The Winning Christmas Tree

There is quite a story behind my Christmas tree this year.

It began when I asked my son to go out into the forest and get me a tree. Not too tall. Not too big around. Maybe even a Charlie Brown tree. When the tree arrived it was about 8 feet across and 8 feet high. Too big for my living room. But my son assured me that when he was finished with it, it would be great.

There was quite a struggle between my son and the tree. It refused to stand up straight in the stand. He had to go before the job was done but assured me that he'd be back another day. Round two between the tree and my son and the tree won again. He assured me that he only had to stop that time because he'd run out of cuss words.

I had a go with it on my own...twice. The second time ended with me throwing it out the front door, over the railing, complete with the stand and the tree top angel that got broken in the first struggle with my son so it was now zap strapped on and I wasn't about to put any energy into removing a broken angel. Sigh.

After much thought about what I'd do, later that day I went out and bought an artificial tree that came complete with lights. It was easy to put together. Three sections with plugs between them for the lights. Plugged it in and it looked great. Turned my back to get the rest of the ornaments and when I faced it again...the top section had gone out! I wiggled and juggled the plug. Nothing! So I sat to contemplate what would be next. And the lights came on. And went out again. And came on again. And went out. With no one and nothing touching the tree! Packed it up and took it back. Checked elsewhere and managed to get the same tree six inches taller and $50 less expensive.

Fortunately, the second tree I brought home worked perfectly and looks absolutely lovely covered in my (mostly) hand made ornaments! So...here is the winning tree....

Three Piece Dark Denim Set

The inspiration for this set was the colours of the beads themselves. When I looked at them together, I envisioned them worn with jeans, heels, a tailored wool or leather jacket and a mannish white shirt. The juxtaposition of the feminine and masculine elements feels balanced to me. You couldn't wear this set and not be feminine, no matter what you wear with it.

I've been toying with other sets of beads and thinking about another set.

The closure button is a 10mm Swarovski crystal button in a colour called Montana Sapphire that I bought online at Artbeads. The way it finishes the necklace and bracelet is exactly what I wanted.



Three types of beads make up the spiral rope; triangles, Toho hex beads and seed beads.

Finally Back to Beads!

Colour me happy! Happy to get back to my beads! The bezel for this stone had been done for a while. In between all of the other things I've been working on I took little snatches of time to work on finishing the pendant. Then the neck piece got done and today I started the day with finishing the toggle for it. It's going into a Christmas sale this weekend.

Being in my studio with the beads has all kinds of things running through my head. I'm happy to say that after Sunday, I'll be able to indulge myself in making whatever the spirits move me to make.

Warning - Not Beading

It's true - that I haven't been beading. I've been really wanting to get back to beads but I'm working on some other things for the PR Fine Arts Christmas sale. It's the last weekend of the month. I also have the opportunity to display my 'wares' at an evening market on Thursdays. My main concern is that I don't have enough inventory. Anyway, I've been working on mini quilts and I have these ten completed.



Too bad you can't see the hand quilting on them. It's there, but the camera doesn't seem to have caught it.

I'm working on another four that are about half way done. I'm sure I'll finish them tomorrow. Then I can get back to the beading. There are so many things that are rolling around in my brain that I want to try. I'm really feeling the urge to experiment with a new direction for both my beading and my quilting.

That's it for now.

Fiery Inspiration

I often watch programs on the National Geographic channel. A week or two ago I watched a fascinating program about volcanos where the host took groups on tours across active lava beds. Cracks in the upper crust of cooled lava often reveal glowing rivers of flowing magma and that was my inspiration for this third amulet bag.



The branch fringe dangling at the bottom of the bag is meant to be reminescent of the movement of the flowing lava.

Another Amulet Bag

If you decide to try this kind of thing...be warned...they are like peanuts...You can't eat/make just one! Here is the second one I've made and I've got ideas and plans for more. In fact, I just prepared three more sets of fabric for beading. I'm starting as soon as I'm done here!



Really, the photos just don't do it justice!

Beads on Fabric

My life has been so crazy busy for a few weeks now and I'm not getting much time to bead...however...

There is a group I've joined in town. It's the PR Fine Arts and the division I'm involved with is quilting. Because I'm a beader, they asked me to do a class introducing them to beads on fabric. This photo is the "sampler" that I worked on in the class while I showed them some basic things they could do. We also did a beaded button as it's such a fun, quick and easy project.



The following two photos are a project I've been working at for a few days. It's actually a small amulet bag, big enough for a credit card and maybe a bit of money. I haven't yet decided what I'm doing for the necklace part, but I have to say that I'm really having fun playing with sewing beads to fabric.

Just Done & Sold

I've been working on this necklace for a while and a friend saw it while it was in progress. She said it would be a perfect birthday gift for her daughter. The necklace portion includes fresh water pearls that I picked up while on my road trip this past summer along with the gold charlotte beads. The pendant is different on both sides and can be removed from the necklace giving it lots of versatility for ways to wear it.

Is it really October?

Nobody told my roses! I just took this photo of them.



Nor were the Dahlias infomed.



I love this Mallow plant.



In case you haven't figured it out for yourself yet...I don't have any new beading to show so I'm showing you my garden instead. I'm working on things. I have a necklace in progress that is already sold as well as a bracelet in progress that is sold as well.

Later, I may get the camera out again because I've been working on samples for a class I'm teaching next weekend. Be kind to me though as I'm horribly under the weather too. (Translation = sick...by doze ids all stuffed ub.)

On A Roll!

It looks like I'm on a roll! I'd done the bezel on the glass pendant some time ago and it's been waiting for inspiration to finish it. A couple of days ago, I finally came up with a design for it and started working away at it. The rope part was pretty simple and straight forward. When I got to the time to work on the branch fringe I prepared to be at it for a while. Since the last branch fringe pendant I did took a whole day, I was expecting this one to take as long or longer. As it turned out, I discovered a technique that made the whole process a lot quicker. And I finished it last night.