Artisan Whimsy, a community of jewelry artisans, has started a monthly group for testing products by using a grouping of components to design with. This month the component provider is ZnetShows and the packet I received is to your left.
My task was to use these elements to create designs and post them by the end of the month. Well, alrighty then. Let's get started!
I'm not one to use all the components in one piece, or even two. So I'm going to show you several different designs.
I thought I'd start with the ones on the top. ZnetShows calls them "fish bones." I did two pieces with these beads, starting with the pairing I did with New Zealand paua shells. These are shells that are collected along the shores of New Zealand that have been somewhat bashed about. So they end up as bits and pieces. But I just loved them. I bought them from a local bead store in Auckland where they drill holes for beaders. I created a fringe with the shells along the edges of a pretty ribbon. Then I bead embroidered the fish bones along the band. I finished the bracelet with adjustable buttons for alternating sizes. I really love how this one turned out. And as an added bonus, it makes the best sound when you're wearing it! The jingling sound of shells.
I used most of the smaller pieces for the bracelet, but with the larger ones I did beaded caps and nestled them into a netting to create a choker. I included a few of the Chinese crystals I had left from an earlier Znetshows stash, and then finished off the necklace with blue leather and a silver hammered closure.
With the individual pieces of sea glass in the middle, I made a series of earrings. I was again creating my own earwires. I'm kind of liking making my own these days! First up are the larger rectangular glass that I paired with a silver wave charm. This pair light weight and has a nice swing to them.
Next are the smaller rectangular glass in a fainter sea foam green. Boy I love this color of glass! I did a slightly 'mismated' pair with a hammered charm on just one of the earrings, and then a silver etched flower bead I picked up at a bead show.
Next are another pair of conch shell earrings. I've been loving these baby conch shell beads; they are so fun to create with! I did a few last week that you can see here. This pair I kept somewhat simple adding only a few Chinese crystals to them. They match up nicely to the netted choker above.
The last pair I made use a pretty little pair of antique silver connectors. These were part of the last set of sea glass along the bottom. I added a little MOP (mother of pearl) charm to the bottom to keep that beachy feel to them.
Ok, you all still with me? I know this is a long post. Longer than I normally do, but the rules are to post all my projects together in just one link so I can connect to the linky on the Artisan Whimsy site. Don't forget to check out everyone else's designs.
I've got just one last piece. It is a green velvet choker with a zig zag beaded trim to it. My friend Christine showed me this stitch the last time we met up. I think it just might be my 'summer fling' stitch! I asked my daughter to model it for you all in a dress I picked up at a Renaissance Faire many moons ago. I love how the choker looks with this dress.
This week Sally's prompt for Focusing on Life is to finish the sentence 'You are ...." She asked us to think about what kind of a person we are. If you could only pick one word, what would your's be?
I've been thinking about that all week, and it just isn't that easy. But I've finally decided on the word unconventional. When I think about the things that define my life, that is the theme. I wouldn't confuse that with more traditional things. I did take my husband's name because I wanted all of us (my kids, my husband and I) to have a family name.
But some of the choices my husband and I have made are unconventional. I work full time, and he stays home with the kids. We didn't mean for that to happen, but when my oldest was born I had the boring, steady job with good insurance. He had the better paying, interesting job in high tech, but his work was on a contract basis. So he quit and we made do on my salary. Don't get me wrong, there are many, many days when I wish we could trade places. But we're just too far down this path to make that change. We both felt strongly about one of us staying home with the kids. It is just how it played out for us.
