Frozen Holidays

Happy frozen holidays to all!  I think snow is pretty if you don't have to go out in it.  I hope the weather is great wherever you are.  Happy New Year!

Brown Medallion Necklace

This is a long necklace made of tiger's eye with golden cylindrical beads.  I made the pendant from resin, in a mold I made from a found item.   I think it looks like an antique or at least part of a space ship.

I colored the resin during the mixing, plus painted and rubbed it after curing.  

Black Choker with Pendant

I decided I needed a short black necklace with a small pendant, so I went through my bead stash.  I had 9 shiny bicones, so I picked up beading needle and thread to fashion a pendant. 

Some people are very good following intricate bead weaving patterns with tiny beads.   I am not those people.  I usually get the larger beads, and then start waving my needle around thinking "I'm sure something will turn out eventually."  So, this pendant is what turned out. 

I used black beading wire for the necklace because I wanted it to show through the clear beads.

Farewell to Summer

We are starting down that path to Autumn now.  I can see the leaves falling from the trees.  Here are some photos from the local park in Summer's last hurrah.

Wooden Hoop Earrings

I experimented with some wood components, and made these earrings.

I put two beads in the middle of the hoop, and then put one bead to dangle on the end.  The color palette is all natural wood tones.

Coral Bead Earrings

I decided I needed earrings in a warm pink color, and found these coral beads somewhere in my bead stash.  I'm fairly bad at remembering bead stitches, or even following a pattern diagram (so sad!) so I just tinkered for a while with thread until I came up with this flower pattern.    Hopefully, I'll remember how I did this for the next time!

Double Ribbon Necklaces

I found these pretty double ribbon necklaces that were already attached to clasps (!), so I merely added pendants to them.

It's not really difficult to add ribbon endings and a clasp, but I thought it was neat that these were already finished.

These large glass foil beads made pretty pendants that complemented the ribbon colors.

I like the organza ribbon combined with the cord.  Now I just have to remind myself to get them posted into my Etsy shop!

Red White and Blue Earrings!

Happy Fourth of July all!  Here are some red white and blue earrings made from fire polished crystals.  I wish you all a wonderful holiday, and hope your weather is sunny and beautiful today!

Turquoise Beads Revisited

Remember this gift?

I received these Cousin Beads from Lisa Crone of A Bead a Day.  I used the beads in this necklace.  I thought the orange beads and the butterfly pendant gave it a nice summery look.

They also looked great in earrings!

Flying Birds Resin Pendant

Remember this lovely gift of an open pendant from Lisa Crone of A Bead a Day?

I thought I could enhance it by creating a design within the opening.  Here is the artwork that I created with Photoshop.

After sealing the design, I applied resin and attached the pendant.

After letting it set, I trimmed back the photo paper and applied gold Gilder's Paste to the back, sealing it with more resin.  The next step will be making the necklace for it!

My New Earring Display

Are you the type of person who saves odd bits of things, imagining you will find a use for them at a later time?  A while back a received a package which had 2 large pieces of cardboard in the packing.  I was sure I might need that cardboard in the future, so I set them aside.

After struggling with trying to photograph clipon earrings on pierced earring displays, I came up with an idea. 

I took one piece of cardboard and cut a rectangle in the center.  Then I stapled the other piece of cardboard on the bottom.

I cut a slit in the bottom and used that little rectangle as a support so that it will stand up.  Now I can use this display for my photographs within the lightbox.

Open House at North Star Orchard

I visited North Star Orchards in Cochranville, Pennsylvania, for their recent open house event.  North Star grows fabulous heirloom fruits such as apples, peaches, and asian pears.  There were many lovely trees to view, and their farmers were all friendly and helpful.

I hungrily await these blossoms becoming fruit!

It was really the perfect day for an outing. Happy Spring to everyone!

Beautiful Gifts!

I just received a lovely gift from blogger and author Lisa Crone of A Bead a Day.  The pendant is large and adorned with aqua and red crystals in an antique brass frame.  It will coordinate with the faceted bi-color crystals in red and brown.

You can see that the pendant is completely open.  I would like to use this in a project where I put some sort of artwork as the base and possibly sealing it with resin.  I just have to do enough planning so I don't irretrievably muck it up!

As if that wasn't enough, I also received various bead strands in lovely shades of blue and turquoise.  Another project to contemplate!  I think I might use silver accents rather than the golden accents that it came with.  The turquoise might "pop" well with yellow or orange colors.  I have used the Cousin jewelry products in my designs before, and they always have many pretty things to get my ideas flowing.

These items were gifted to me, rather than purchased.

Ladybug Earrings

I came across these red ladybug beads and made them into earrings.  They are actually quite a lot larger than real ladybugs.  Ladybugs make me think of spring and gardening. 

Green Crystal Earrings

I was thinking green because St. Patrick's Day was coming up.  So I used two colors of green crystals for these earrings.  The faceted rounds have a sort of milky opaqueness to them.  The center beads are Swarovksi roundels, which always look good in anything!

Melon and Pumpkin Pearls

I recently bought some pearls from Auntie's Beads because I saw some new colors available.  I bought melon, cantaloupe, and pumpkin.  Here they are with an orange (I have no fresh cantaloupe today!) for a color comparison.

The "matte" pearls shown in the forefront are named "pumpkin".  I think these could look either summery or autumn-ish, depending on what you do with them.  The large pearly ones are named "melon", and the small ones are named "cantaloupe".  I can't discern the difference between the melon and cantaloupe.  Can you?

Nevertheless, I think these are very pretty and will make some nice jewelry pieces when I decide what to do with them.

Below, I have arranged them in a mock three strand necklace.  These beads would look nice just strung like this, but of course I will find some way to mix them up with different colors when I make the final design.