Wednesday, July 4, 2012

Pantone Colour Bead Swap

Wow! It's been a while since I blogged. It's July now and school is out!!!! Yeah! So I can focus more on my shop and creating new products.  After a year of classroom trashing and other challenges, I'm ready to get back to may "business hobby".  lol.

Last month, I participated in Lori Anderson's Pantone Colour Bead Swap.  I'm learning so much through these hops and challenges. Here is what I sent to my partner Tania Hagen:
 -------------->

Just like the BSBP, we were paired with a partner and discussed what we sent and how much.  Tania and I decided to send a bit of all the Pantone colours.  My first task was to find out what are Pantone colours.  Apparently, Pantone are the peeps that decide what the colours of the year are. Each year and season, there are a new group of colours for designers to play around with.

I have a few of the same beads I gave to Tania and of course the bunch that I got from her.  It's time to get them out and start making something!



Saturday, May 5, 2012

One Colour Crayon Challenge Blog Hop


Today is the big reveal of of the One Crayon Color Challenge!  For this challenge, we were to pick one colour and use all the shades, tints, and tones of a colour.  Of course, I chose my ultimate favourite colour.  and my colour is.........

purple!


I started by gathering all the purple beads I could find from my stash. Since it was my favourite colour, I didn't have to look very far. The hard part was putting something together that actually looked nice and deciding which beads I should use. Should I use all of them or some of them.

I decided to use the purplish-blue hue instead of the red-purple. Then it took me a couple weeks come up with the design.  I had several butterfly filigree beads that I never used so I thought I'd include that into the mix.



Started by placing beads onto my beading tray and rearranging and adding/subtracting pearls until I got to something that looked like this....



I used 2 sizes of mauve Swarovski pearls. The larger 8mm pearls near the center/focal and the smaller 4mm pearls were handknotted for the rest of the necklace.  I also used dark purple nugget shaped Swarovski pearls.  I have never seen Swarovski pearls in this shape before until I saw them at a local bead store and just had to buy them. In the center, of the butterfly are two shades of purple Swarovski crystals with a teardrop Swarovski pearl hanging  from the bottom of the butterfly.

And here it is!




Here are the matching earrings.




Both pieces are now on sale in my Etsy store. Just click on the button below.

**NECKLACE IS SOLD**


A big thank you to Sally Russick for hosting this challenge. I learned a lot more about colours and jewellery design. Now, off to check out the rest of the participants!


Hosted by:

Sally Russick  http://thestudiosublime.com

Red

Bobbie Rafferty   http://beadsong.blogspot.com

Orange

Linda Landig  http://LindasBeadBlog.com
Renetha Stanziano   http://lamplightcrafts.blogspot.com
Tanya Goodwin  http://pixiloo.blogspot.com
Amy Severino   http://amybeads.blogspot.com

 Yellow

Heather Powers   http://humblebeads.blogspot.com

Blue

Rebecca Anderson  http://songbeads.blogspot.com
Hope Smitherman  http://craftyhope.blogspot.com
Alicia Marinache  http://allprettythings.ca
Charissa Sloper   http://blog.obsidiansoda.com
Sandi Volpe   http://sandivolpe.com

 Green

Jenny Davies Reazor   http://www.jdaviesreazor.com
Elizabeth Auld  http://beadsforbusygals.com

Purple

Jennifer Judd Velasquez http://jenjuddrocks.blogspot.com
Lori Anderson  http://prettythingsblog.com

Brown

Diana Ptaszynski   http://suburbangirlstudio.com
Janice Everett   http://JLynnJewels.blogspot.com

Black




Saturday, April 28, 2012

Broken Butterfly Bead :(

After participating in the Bead Soup Blog Party, I put the pieces I made on a necklace stand on our dresser. Just so I could look at it but mostly cause I didn't know where to put it. One morning, my husband comes to me and says that he was really sorry and told me not to get mad. He had accidentally knocked the necklace stand over and the pretty orange butterfly bead broke into many pieces. 

This is what the bead looked like before.....



and after.......



Now it gives me an excuse to make a new one.  :)




Monday, April 9, 2012

Bead Cruise: I wanna go!!!!



 I just found out about the existence of bead cruises. A week long cruise filled with everything you would enjoy on a cruise ship PLUS beading workshops, design challenges and meeting other beaders. Why would you not want to go!

For more info about the Bead Cruise click here: www.beadcruise.com

Speaking of cruises, I just came back from my very first cruise with my family. The best part of the cruise is the food. Imagine, all you can eat fine dining everyday. I'm not a big meat eater but their steak was 'melting' in my mouth. Here are some pics from my trip.


