It all started...

It all started with Tina posting to her Yahoo List encouraging the members to feel at home and comfortable about posting.... Now I can't seem to stop and I might as well take advantage of my chattiness to blog!

I said I'd post some of the work I've been doing, and there's a lot!

This focal was the reason I decided to tackle the double spiral pattern in the magazine I referrred to earlier today. I just like to make bracelets and this seemed like a new way to display a focal.

It's kind of tigerish in its coloring and I love how it picks up all the sparkle of the beads.

I have a couple of other experiments that I'm not posting today, but this peachy turquoise one is a combination of colors that I seem to use a lot.

The copper pearls just pop and the coloring is a little more vibrant than it shows in the picture. Those purplish seed beads are actually peach too.

By the way, I think if you click on the picture (if the resizer is working properly) you will see these all bigger on a single screen.

I may have posted this necklace before, but I just wore it the other day to a dinner theatre matinee and it seemed to fit in here. It was another fun piece to try to match up with a special combo of beads.

It's been around for some time. One time, at a bead show, there was a guy set up on a card table sort of display with a box full of these Raku pieces. I've never seen his before or since and wish I had bought more.

It was a little expensive, but the pieces are so distinctive


It inspired me to try again with the "raku" frit on a focal the other day and the center bead in this bracelet is the result.

I added a band of Goldstone so there are copper beads in the base of this one along with gold ab crystals and a little turquoise thrown in - all to pick up the colors of the focal.

I love to work like this. Over the years I have collected so many "companion" beads and it's nice to finally use some of them.

Finally, my "Steel Blues". This may not look terribly exciting, but I love it. The base color is a dark blue metallic and all the sparlies just bring it alive.

It's perfect for those times when you want to "spark up" a blue jeans outfit.

Not as interesting to work as the really colorful ones, but each piece has a pattern and personality of its own so it is so much fun to watch what happens by substituting a crystal for a bugle bead or a breaking up line of seed beads with a fresh water pearl.

Sure is a good way to get out of the doldrums. I'd much rather be beading than playing a computer game (what I was doing for a week or so before this particular binge began!)