A little Monkee YouTube show!

Beading Times Featured Artist

Beading Times is an online magazine for all things connected to beading.  Each month they feature a different Bead Artist and I'm so honoured to announce that they chose me for December's edition!



Here's a link to the article December's Featured Artist, Carolyn Jankovskis of Beading Times was drawn to my Monkees and also my Faux Boro beads so they are the main focus of the article.

I'm very excited - it's a fantastic way to finish up a year that's been full of growth and firsts for me on my beadmaking journey :o)

A tutorial from Aardvark

Sometimes my will is weak.

When I saw what fellow WC-er Maxine had created with her Aardvark Fish Tutorial - take a peek here, and saw what wonderful creations people were posting on the LE forum , I have to confess my will broke completely!  I purchased my first ever tutorial.

Was it worth the money?  You bet it was!  Lots of useful tips and ideas, but no matter how hard I tried to follow the instructions I couldn't quite end up with a fish ..



It nearly looked like a fish, but not quite, something just wasn't right...

So I tried another...



THEN I realised what the problem was!

These weren't FISH!!



The were SEA MONKEES!!!

After that revelation I tried the eyelid part of the tutorial and I think I ended up with my first ever Sea Monkee in Space, and she looks pretty PO'd about it!



I think I need to work on the eyelids a little!  In my defence it was getting dark when I made her and the light in the suporch is really bad ;o)

So would I buy another tutorial?  Yes, most definitely!  The trick is to take the information you learn and turn it into something else, to put your own twist on things.  Sea Monkees hadn't entered my mind until I got the 'It's a Wonderful Fish' tutorial and brainstormed with a friend.

Art Fire shop is brimming with cake testers!

I didn't get them all added on Saturday, so this morning I have cleaned and photographed all my latest cake testers and uploaded some of them to my Art Fire shop .  I'm about to send out my first newsletter and wanted to make sure I was well stocked before I did.

Here's the wackiest one so far.  I'd like to try and refine this design a bit, but I thought someone with a wild sense of humour might enjoy it.



Along with this crazy cake, you'll find space monkees, chef monkees, Bill the Baker and little Nobby amongst others.

Who's Nobby? Ahhh well, there's a story....
Little Nobby never did understand why his mother made him keep his hat on all day at school...

Monkees with freckles!

From time to time something goes awry.  Something unplanned happens, as with this guy



Isn't he good looking?!  I'll call him Murdoch.

Murdoch was born with looks to wow the ladies, and a cowlick that most bovines would jump gates for.  David says he has a Homer Simpson quality to his face, I happen to think he looks far more intelligent ;o)

All was well, until Murdoch was pulled from the kiln and I realised he has a blemish.  Yes, even the best of us can have blemishes.  The back of his head touched a hot mandrel in the kiln and it left a mark -



Barely noticeable right?  There's a small indentation up near the top back of his head, it doesn't feel sharp, it's just there.  Poor Murdoch!  He's got such a lovely face I still wanted to offer him for sale, and didn't want him to think he was somehow a 'lesser' monkee because of it.  So I decided to call it a freckle.  Freckles make me think of happy children, the word somehow doesn't carry the weight of 'FLAW' or 'DEFECT'.  Murdoch certainly doesn't have either of those - he has a FRECKLE!

Monkees with FRECKLES are extremely special, and because of this I've decided that I need to make them even more accessible to people!  In order to do this, I'm offering Murdoch at a special price!  If you think he's dashingly handsom and that his FRECKLE makes him super special, you can purchase him for $10.  He's delighted about the whole thing, because he feels that it lifts him above the crowd where he surely deserves to be.

Visit my Buy Beads page to find out how you can purchase Murdoch, Monkee with a FRECKLE!

Glub, Glub, and monkees on sticks!

One thing that I really enjoyed about the Ottawa Bead Show was hearing other peoples ideas.  One lady called my cake tester's 'monkees on sticks' and I though how perfect that was.  A nice catchy name that was rather humourous!

Here's an experiment - Scubamonkee!

First Ottawa Bead Show - A HUGE Success!!

I'm so excited to write this post.  Our Ottawa Glass Bead Artists Show was on Saturday and I am still on a high from it.

I think it's safe to say it was a wonderful success!  Thank you Valentina for all these pictures!

[caption id="attachment_929" align="alignnone" width="450" caption="Ottawa Glass Bead Artists First Show!"][/caption]

This was not only the first Bead Show I have attended but also the first Bead Show I have been in, and for me it couldn't have been better on both counts!  The attendance was amazing, I guess the word really got out, and the feedback we were getting from attendees was that this was something that was LONG OVERDUE in the Ottawa area, and also that many of the people visiting had no idea that there were so many talented beadmakers in the area.