Last week I told you about my two rings, and mentioned that there was another story behind the diamond ring. So when we got married, we exchanged simple wedding bands. That is because we wanted a simple wedding. We got married by the justice of the peace up in wine country. It was the dead of winter (December) and pouring rain. I wore green velvet (that first pic is us on our wedding day). As many of you know, my favorite color is green. We planned everything over the course of 3 months .... so there was no running off in the night. It was just how we wanted to do it. But perhaps I should back up one more step. Late Summer, I was planning a trip down to see my sister who lives in New Zealand. As I was completing my plans I said to my then boyfriend, "so am I going by myself? or are you coming? because either way I'm going." He decided that he did want to come with me. And then as we started to plan out all the places to visit we realized that for a mere extra $100 we could stop off in Fiji. Sign me up! The more we talked about it, the more we realized that we were planning a very romantic trip, and commented on what a great honeymoon Fiji would be. We looked at each other and said, 'let's do it." So we planned our honeymoon before the wedding. But that is our life. We love to travel, so we tend to plan around places we'd like to visit. (Picture of our island in Fiji and a picture of my sister and me in NZ)
Ok, the diamond ring. We had been married 5 years at this point. I was roughly 38 weeks pregnant on our 5th anniversary. We decided to celebrate by going out to dinner. We were at a 'cozy' little restaurant in San Francisco (where we lived at the time). You know the kind of place where the tables are all right next to each other with a bench that lines the back wall across all the tables. A couple with their kids sat next to us. The woman was a serious Nosey Parker telling everyone what to do, what to order, reaching across the table to cut someone's meat. She saw my husband pull out a little velvet box and slide it toward me. She audibly gasped. She nearly yelled "he's going to ask her to marry him!" The look on her face was sympathy that he was going to make me an 'honest woman.' We both shot her a glare and my husband said, "we've been married for 5 years and this is our anniversary, as if it is any of your business." You could see the relief on her face that I was not having this child out of wedlock. Now it makes me giggle when I slide on my ring and think of that bossy stranger interrupting my moment. It is par for the course of my unconventional life.
Well I have apparently jump the gun! I posted too early to reveal some of my projects. So those of you who were here early and saw my reveal of the first 2 pieces ... you got the sneak peak! The rest of you will have to come back to see these and the others!
This is part of a new effort by Artisan Whimsy, a community of jewelry artisans. It was started as monthly group for testing products by using a grouping of components to design with. This month the component provider is ZnetShows and I got my packet about 2 weeks ago (you can see them off to the left). I will re-post at a later date ... when I'm supposed to (doh!)
This week's prompt for Focusing on Life is to find the green in your life. As Sally says, it is the color of balance, learning, growth and harmony. It symbolizes calm, self-respect and well being.
Green has always been my favorite color. For as long as I can remember. And when my husband and I got engaged, I knew that I didn't want to do anything in a traditional way. We ended up eloping, which means no one knew we were engaged. And when we did get married (about 3 months later) we exchanged simple wedding bands.
Afterwards, my new husband surprised me with my engagement ring which was an emerald. Our marriage has been about building a life together, about finding balance in life and a harmony in our relationship. I can say we really have grown together over the 20 years we've been married. And I cannot image any other path in my life.
The second ring is a beautiful diamond that my husband gave me five years after we were married. Certainly not traditional! He surprised me on the eve of giving birth to our first child. Funny story, but perhaps for another post.
I have been wanting to try my hand at Lesley's tutorial that she calls Double Strand Seed Bead and Jump Ring Bracelet. I saw this posted months ago back on her blog and thought what a fantastically simple, and elegant design.
So many other projects got in the way, but I finally gave it a go. I've been wanting to use these beautiful shank buttons with a 4 leaf pattern, which I think have sort of a Celtic feel to them. The background in the button is coppery brown, so I pulled out copper jump rings. And just to accentuate the pattern I played the copper off alternating white crystals to really show them off.
I've been experimenting lately with tone on tone pieces that let the pattern really be the star. And I have to say that I am quite happy with the elegant, subtle color of this one. Anyone else playing with tone on tone lately?
I really have had so much fun creating with the beach glass sent to me from ZnetShows. I love that Beach-Boho look, and these pieces just fit right in on my beading table.
My latest piece is a fun little beaded summer cuff with an orange starfish that is actually a shank button. So it made the perfect button closure on this simple ladder patterned bracelet.
I added a little orange sparkle throughout with some accent beads in Chinese crystal that was sent along with my beach glass. It does look so pretty together! And, it looks great on my daughter with a whimsical, beachy top. Perfect for summer.
