Playing With Colours

These Corona beads have proven to be very addictive and I’ve found many new combinations to try! The best thing about them is that they’re quick to make and use regular beads that most of us beaders already have in our stash. I don’t know about you but, there’s nothing worse than being eager to start a new project from a magazine, book or tutorial only to find that one of the main ingredients is a hard to find bead or a vintage component. Each of these beads needs 20 Czech crystals (or Swarovski bicones or even pearls), a small amount of size 11 and size 8 seed beads and a needle & thread. The Corona Bead tutorial is available in my Etsy shop or if you don’t bead, you can find these ready made necklaces in the same place :)

Antheia

Pomona

Fiesta

Dracula

Pandora

Another project I’ve been working on recently has been this small crocheted blanket which I finally finished a few days ago. It’s one giant granny square and took me less than a  month to complete. It’s for my Nan so I chose lovely pastel shades: pinks, lilac, greens, blues, lemons, lilac and white. I was easy going to begin with but it got tricky towards the end as I started to run out of yarn! I’m fairly new to crochet and still learning how much yarn a project takes. As this was a project to use up my leftover yarn I didn’t want to buy more, so I ended up just doing one row for each colour. I’m really pleased with the finished blanket and my Nan loves it :)

Note that this isn’t the project I was working on some time ago. The squares eventually got turned into a poncho for my Mum but it was a bit of a disaster as I joined the squares together on the wrong side. This means that the lovely joining lines are on the inside while the outside shows messy little pips. I’m so embarassed by it that I’ll never show it to anyone! And poor Mum has been ordered to use it to keep her warm around the house but never to wear it beyond the front door!

The Tale of the Crystal Bead

Once upon a time there was a girl who wanted to make a beaded bead. Not just any beaded bead; this girl wanted to make one adorned with crystals. Sparkly, glittering crystals, that caught the light when the bead was worn. One day she decided that this was the day she would design her crystal bead, so she gathered together all her materials and set to work.

Weaving together dozens of tiny seed beads and the precious crystals with her needle & thread, she reached the half way mark. Peeping inside, she was dismayed to realise that her wooden bead was never going to sit very well inside the sparkling shell because of the depth of the crystals. But not one to give up without a fight, she carried on with her weaving, hoping that the beadwork would be stiff enough to support itself.

Alas, it was not to be; the bead was sturdy enough around the equator but at the poles it was incredibly flimsy. She held the bead up and, as if to prove the point to herself, squeezed the ends together. It was at that moment a spark of electricity shot through the air as the Corona Bead was born!

The girl was happy; she had woven her magic.

New Corona Bead tutorial on Etsy.

Lunar Eclipse

Sometimes I really enjoy the process of photographing my work , especially if it’s a nice day with plenty of light. But sometimes it feels like the biggest chore in the world! In the Summer it’s great to be able to make something and photograph it the same evening. But in the Winter it’s a completely different story and around this time of year if I don’t get to that windowsill by about 2pm that’s my chance gone until sun up the next day.

I’ve been thinking of investing in a set of lights for some time so a couple of weeks ago I thought, what the hell, let’s go for it. Not wanting to spend too much I headed for Ebay and got a really good deal on a set. In all the excitement I didn’t check the measurements properly and so I had quite a surprise when my equipment arrived. The lights, currently taking up most of the space on my desk looking like something from War of The Worlds, are huge! But boy they are bright, perfect for showing up all the details in my beadwork and I’m really happy with them.

But the biggest surprise I had was when I opened the light tent – tent being the right word, I could practically go camping in it! It’s much too big for my tiny beading but not a disappointment as I only really wanted the lights anyway and the tent just came with them. I’m happy to stick a couple of pieces of greaseproof paper to them to filter the light, it actually works quite well. Folding the tent up again was a scream, I had to look on the internet to find out how and this was the best tutorial I found. Still a challenge but I got it in the end.