[caption id="attachment_933" align="alignnone" width="450" caption="Crowds!!"][/caption]

So we definitely raised the profile of Glass Beads in Ottawa!

From the time the doors opened until mid afternoon there was a steady stream of people coming through, and it seemed to me that things only quietened down in the last couple of hours.  We had wonderful door prizes available and there have to be some excited winners out there somewhere.  I know I would have been thrilled if I'd won any of them.



From a vendors point of view, I feel as though I have learned so much!  It was really good to see other Artist's beads and see the size, quality and price.  That has helped me a lot because I was mostly guessing and hoping I'd got it right.  It was also very helpful to hear people's comments and see which beads got the most attention.  This has given me more of an idea of which direction to head off into next.



I have to say for me, my Monkee beads were the hit!  I had so many wonderful smiles and chuckles from people, and lovely comments.  One young attendee came to the show with her parents for the sole purpose of seeing and buying a Monkee bead!  I was so honoured!  Monkees in Space are also a hit and I sold half of my stock of them, so I will definitely be making more and thinking of ways they can evolve.



There are so many people who need to be thanked!  Grace Edwards, our Lauscha Lady , without her drive and determination this show wouldn't have happened.  Then there are all the members and volunteers who did so much to make sure we had a successful day.  I have to thank also, my good friend Valentina and partner Lou, who shared a table with me, and took lots of pictures!  Valentina's talent seems to be without end, not only can she create beautiful silver chain maille, but also makes glass beads, jewellery, and sings - watch out because she's about to hit Ottawa in a big way!

Of course, we need to thank every single person who showed up to see what it was all about - I do hope you'll all come back next year, and check out all the Artists in the meantime.

Lastly but most definitely not least -- I wouldn't have been at the show myself, without the help and support of my husband David, and best friend Jane.  Jane got up at 5am to be there at my side for setup and stayed all day, helping in many ways.  David lived through all the pre-show stress and jitters as we tried to figure out a display and make sure there was enough content, he stayed throughout the afternoon until the show was over.  It was David who created the postcards for the show, and also a poster that was setup out front on the day.



It really does take a lot of people to bring off such a successful event!

Last Day Before Show!

And as Scooby would say "YIIIIKES!"



Yes, tomorrow is  the Ottawa Glass Bead Artists’ (OGBA) First Annual Bead & Jewellery Show!!!

If you are in the Ottawa area, you should really try to get there, I know for a fact there are some extremely talented Artists displaying and selling their wares.

The show runs from 10am to 5pm at the RA Centre, 2451 Riverside Driv, Ottawa, Ontario - entry is FREE and there will be some wonderful door prizes, including a ready made collection of Artisan Glass Beads, and Free lampworking sessions at the studios of some very generous Glass Artists!

As well as Glass Beads, there will be other beads, beading supplies and lampworking supplies for sale.  It's really shaping up to be an incredible event.

That said, I'm down to the wire, I have a huge list to still wade through and that's today taken care of.  Since this is my first big event I'm feeling nervous but also excited.  I'll have beads, Space Monkees, and a selection of jewellery for sale, much of which is the result of a collaboration between myself and Meghann Gervais, who's work is of wonderful quality and style.

The weather doesn't look good for raking leaves or doing outdoor things tomorrow, so why not get a jump start on your Christmas shopping, and come out and meet the Ottawa Glass Bead Artists group and everyone else who will be there!

Tag I'm it and a Brooch to go APE over!

Well, I woke up this morning, and you were on my mind... you were on my mind...  Oh sorry, too little sleep has me starting the day off with a song!  Let me try again.

I woke up this morning to find I had been tagged by Rita's Rambles - Thank you Rita!

What does this mean you might ask?  Well I will tell you, here are the rules -

Here are the rules of tagging
1. Link to tagger and display these rules on your blog.
2. Share 7 facts about yourself - some random, some WEIRD.
3. Tag 7 people at the end of your post by including links to their blog.
4. Let them know they have been tagged by leaving a comment on their blog.

Now I have to find SEVEN people to tag!  Bet you are all quaking in your boots!

Before I do the weird stuff and tagging, I want to quickly share this wonderful brooch that Meghann Gervais made for my right before my very eyes yesterday!  I love visiting Meghann because she's super talented and loves too bake, so there's always something yummy on the go as well!  Yesterday she sent me home with a whole half of her delicious bundt cake that was still warm and moist and crammed with cranberries.   Ooooh I felt so special :oD

The brooch?  Oh yes, here it is!

