted to do it! I mean, come on! I even wrote this desire on my Google profile page!

So there you go! Vision boards, people! Write down what you want and then get to work!!!