This week's Focusing on Life challenge was to look for typography and blog about whether it drew you in, inspired you or perhaps spoke to you. Hmm, this one really had me thinking.
Each day as I commute to my job, I walk through Grand Central Station. Recently I've noticed the sign for the Graybar Building. Ornate and interesting. I must have walked by it hundreds of times. Always in a rush, never paying any attention. But in the last few weeks I kept thinking, I need to look up what 'Graybar' means. So this week, I did. In fact, I took a lunch hour to walk over to the building and snap some pictures. Both inside the lobby, and from across the street.
The Graybar Building sits next to Grand Central Station. I mean literally, right next to it. There are entrances in the station to the building lobby. Across the street is the Chrysler building. I think with all these other iconic locations, the Graybar Building gets lost. I had never heard of it, yet I walk by it every day. The Building was the first office building in the immediate Grand Central Terminal area of the city. Wow. There are so many today, but then this building dates back to early 1900s.
It was named after its original tenants Elisha Gray and Enos Barton. It has that same classic Art Deco style that I love in the old buildings of New York, complete with an old mail slot. It isn't in use (note the "closed" on the box). I love all the details in the lobby. They have a Moorish feel to them. The floor has tiles like the edges of a rug, look up and you see beautiful rich reds in the ceiling with lantern-like light fixtures. Lots of circles adorn the lobby. No detail seemingly forgotten.
The most interesting part of the building is just outside the front door. The canopy, above the entrance, is held up by 3 large metal rods resembling the ropes (or mooring lines) off a ship. You'll notice cones on the rods which are 'rat guards' that keep rats from climbing on ship when in port. Just below the cones you see that there are 3 cast metal rats. Some say that this is the first nod to New York City being called the 'rat race.' If you look closely, where the cable (or 'hawser') reaches the building there are eight rat heads. (You might need to click on the link as I couldn't quite capture them with my little iphone). So the question is ... are we the people, represented by rats, trying to get in? Or are we already inside trying to get out? The conundrum of New York City.
The most common explanation for the 'rat' architecture is that it represents the shipping business that defined the historical roots of the Graybar company.
Also, at the time of the building's construction the city was much more of a waterfront, or port city. I can honestly say I never noticed the rats. But standing there and looking up; sure enough ... they are metal rats!
There are figures on the building facade. They are bas-relief panels and have an Assyrian look to them. I could't find any explanation or background on what these panels had to do with the building, but I like them.
The Graybar Building is certainly one of the lesser known skyscrapers in the city. I had no idea about it's background, or that it is registered as a Landmark. But I quickly found out as I drifted through the lobby taking pictures on my paisley covered iphone. As I was snapping away one of the security guards shouted at me to stop. I didn't realize that it was threatening to take pictures of clocks. But apparently anything deemed a Landmark is off limits. Good thing I got my snaps in before he chased me out!
Sea glass from ZnetShows is still on my bead table! But I am coming to the end of the amazing stash Bill sent my way.
I love these diamond shaped ones. They have such a softness to the edges of the glass, and really do look like they were tumbled by the sea.
I love the simplicity of how the orange hue from the glass comes through the etched leaves. I wanted to lock the pattern in place by wire wrapping both the charm and the glass together. A simple double wire wrap.
If you want to give a double wrap a try, you can find my tutorial on this technique in one of my posts from last Fall, along with a few examples.
This was a fun project for so many reasons. First, as you all know I'm nuts about history and the origins of artifacts. But I was thrilled when a friend handed me a bubble wrapped mystery and asked if I might be able to do something with it. As I unwrapped it, I got very excited. Yah, I know I'm a geek that way. But I saw these shards and realized that they had to be from a recent trip to Thailand.
Our friend was explaining that he'd been snorkeling off a small island in the Philippines called Isla Verde, a popular dive site where a Spanish Galleon ship went down in 1620 after returning from a trip to China. It was full of items; including Chinese pottery, when it went down. Those pottery shards are now washing up on the shore of the small island.