[caption id="attachment_856" align="alignnone" width="450" caption="Marmite - Spread the World!"]

Go Ape over Monkees Brooch!

A BIG list of things to make

The Ottawa Glass Bead Artists show is now LESS than two weeks away.  I have a HUGE list of things I need to achieve, I don't know why I put things off.  Display?  Yeah... I'll get to it....  Now I really do have to get to it.  It's funny sometimes I work best under a deadline, some of my more creative ideas come to me at the last minute, which is not always a good thing because I seldom have what I need on hand to pull them off!



Sooo, I have to get with the display, I have some ideas, unfortunately they involve sawing wood which I neither have the tools or the expertise for, but I'll work on that.

Aside from a display I need to make more beads.  Monkees in Space are getting lots of wonderful comments, as are my regular Monkees so I want to try and get a bit of stock up there.  I have an idea for making cake testers too, which I think will be a popular gift item (unfortunately these involve sawing too!).  Oh, lets just go with the list -

1. Space Monkees


2. Monkees


3. Beads for Meghann to turn into a collaborative piece


4. Matching pairs for earrings


5. Cake testers


6. Display


7. A combination technique bead to show Marcy for her blog.


8. Other things for show - postcards - price tags - etc.

I think that will keep me busy today!

Oh and one more, but it might have to wait, I want to try a copy of a sugar skull bead - again Marcy posted an image on her blog and I'd love to try a copy of this skull!

Five more Monkees heading for Hollywood!

How exciting for them, and just in time as it's very cold and frosty outside my window this morning!
Here's a couple of them, just so you can see their smiling faces.

[caption id="attachment_819" align="alignnone" width="400" caption="Hooray! I'm heading South! SOLD"][/caption]

[caption id="attachment_820" align="alignnone" width="400" caption="I want to be a STAR! SOLD"][/caption]

Meanwhile, other crazy monkee ideas are hatching . . .

A LONG Long long long time ago, in a Universe FAR Far far away....

Well now, on not QUITE such a dramatic scale but almost....
Avert your ears if you hear a bad word!



So anyway, these Monkees went again!

[caption id="attachment_809" align="alignnone" width="450" caption="Monkees In SPACE!!"][/caption]

Trying a Flickr Slideshow!

I want to see if I can put a flickr slideshow into a post -



Apparently I can! That was quite painless, I think I'm Flickr challenged, it usually takes me forever to find instructions on the Flickr site to do what I want to. There's a little slideshow icon above your Flickr images that you can click to create a slideshow, and once the slideshow starts you can click the 'share' button to grab the code you need to place it into your blog or webpage. Too bad it resizes the smaller images to fit, making them look very pixely.

Hooray for Hollywood!

These three little guys on their way to Hollywood, I can't help but wonder what adventures lie in store for them!

[caption id="attachment_754" align="alignnone" width="300" caption="SOLD!"][/caption]

[caption id="attachment_753" align="alignnone" width="300" caption="SOLD!"][/caption]

[caption id="attachment_755" align="alignnone" width="300" caption="SOLD!"][/caption]

Alvin's feeling pretty pleased with himself too - he won a prize in Artistry In Glass' Intermediate catagory of their latest contest.  He's sure it's going to make him even more appealing to the ladies!

[caption id="attachment_757" align="alignnone" width="400" caption="He's a WINNER baby!"][/caption]

Developing your Web Presence #3 - Branding! Or 'Ouch! Don't come near with me that hot poker!'

To see all posts in this series click here

Seriously it's not half as painful as it sounds - Branding - and it doesn't involve anything hot - except your image when people see it and love it.

An example of excellent branding would be Apple - Mac - Imac - Ipod - Iphone - all those products.  What do you think of when you hear their name?  I think of the apple logo, and I think of bright colours and cool products.  Why?  Yep, because they've done a remarkably good job of Branding themselves.  If you look around you, you'll see company logos everywhere.  They might be text - like IBM and DELL, or they might be graphics like the Apple or ReMax with the balloon.

Now, I can't say reading this is going to give you the ability to become the next Apple, but it might make you consider how you can brand yourself a little, so that your image is consistant and reflects who you and your business are.

Back to Apple for a minute, I know what to expect when I see anything related to them - it's the image I spoke about above.  If I went to Apple's site and found a grey and blue page, with no apple logo and no bright colours I might be confused - I might wonder if I were in the right place.  The same idea can help you!

Think of all those web places again.

