New style

 A couple of years ago when I was in Israel over the summer I picked up some semi-precious beads on the streets of the Old City in Jerusalem. I haven't done much with them, but I decided to pull out this one and create something for a friend who generally has a different aesthetic than I do.  This is a long piece that just slips over the head. I was really pleased with how it came out and the combination of the wooden ring with the brass leaves and chain and malachite.

Bead Soup Blog Party Reveal!

It was down to the wire, but I turned this:

Into this:

The bead soup at the top came from the very talented Tammy Powley. You can see all of her work at her blog and specifically what she created with what I sent her here.  She sent me some great stuff and I tried to incorporate as much of it as I could.  I'm looking forward to playing with the pieces I didn't get to use in time for this reveal in the future.

There were beaders from five continents who participated in this bead soup party and huge thanks go to Lori Anderson for organizing the event.  You can find the whole list of participants and blogs on her website.  I'm looking forward to checking out all of them over the next few weeks.

I really loved the focal bead that I was sent and the way one of the clasps picked up some of the colors in the multicolored bead.  I don't often make really colorful pieces but I really wanted to use the seed beads I was sent plus extra beads from my own collection to capture how multicolored the focal bead was.

A Present

I put together this little set a couple of weeks ago for a friend who was getting married.  We celebrated her bachelorette party the night before Hurricane Irene hit and it unfortunately disrupted the wedding plans a bit, but she managed to reschedule for the next week and have a beautiful wedding.  I'd wanted to put together something special for her so I created something based around some turquoise beads that I had gotten in the Old City in Jerusalem last summer.  I wish her and her new husband all the best for the future!

Where have I been keeping myself?

It's been a long while since I've worked on anything new when it comes to beadwork. 
Back in December while I was doing some cross training for the half marathon I ran in January I started to feel some sharp pain in my wrist when I would do a push up.  I figured I'd hurt the muscles a bit and if I just laid off it would be fine.  As I am sure you can imagine it really wasn't a hardship to not do any more pushups at the time.  For a couple of months everything seemed to be ok, but then the pain in my right wrist started to get worse.  After a couple of doctor's visits and an x-ray that revealed nothing the doctor decided it was tendonitis an sent me for physical therapy in April.  I've spent a long summer of PT and the wrist is now nearly all better (plus I have the best upper body strength I've had in years!).  I can't speak highly enough of how wonderful my therapy experience has been.  I didn't think it would really help or fix the problem, but though the process is slow, I haven't felt real pain in months.  It has meant that beading took a bit of a back seat as I was trying to avoid doing too much handwork. 

However, now that I am feeling better, I though I'd start by participating in Lori Anderson's Bead Soup Blog Party.

A few weeks back I got this beautiful assortment of beads from bead party partner Tammy Powley.  I'm excited to show you next week what I've come up with!


In the meantime you can check out the other blog project I started - Disney Diversions!

New things in the Etsy Store!

Need a last minute Valentine's Gift? Check these out. Purchase here!