Disneyland

Did I mention that the food was fantastic??

Smoked salmon and apricots...  Mmmmmm!


and......

I joined another blog hop! For this challenge, the participants will choose one colour and create something using all the tints, shades, and tones of that one colour.  I just taught a unit to my Grade 1's about colour value. Guess what colour I'm going to use?

Join me on May 5th for the "One Crayon Color Challenge"!

Monday, March 26, 2012

DVD Tutorial Giveaway!

So.... Lori from Pretty Things Blog is having a giveaway! She reviewed Scott David Plumlee's how-to DVD's for making wire jewellery and chain maille and now she's giving three of those DVD's to some lucky people. I started making wire jewellery awhile ago but didn't really get too into it because silver wire was hard to come by locally and I just didn't have the $$$$. Bought the hammer, a wigjig, and some cheap wire too.  Even got my dad, who's an engineer, to get me a big block of metal from work so I have something hard to hammer on. Chain maille has always fascinated me. Just how much detail goes into making one of those jewellery pieces.

If you want a chance to enter click HERE!


Saturday, March 3, 2012

Bead Soup Blog Party: The reveal!


Hosted by Lori Anderson
It's Bead Soup Blog Party time!!!!!!!!
This is the longest post I've ever written but it's also the most exciting. Last month, I got to participate in my first ever Bead Soup Blog Party. What happens is each participant gets paired with a partner and they exchange a 'soup' of beads. The partners are meant to challenge each other by getting her to work outside her comfort level.  This was definitely a challenge for me as I've never worked with copper or brass before.

When I first got my package from Shanti Johnson, I immediately loved the colors.  It was so bright and orange-y and pretty.  My next thought was "What am I going to do with these????????"
  

My delicious soup from Shanti
It took a while but I started working with the brass 'hope' focal  first. This is what I made with the brass materials but it was too simple and I didn't like it, so I took it apart.




I have a soft spot for butterflies so naturally the orange butterfly beads were one of my favourites in the mix. They became the focals for this necklace:

Copper leaf toggle clasp.  So pretty!
Other than the two butterfly stone beads, I used some turquoise stones, brown wooden beads that went will with some orange rondelles. I love the leaf toggle, so I used that in this piece.


As I looked at the rest of the beads, I really couldn't figure out what to do. I've never used copper before. My main material for my jewellery pieces were silver and pearls. As I finished that butterfly piece I actually ran out of copper materials.  So I thought, "Why can't I mix colours together?" and that's how this necklace came about: A mixture of copper and silver.  haha...  I know, I cheated.



This necklace was made from a two-toned Swarovski crystal and one of the focal rings from Shanti. Isn't it beautiful?




This necklace is now on sale in my Etsy store. Just click on the link below.





This brass bracelet uses the really cute elephant clasp and some brass rings.  I thought, I would just add a litte bit of me to at least one piece, so I decided to sprinkle it with some white, creamrose, and bronze Swarovski pearls.



I started my beading hobby by making earrings and I can't believe through this whole bead soup, I only made one pair of earrings.  These are the pretty turquoise stones with brass chains.




Well, that's all I had time to make.  It was such a learning process and so much fun.  I'll be blog hopping now.  First hop will be to my partner, Shanti, who gave me all those wonderful beads.  Here is what I gave here.  Click to see her post of what she made with my soup. www.sunshinebliss.com



Here's all the participants of BSBP:
Visit my Pinterest (will be updated once I get to all the posts) to see all the awesome creations or visit each persons blog below.

Wednesday, February 22, 2012

Beading to Beat Autism

So far the bead soup is still brewing.  I've finished one necklace that I'm very happy with and a few other pieces that needs more work. I think I'm going to need a few more pins but I'm doing pretty well using all the scrap wires.  I think my next piece, I'm going to add some pearls onto it. Just a touch of "me" in these pieces.

Report cards were sent home last week, so weekends are a bit more relaxing.  More time to make jewellery and work on my Bead Soup!

Two weeks ago, a couple of colleagues and I started a beading club at my school for Grades 3-5. It all started when I found out about "Beading to Beat Autism".  A 14 year old girl from Kentucky raised money for an Autism treatment for her little brother just by selling beaded bracelets that she made.  Now she has taken on the mission of raising money to build a foundation center for Autism research. You can read more about her story on the link below or watch the video to find out how you can get your own "Michala's Kit".



So far, our beading club has 30 or so girls participating and making bracelets. They're even bringing in their own beads to donate to this great cause. Maybe a few more weeks from now, we'll be able to sell them to the rest of the school and community!  



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