The island is located right in the center of a strait in the Philippines and known for it's pristine clear waters with a great view of the wreck. Not much is left to salvage from the wreckage except for shards of porcelain and a few larger pieces of terracotta jars. It is a pretty unique place where you can enjoy amazing scuba diving, and above the water you can walk the beach to discover pieces of porcelain from the shipwreck centuries before.
Our friend asked if I might be able to take the shards and create a pair of earrings for his girlfriend. I tried to be as minimalistic as possible (or in other words, I did not not want to bezel these). I wanted to leave as much of the edges as I could so you could still see the wear on the porcelain from the sea. I decided that I would cold forged some 16 gauge silver to create a partial bezel and glue it to the porcelain. Because the porcelain is porous it worked quite well for this technique. These are a secret gift, but no worries as I don't believe she reads my blog. I hope she likes them!
Kashmira is hosting a hop today featuring anklet designs. She gave us a few tips prior to us getting to work on our pieces. She tells us that we really need to first think about the construction of the ankle itself. It is cylindrical, and therefore the pattern really needs to flow well. And don't use anything too large which will prevent it from draping well.
The other thing about the ankle is that it is bony and anything sharp can cut into the skin and make for a seriously uncomfortable situation. So avoid bicone crystals or anything else that can feel sharp.
As we all know, we tend to show off our ankles when it gets warm, but hot weather can also cause swelling, especially if you're walking a lot. So make sure you've left enough room to your pattern; definitely it should not be tight. All great advice!
I decided on a beaded anklet with turquoise (I love this color in the summer especially with whites). I also could just not help myself ... I've always wanted to add a little chime to an anklet, so I did add small bells. It took quite a hunt around Manhattan to find a place that carried these! The second the bells were added, my daughter was asking if she could try it on. My model for these pictures would be my daughter, and the anklet has found it's new home as I haven't been able to get this one off her since.
This week Sally asked us to focus on food for our Focusing on Life prompt. Well alrighty then. I can do that!
A comfort food to me is a lazy weekend lunch of bread and toppings. An open-faced sandwich if you will. Growing up; it was a staple. You can find this in pretty much any Scandinavian kitchen. My Norwegian friends call it a smørbrød, and if you're Swedish you might call it a 'cold table' or smörgåsbord. I just call it delicious.
So a favorite for me is to slice a few pieces of a fresh Italian bread, some greens (I prefer arugula with its slightly peppery flavor), a few slices of cheese and a little kick with jelly. I LOVE chili jelly. And a good friend of mine makes some pretty amazing homemade stuff. On my table is a little from her farm called The Land of Nod in Canaan CT (just in case you're in the neighborhood and can stop by).. it's worth it.
Earlier in the week I posted a blue sea glass necklace in silver. I really like the blue sea glass with silver as it has a casual Beach-Boho feel. But I wanted to try something with a little more glam.
This is a similar piece, but this time I used gold and orange glass. I created a focal with a beautiful piece of orange sea glass from ZnetShows shaped as a conch shell.
This is a handmade chain with faceted cut, accent beads and gold bars I was gifted from Christine of One Kiss Creations. I also made a hook clasp with a little hammer gold 18 gauge wire.
A simple piece, with a touch more elegance in gold vs. the silver. Perfect for a summer's night out.
This month Sharla of the Beaded Tail has challenged the BBA team to "create something with flowers and let your imagination bloom!"
I confess that this Spring has been start and stop. One day it is miserably cold, and a few days later it feels like July. I think my flowers in the yard are equally confused! Their blooms open up to the spring rains, and the hot days wilt them.
This year I've been feeling like the colors are washed out, and decided to do a piece in muted colors. I took inspiration from my yard.
I've been wanting to use some new beads that most people call "dragon scales." If you line them all up in a row they do look a bit like scales. If you click on the link you'll see an example of a bracelet made this way.
