Sue Beads

August just flew by, didn't it?  In addition to moving my daughter into a new apartment for college and painting it and generally trying to make it not a slum anymore lol, I took an intensive class at the Glass Center with JC Herrell, took a trip to Scotland with my family, moved Jason's kids into their dorms at IUP and had a Facebook trunk show on Glass Melters Open Market!   AND it's time for the August Component of the Month with Diana Ptaszynski.  As usual, I didn't take a photo of the component when I got it, but it was this awesome stoneware coin pendant.  My idea didn't some to fruition (I think I say that a lot); I was going to use one of the bails pictured below, that I found at  Lima Beads.  While they are lovely, the color just didn't go with the focal or my idea.  Fast forward panic - what to do?  I really hate gluing bails on pieces of art, but decided in this case if I wanted to get anything done, I would need to go with ...

It was my turn to provide the Component of the Month over at Art Jewelry Elements this month.  I chose to make beaded beads for everyone. I got the tutorial from Datz Katz over on etsy - Debra Schwartz has many tutorials for beaded goodies if you want to visit her store! Here's what I made from several pairs of my beaded beads! Of course, there are other things you can do with pairs of beaded beads besides making earraings, but I really love making earrings so.... Please check out what everyone else made with their beaded beads! Guests Elisabeth Auld Mischelle Andrade Karen Martinez AJE Team Susan Kennedy Jennifer Cameron Diana Ptaszynski Kristen Stevens Jenny Davies-Reazor Lesley Watt Melissa Meman Linda Landig Caroline Dewison Lindsay Starr Niky Sayers

It's yet the end of another month, and that means it's the reveal day for the Art Jewelry Elements Component of the Month. For April, Rebekah Payne of Tree Wings Studio provided us with these cute little polymer hearts! If you love them, she has them available in her shop! I asked Rebekah to send me a surprise, and I received a copper one! As usual, I stared at the bead, stumped, for the better part of the month.  Feeling under the gun with many blog and personal and work deadlines, I was finally able to come up with what I wanted to make after looking at another piece I had made quite a long time ago! These stone beads caught my eye on my dresser, and that was it.  I knew what I was going to make!  They match perfectly with the heart!  I added some pretty copper accent beads, and a copper clasp. I'm really happy with the way this came out!  I will happily be wearing it!  Thank you so much Rebekah for another month of inspiration! Check o...

It's that time again - time for the Art Jewelry Elements Component of the Month challenge. This time, it was Melissa Meman who provided us with some morsels to play with!  She makes awesome copper clay components.  This is the one I chose. I knew I wanted to do bead weaving (again!!!) and I picked some awesome colors to go along with the copper - peacock blue and wisteria. I did a spiral rope with size 8 peacock color beads and size 11 wisteria. I have to say, I don't like this method of using 3 8s as the base and 4 11s as the spiral - it's too loose for me.  I will write about this for my Tuesday post on AJE.  I used some beautiful angelite faceted rounds I had as an accent to the necklace, with about an inch of spiral rope in between the trio of beads.  The color of this angelite is really amazing!  As I was toggle clasp deficient, I decided to make some.  I punched 22 gauge copper sheet with my disc cutter, cut a hole in it, textur...

I've been having fun making heart beads - hand-shaped, long, primitive looking!  You can find them in my etsy store ! Some have pure gold leaf on them, as well!