Other Unfinished Objects

Polymer is my primary focus, and even though my stash is overflowing with beads that I have made, that doesn't stop me from buying beads and focals elsewhere.  It is an addiction that Lord Opuson wishes I was cured of. Of course, we all know that once a beader always a beader ... give up Opuson and let me expand into the garage or maybe when we remodel that back bedroom that is just being used as a "junk room" already ...

But I stray ...

My beading buddy Karen and I visited Shipwreck Beads last week.  I just had to pick up some Preciosa Ripple beads. I have been lusting after them since I first saw them on the Shipwreck website. I started  this bracelet while watching Game of Thrones Sunday night.  

    Half way through the episode, one of Lord Opuson's old friends that we haven't seen in almost 9 years showed up on our doorstep.  What a blast it was catching up.  He had been living in Arizona but recently divorced and moved back into the area.  I am so happy for Opuson to reconnect after all this time.  

    As CJ had interrupted the episode, we got to watch it again later.  That gave me a chance to finish it all in one evening. It looked a bit sparse with only the ripple beads, so I added a few floral beads to plump it out.

I have had this ceramic focal for some time, the glaze reminded me of frosted window panes on winter nights in my childhood home. My folks had no central heat in those days and our upstairs bedrooms would get sooooo cold at night.  At the time, I did not appreciate beauty of the winter wonderland right outside my bedroom window (teenage ennui and all that growing up stuff ....).  Now I wish I could look out at night and see a ceiling of stars painted from one side of the sky to the other... too many lights in the city now.
    I finally found beads to pair with it.  The crackles really add the perfect touch.

Winter Frost

I also got some earrings finished, but that will wait till my next posting.  Have to finish the laundry, or there will be nothing to wear to work.

Newest earrings

Spent the day trying to learn how to download and edit pictures on my new laptop.   I have been really hesitant to upgrade because the new Windows is such a pain to use, but my old standby is just getting to be too slow.

I took pictures of earrings I had made with from my newest beads, and spent the last several hours trying to figure out how to edit them.  That was after I cussed repeatedly at the computer because it also makes downloading from the camera so difficult. Old computer, I plugged in camera, turned it on and it downloaded automatically.  New computer, I have to find the "my computer" function and them manually move the pictures from the camera. Probably is an easier way, but have yet to find it .

Darn thing is even giving me problems as I type this ... the screen keeps changing it's resolution and I am doing nothing but typing.  Very frustrating  ,,,.. I foresee a large learning curve.

At the last Puyallup clay gathering, Kim showed me how to make a leaf cane.  I am not a caner. I don't seem to have the patience for it, but I was assured it was an easy one to make.  Still have a problem with keeping the form of the leaf when reducing, but am told that too comes with practice.

 

Here is an earring made from one of the multicolored spiral beads I showed yesterday.

 

 

 

While putting away old beads on my worktable, I came across a pair dragon egg beads that I had made several years ago.  Finally made them into earrings.

 



And for my final pair ....these are not polymer, but I fell in love with these seahorse beads at Michael's.  Bought the string and made up these for me and a pair for my scuba diving friend. Hope she likes the beads as much as I do.

 





Wow, as many postings in 2 days that I have done in 3 months. Maybe the greys have ended?

 

 

 

Studio Time

Finally, a weekend when I did not have to go anywhere or do anything .... I could dedicate myself to my clay and the BSBP.

This picture WILL NOT let me place it where I want
it to go.  

    I can't show you the Bead Soup for a while yet ... not till the last reveal, in April.  I am surprised at how quickly the design popped into my head.  Reading all those beading and stringing mags is paying off.

     I liked some of the beads I sent to my Bead Soup Partner Stepha so much, that I made a few more for myself, then tried a few different color combo's from the scraps of clay left over from other projects.

Green is in this Spring

Can't resist the color purple!

I would love to show more of the beads I made this weekend, but am having a problem with adding photos.  They all want to go to the top of the page, and refuse to move where I want them to go.  Rather than get even more frustrated with Blogger, I will just write another post later.

Catch up V2.0

Still have two more pair of earrings to blog about.  Just got too tired last night to continue.

Both these were made from metal beads that I picked up from Ben Franklin.  I colored them with the Ranger/Vintaj Patina paints that have come out recently.  I am really liking these paints. They are bright and cheerful and you don't have to bake them (a big plus).  Only time will tell as to how durable they are.

Week 20 earrings were made by painting base silver beads with a mixture of amethyst with the Patina Glaze to lighten it a bit. Then I went back in and with a toothpick carefully laid the straight amethyst into the indents in the beads.

Original metal beads

Earrings after painting with Amethyst Patina.  "Seeing Spots - Week 20

The next pair use the Jade color of Patina.  This time I also painted the end cap beads with the straight Jade.  The pair I am picturing are made from applying the undiluted Jade  to the bead.  I had also mixed the Jade with a larger amount of the Glaze to get more of a color wash.  I like the straight Jade better.

Green Twist Week 21

Original bead on left, Jade colorwashed bead on right.

My first new color

The new Premo colors are trickling into the local Michaels.  I have been waiting for them to go on sale,  but I did use my 40% off coupon to buy one block to try it out.  It was hard to choose but I  have a real weak spot for purple of all hues, and this metallic is just too yummy.


  I found it very soft out of the package,  which caused me to loose some of the fine line texture in these beads.  I was able to put it back in with the help of my CLWI tool though. 

I think I will leach the clay a bit before using it again.