But I wanted to try something different. I did a double cross over which created a cluster that locks in place, which I think resembles a lotus flower. I also used a few faceted yellow glass beads from Znetshows. I like how the white makes the pale yellow stand out like my flowering dogwood or my double bloom daffodils. I do like how this pattern turned out. I just might have to try it in other colors!
I wanted to make a simple necklace with a single sea glass focal from ZnetShows.
This one does just that. I added a starfish charm to pull in that Beach-Boho feel. Bill also sent along a few blue faceted glass beads to use as accent. They work perfectly in this simple hand-made chain I did for the necklace. You might notice some sweet silver bars I also used ... many thanks to Christine who gifted those to me!
Clearly, I'm having a lot of fun with the sea glass pieces. You can dress them up, or down ... make elaborate bead weave patterns or simple wire wraps. Hope you are all having a wonderful Memorial Day Weekend! Be safe out there.
I wanted to really play up on the richness of the orange sea glass from ZnetShows and decided to pull our some charms that I got when we were traveling in Spain a few years ago. I picked these up in Toledo. They are a technique called Damascene where they score metals and oxidize the unmarked areas. I blogged about our trip to Spain awhile back.
I wanted the charms to lay flat on the sea glass, but to do that I had to make my own kidney wires. Typically the wires only have room for a single charm. But with the thickness of the glass I needed to make a larger loop. Making wires are actually not difficult at all to make. One more thing I ask myself why I buy them if I can make them so easily? Hmmmm, note to self.
For this second pair (same glass shape) I used a pale yellow, etched glass leaf. The earwires are copper from Melinda of ORRTEC. The copper gives it a little more rustic look, which I really love. With these earwires I also had to re-shape them to widen the loop to fit both pieces, but that was easy enough. These are a sweet little pair and I just love the simplicity of them.
When people talk about something being an 'acquired taste' they typically mean that as you grow older that you've had time to become familiar with unusual tastes, smells or even odors (such as cheeses). Over time you might actually grow fond of that unusual taste.
Salmiakkis are an acquired taste. But I don't think it has much to do with age since every kid on my block loved them. They are considered a treat for Finnish kids, and my neighbors had them shipped (by the box load) directly from Finland. We all asked to get in on the action.
What, might you ask, is a Salmiakki? It is salty licorice that originates from the early 1900s in Finland, Norway and the Netherlands. Originally it was used as a cough medicine known for 'tongue-numbing,' and somewhere along the way became a candy. Clearly, an acquired taste! They are quite salty.
This week Sally asked us for our Focusing on Life prompt to think of a time when in the middle of your busy day something unexpected brings you right back to childhood. I was traveling for work last year and was in our London offices, and saw a box of Salmiakkis on a co-workers' desk. She cracked open the box and I popped one in my mouth. Instantly I got flashbacks of me, standing in the yard with my childhood friends. I get that with tastes, smells and especially music. Salmiakkis definitely make me feel like a kid.
This is a quick post today from my bead table to show you a simple pair of earrings with sea glass from ZnetShows. I used infinity charms from Nina Designs. They are the last of my stash that I was sent last August. I really love how well the gold and orange go together.
I have a few more earrings paired with orange sea glass to show you that I'll post over the weekend, so stop back by!
This piece came together quickly. I was playing around with bezeling the outside of a piece of blue sea glass and then added a second and saw a focal coming together.
I think for me, when Bill of ZnetShows sent me a stash of sea glass I immediately saw how a few pieces here and there could be added to patterns. I've shied away from using the mother-load in any one piece. But that also means that the projects will just keep rolling out over the next few days, to a week. Dare I say 2 weeks? I'm not sure yet as I'm still working my way through it all.
Ok, back to the piece here. The inspiration was silver. I really love how silver can bring out a richness to deep blues.
I found this gorgeous bail at a recent bead show. And yes it is a little heavy, and yes they weigh the silver which means this was a bit of a splurge. But I love it. I added my own hammered charm and a few large silver beads. Just enough silver to play off the blues.
