Women’s Fair and CL’s Necklace

With the Women's Fair coming up I thought I should make some Christmassy themed beads so here's a preview of some I'll have available that day -



I've wanted to make some Goddess beads as well, but can't bring myself to try the torso type so decided to take another track. There are some beautiful torso's out there, but I don't think I could bring myself to wear a naked body round my neck (it's the prudish side of me coming out I guess!!), so here's what I did instead. I've got some ideas to progress with these which might be fun to try. Don't pay too much attention to the trees, they will require YEARS of practise!



And here at last is CL's necklace, I am really pleased with how this project turned out, there are so many colours in it I think it would go with anything. I took the beads into the local bead store to see how best to string them and got such a positive response from the owner and other lady that works there that I came away on cloud nine.

Just when I think I've found the most amazing thing about the glass I'm using, I do something else and get blown away by what happens!!

These are the latest, the base beads are wrapped in silver foil, which is then burned off in the flame resulting in that wonderful colour and texture!!
 
I've put dots on top, and also used glass that will reduce in the right kind of flame giving a metallic shine to them.  

The reducing part is a bit tricky, I seem to get the effect but end up with one part of the bead where it burns off again, I guess it's another case of PPP -- I have to make more of these beads....
** A word of caution - silver fumes are toxic, so if you are going to use any glass with silver make sure your ventilation is VERY good!**

These beads remind me of the colours in butterfly wings

And the blues really pop if you put iris blue over top of opal yellow!! The picture doesn't do the colours justice.

I got my glass order at the beginning of the week and have finally had a chance to play with it.

I got some Reichenbach reduction rods which can be used to create the 'faux boro' effect I tried before.

The colours are very pretty that show up in the glass but you have to be careful not to use too much as it's not the same COE as the Effetre which means the two are incompatible.

I'm trying to get the necklace made for CL, but the coral that came is more like orange so I'm wondering if I can use some of these faux beads in her necklace instead.

**Attention - Techy post - boring for almost anyone unless you happen to melt glass! **
Having tried a bigger torch out at Carp, I've been very interested in the news that Nortel has a new torch out.  It's a step up from their popular minor torch, which would have been one of my picks.  From what I've read this new torch works really well on one oxycon, putting out more heat than the minor or the Carlisle mini cc.  Not to mention it looks reeeeaaally cool too!  Artistry in Glass has it on sale at the moment, and if you are interested in finding out more here's a link to Nortel's site, they don't have an online catalogue but you can at least contact someone and I've heard they are really good at responding.

Nortel Manufacturing Canada

It's 3:40 in the morning and I can't sleep.  I'm wide awake and feeling excited - I had a great day yesterday, Jane and I went to the Carp Farmer's Market and met the nice folks from Reid's Beads.  They were demo-ing glass bead making and it was the first time I actually got to see someone make a bead.  Paul showed me their wonderful collection of beads from really talented artists, absolutely incredible!!!  I think my very favourite was the Dustin Tabor pendant, the precision in the dots was unbelievable.

Aside from getting to drool all over their collection and their own beads (figuratively, not literally ;o)  ), I got to make a bead on their big oxy propane torch.  Wow!  What a difference from my little hot head!  The flame felt so soft and gentle but hot at the same time - it comes gushing out of my hot head like water under pressure, this big torch was so quiet, a totally different experience.

Who else should show up but Evelyn, who I met at the Bridge St. Bazaar, I think she'd understand if I told you she's crazy about buttons!  I just happened to have my buttons on me so she got to see them up close and seemed to be delighted.  I have to get busy now so that I can get things annealed hopefully later this week or early next.

There was also a lady who made me feel wonderful when she commented on my necklace, she seemed genuinely impressed when I told her I had made the beads.  Then she let me know she was the treasurer of an Ottawa bead group, so I felt very happy!!  I'm still basking in the excitement of the whole morning!

Friday night was Miracle in Merrickville Night - on our street at least!  I made this bead, and I still can't believe I made it.  I haven't been able to replicate it yet, so if anyone reading this has any suggestions on how I can do it again please let me know.  Bear in mind I am on the hot head at the minute.  This bead has a base of reddish orange and swirls of copper green - I've never been able to get copper green to do this wonderful thing before but hopefully with perseverence I can get it to happen again.  I won't apologise for being a picture hog here, it's my blog and I LOVE this bead :o)

Last week was a rough week, our 18 year old cat Pickles crossed the bridge.  She'd been loosing weight and getting more frail so it wasn't entirely unexpected but still very sad.  We got her and her brother Raffi when they were kittens so it's really hard to get used to not having her around.  She was a silly little thing, it was almost like she stayed a kitten, I think she was the runt of the litter, if she sat on my knee she'd be kneading with her paws all the time, and always, always would run to the fridge door when she heard one of us go into the kitchen, she always wanted milk.  Sweet little Pickles, we buried her out by our pond as she liked to go out there to drink and lie in the sun on the grass.  While we were digging her grave the biggest dragonfly came and hovered over the pond, I'm taking it as a sign that everything is alright.  Here she is pretending she's a bird.




It's September already and I'm starting to wonder what I'm going to do when the weather cools down.  I've turned the spare room back into a bedroom that Raffi our cat seems to have taken over and I don't want to go back up there and struggle with small tanks of gas again.  Ohhh if only the sunporch was insulated at least.  I guess I'll just carry on and see how it goes out there, but there won't be much torching for me when it reaches -10 and colder.

I had a request for buttons at the street sale in Carleton Place so have been giving them a go and having lots of fun with them.  They are smallish at the minute and have a glass shank that is melted right into the front part the button.


And a little sun



Our friend CL would like a necklace for her son's wedding in October, so I've been working on that too, it needs to have teal in it - I love this first bead, but the second group have more of the right colour combo for CL's dress.





Here are a couple more recent beads and my latest bit of fun from the weekend.  I'm still working out the skeletons, I want to do more with their mouths, just not quite sure what at the minute, although I did see something that gave me an idea yesterday, and I'd like to try them in ivory too.  The picture's a bit on the dark side because it's hard to show their mouths off in a picture.