Are they connected visually in any way?  Do they have a theme to them, or are they all bursting with their own personalities?  If you are anything like me, when you start something new you are excited and want it to look fresh and different.  What we should be considering is - 'how can I make this new thing fit with my other things'.

I'll use myself as an example for this, because I'm trying to connect my places and things with a similar look and feel.  See my header at the top of the page?  I've had that there for a while, and at the minute, my Etsy header is similar.  On my business cards I put that little dingbat logo thingy I created and that helps to tie everything together.  BUT I have a problem!  It's those darn monkees!!  Since I first created these graphics my focus has changed a bit, and somehow I don't think they quite reflect what I'm doing now - I want to include my monkees in my banners.

I signed up for Entrecard and needed to create a graphic for it, this is what I came up with -

I thought the monkees looked cute, so when I signed up for Beader's Showcase I made this for my avatar



Then I created a header graphic for my Beader's Showcase page.



See a pattern developing?

Then I signed up for the new 100 lampwork list - Wall of Flame and needed a banner for it

Now a pattern is really starting to appear!  Problem now is that my Etsy header and the header for this blog are different.  I'm going to change those as well, just as soon as I get myself on task!

Hopefully people will start to connect these images to my beads and myself.  If I make signs for shows or sales I'll try and carry the theme over to them, and if I were to do any advertising I would include similar images.  Instead of being ten different sites all over the web, I am starting to look connected, and starting to generate a Brand for myself and my beads.   I'm not going to be the next Apple either, but my web presence will at least be consistant!  ...Now I just have to hope that I don't go off monkees ;o)

If you found this helpful, I'd love to know, and again if you've got any questions I'll answer them if I can.  Thanks for reading!

Next up - Why do I need a Blog?

Now it's time for bead pictures!

I think it's time to brighten this place up with some bead pictures!
I've just created a signature stamp in Photoshop so that I can quickly add my signature to my images. This is another way to help people remember you and associate you with your art.  It's fun because I can change the colour of it depending on the photo.

[caption id="attachment_674" align="alignnone" width="400" caption="Beads with waves"][/caption]

[caption id="attachment_673" align="alignnone" width="400" caption="See no evil, speak no evil, hear no evil"][/caption]

[caption id="attachment_672" align="alignnone" width="450" caption="Mass Monkees"][/caption]

Women in Glass Edition of The Flow

The deadline is fast approaching for the 'Women in Glass' edition of The Flow Magazine. I've just sent off some submissions for their gallery, one of which is these little guys -

[caption id="attachment_563" align="alignnone" width="400" caption="No Peeking!!"][/caption]

I like the way they turned out, the middle one makes me laugh, he's got such an innocent look on his face while the outer two are obviously full of mischief!

I believe the submission deadline is Sept 20th, - if you want to send something to them the link with all the info is HERE

Please Stand By - Technical Difficulties

I can't seem to get any work done!

Maybe it's because I'm obsessed with MONKEES!

Sidetracked

I was going to try and beat the 324 +/- dot bead that's currently in the lead on the dot challenge, but somehow those little primates were calling to me today and I had to do monkees instead.

Not content with World Domination, seems like they might be shooting for Universal Domination -

MONKEES IN SPACE! 



..I think each one has about 26 dots.....

Monkee Business

Some days are better than others!  Today I found out one of my favourite web blogs is back!  Monkeemaker is back, bigger and better than ever, she has a whole new website and I can't wait to find out what kind of summer 007 has been having!

I was so inspired, I thought I'd have a go at monkee beads for a hollows exchange I'm in, they are in flux at the minute, I'm trying to figure out which is the best (and cutest) way to do them.



This is my first attempt, I was pleased as he's pretty cute, I made his smile with a black dot of glass covered with another the same colour as his face.



This one I decided I'd try painting on the mouth, I don't like the look as much as the first one.



Painted mouth again on number 3, it's not working the way I want - I think thinner stringer is in order.  BUT!  I do like the blue eyes!



Now even if you don't like Monkees you have to admit this one is pretty darn cute!  I had a revelation with his mouth and I love the way he turned out.  Too bad the hollow blew a hole just above his face so I put a blob of brown there hoping to patch it up, it looked a lot like a cow-lick so I decided to keep it just the way it was! --That's one of those 'happy accidents'!



This one looks even cheekier than the previous one - I'm liking this mouth sculpting thing and wondering how else I can use it!



This one is just silly, I tried to put a banana on his head, it didn't  quite work and I notice it's got a small crack in it - back to the drawing board.

....I have MORE cooling!!