The spiral is a Russian Spiral done with all the same size beads. What this means is that it has more of a webbing look and feel. I threaded the spiral over light blue cord and used a couple basting stitches to keep the spiral in place. Honestly, this piece came together inside of 2 hours. And I just love it's Boho Zen feel. Check out my teenage daughter sporting it with a denim shirt and lace top.
I've got a lot of sea glass from ZnetShows on the bead table at the moment. In fact I kinda have it all over the place with pieces in varying levels of 'done-ness.' Much to my family's chagrin.
I'm working as quickly as I can to plow through the patterns, but just as I'm halfway through one another pattern seeps in and I need to start that project so I don't lose the idea. Yeah, I know, it's kinda a sickness. But the ideas are just pouring out as I play with this wonderful sea glass!
I think this freeform piece might just be my all-time favorite. Not sure why exactly since I had a bit of a throw down wrestling with the pattern. It was all good in the end. The cream, matte beads seemed to pick up the texture of a starfish and the orange sea glass are like windows beckoning both sides of the cuff. It is uniformed when looking at the whole piece, but pull up close and it has the uniqueness you'd find on the surface of a starfish, or snowflake that only a freeform pattern can do.
I used a number of stitches in this one. The main one being freeform peyote, but I also used ladder and brick with some larger square beads. I also continued this freeform stitching for the bezels around the sea glass, and brought in some micro seed beads to create a bit of a dainty pattern around the edges. I am still working on the closure, but I will most likely use my most recent zig zag pattern to give it a continuous feel.
I have been trying to find my groove with freeform, but I have struggled with feeling like I am suppose to create a somewhat 'messy' pattern. But my big epiphany with this piece is that there are no rules, and who says you can't have a little structure to freeform? I still stitched organically across the pattern, but I used some structured elements too. I think this might actually be my comfort zone with freeform beading.
Artisan Whimsy, a community of jewelry artisans, has started a monthly group for testing products by using a grouping of components to design with. This month the component provider is ZnetShows and the packet I received is to your left. 
I'm not one to use all the components in one piece, or even two. So I'm going to show you several different designs. 
I thought I'd start with the ones on the top. ZnetShows calls them "fish bones." I did two pieces with these beads, starting with the pairing I did with New Zealand paua shells. These are shells that are collected along the shores of New Zealand that have been somewhat bashed about. So they end up as bits and pieces. But I just loved them. I bought them from a local bead store in Auckland where they drill holes for beaders. I created a fringe with the shells along the edges of a pretty ribbon. Then I bead embroidered the fish bones along the band. I finished the bracelet with adjustable buttons for alternating sizes. I really love how this one turned out. And as an added bonus, it makes the best sound when you're wearing it! The jingling sound of shells.
I used most of the smaller pieces for the bracelet, but with the larger ones I did beaded caps and nestled them into a netting to create a choker. I included a few of the Chinese crystals I had left from an earlier Znetshows stash, and then finished off the necklace with blue leather and a silver hammered closure. 
With the individual pieces of sea glass in the middle, I made a series of earrings. I was again creating my own earwires. I'm kind of liking making my own these days! First up are the larger rectangular glass that I paired with a silver wave charm. This pair light weight and has a nice swing to them.
Next are the smaller rectangular glass in a fainter sea foam green. Boy I love this color of glass! I did a slightly 'mismated' pair with a hammered charm on just one of the earrings, and then a silver etched flower bead I picked up at a bead show. 
Next are another pair of conch shell earrings. I've been loving these baby conch shell beads; they are so fun to create with! I did a few last week that you can see here. This pair I kept somewhat simple adding only a few Chinese crystals to them. They match up nicely to the netted choker above.
The last pair I made use a pretty little pair of antique silver connectors. These were part of the last set of sea glass along the bottom. I added a little MOP (mother of pearl) charm to the bottom to keep that beachy feel to them.
Ok, you all still with me? I know this is a long post. Longer than I normally do, but the rules are to post all my projects together in just one link so I can connect to the linky on the Artisan Whimsy site. Don't forget to check out everyone else's designs. 