I’ve been really busy this week, packing up orders, working on commissions and trying to update the photos in my Etsy shop. But I have found time to make a new necklace. Lunar Eclipse is one of my Colossal beads in shades of red, on a length of black waxed cotton cord and you can find it here in my Etsy shop : )

Making a Bead Mix

Seed bead mixes are one of my favourite things to work with, especially when I’m making a beaded bead! There are many fabulous bead mixes available from both Toho and Miyuki but I have to admit that really enjoy making my own. Today I’m making one of my Colossal beads and need a custom mix so I thought I would take this chance to show you how I go about making them.

First I decide on a colour way. More often than not this is just two colours but today I’m making a three colour mix. I start by selecting my colours, this one is going to match the October Moodboard challenge over on Operation Tackle That Bead Stash which is red, white and aqua.

Rather than just select three boxes of beads in those colours, which can end up looking too solid, I prefer to pick out maybe three of four shades of each colour to get a more blended effect. I also like to combine different bead finishes to give variation in texture and depth. In the mix below there are opaque, transparent, colour-lined, lustre, milky, matt and frosted beads. A couple of them also have an AB finish which adds a little touch of sparkle. You may notice that I haven’t added any silver-lined to this mix, this is because I didn’t want to make my bead look too sparkly. Silver-lined can be very overpowering so when I do include them, I use them sparingly.

Here’s a list of the actual colours I’ve used, in case you’re interested…

Top row: Milky Aqua, White Lined Aqua and Dark White Lined Aqua.

Middle row: Matt White, Lustre White, Transparent Rainbow Crystal ABand Frosted Transparent Crystal.

Bottom row: Transparent Darkest Red, Frosted Transparent Ruby, Opaque Pepper Red and Transparent Rainbow Raspberry AB.

As you can see in the photo above, I’ve tried to pour out the same amount of beads for each of the three colours as I want them to be evenly balanced. But sometimes I will want more of one colour than another, it depends on the effect I want to achieve.

Here’s the finished mix after being scooped into a grip seal bag which was sealed and shaken until the beads were evenly distributed…

And here’s the finished bead! I’ve just strung it simply on some waxed cotton cord. I wear one of these pretty much constantly, they’re great to ‘play’ with (if you’re like me and constantly play with your jewellery!) and the waxed cotton cord stands up to wear and tear really well. Peppermint can be found in my Etsy shop.

Pair of Eyes

More fun with eyes! These were a pain to photograph. I take my photos on a north-east facing windowsill, a nice bit of bright daylight but out of full sunshine, which most of the time works well for me. But whatever I did I couldn’t stop the window from reflecting in the glass cabochons! And while I’m fault-picking, the camera has made the eyes themselves look very fuzzy when in real life they look lovely and clear. I’m guessing it’s something to do with the dome of the cabochon.

Ok, quit complaining girl and get on with it! I’m really pleased with how these turned out, especially The Seer, which I was really tempted to keep for myself. I’ve picked out the blues and purples of the eye and as a complete fluke the AB beads have a touch of the yellow/green that’s in the centre. I think this piece looks quite futuristic, helped by the metallic coated crystals.

For She Wolf again I’ve picked out the colours of the eye for the beads and crystals. Lovely topaz and olive greens with a touch of amber. Does anyone else think this looks a bit like a sunflower? Both of these are available in my Etsy shop and on my website.

Ghost

I had great fun making the bead for this necklace as well as completing a couple of challenges that I set for myself. The first was to use Czech seed beads instead of the usual Japanese Miyuki/Toho. I follow my own Colossal tutorial to make these 1″ beads but as the Czech beads are a slightly different shape than the Japanese variety they don’t work well with it. But once you know how to make a beaded bead it’s quite easy to use other beads without following a tutorial, as long as you keeping checking the fit and making adjustments as you go.

The other challenge was to make the holes at either end a little larger than usual! It took a bit of working out but I finally got both ends looking neat and large enough to accomodate pretty much any width of cord or ribbon. I’m hoping to post a tutorial for that here on the blog soon :)

I adore the colour of this ‘Apparition’ Czech mix: opaque white and milky white, clear, silver, and very subtle blue, purple and green. I’ve attached it very simply to a doubled length of grey waxed cotton cord with silver plated findings. You can find it in my Etsy shop.