Bit behind with my 52 Things Challenge -- Week 10 & 11

Yes I have gotten a bit behind with my challenge write up, I have been making things but just not had chance to do the writing up of it.  I can only write my blog on my laptop as I can't get pictures to load from my Samsung Tablet onto Blogger for some unknown reason. And as I am always on my tablet my blog gets a bit left behind because my laptop battery is completely fried and I need a new one, so my laptop is a bit of a chore at the moment.


So here we are then Week 10 first

I was actually off ill with a bit of a bug this particular week from work, but I did manage to put a pair of earrings together just before I was ill. I used some of my spiky pod like headpins in a deep dark blue CIM glass called Trade Winds, well originally I thought it was CIM Marine but when I checked the other day, I had it wrong, they are called Marine Spiky Pod Earrings, it doesn't matter as they are for me.

 

My own large earring hooks

I used black patinated brass metal bead caps and beads along with black patinated wire which I used for the hooks but I think it could be copper wire, these came from Fallen Angel on Etsy. I have others which I intend to use very soon as well.

I couldn't sell these headpins as I had dropped them after a photo shoot, so I just had to keep them for myself, not that you can see the tiny scratch on them.  Plus I need a pair of earrings in these colours for a top I don't have any jewellery for anyway!!  I do enjoy making jewellery for myself but I just never seem to get round to it much anymore!!



Right onto Week 11 then


I am getting to my torch at least once or twice a week now, as I really am determined to get more beads made along with new designs in headpins, cabs, well anything I can come up with.

I am still practising with my flowers and thought I would have a little go at putting one onto a cab, not sure if its quite good enough just yet, its a work in progress....

I will give it another go but maybe different petals next time, maybe a pansy!!!

I am enjoying my time playing!!


Oh and here is the rose bud you can see in the background

Its sort of between a full rose and bud really, maybe we'll call it semi-opened!!  Ha ha!!

Ta Ta

E x

52 Things -- Week 3 - Its a Boy!

Well we have had a new arrival in the family, my husbands cousin and his wife have just had a new baby.  His name is Arran and he weighed in at 13lbs 13ozs. We haven't been to see him just yet, WOW he was a big boy!!! He actually arrived on Boxing Day as he was a few weeks early because he wasn't due until 10 January but we only found out last week as I didn't receive the original text message.

So as I am doing this '52 things challenge' on the Craft Pimp forum, my goal is to make all sorts of arty crafty things each week for this year.

This is my week 3 offering its a card I made for them

Xxx Congratulations xxX

 Steve and Caroline

on the new arrival of your little bundle of joy!  xxx


Hope to get some photos of little Arran when we go to visit.

E x

O Christmas Tree

My new Christmas Tree, very tall but narrow just right for the only place in the house for it.

Its growing on me, we gave it a silver and blue theme (needs more blue I reckon!)

I love to have a real one but hubbie said no this year because I normally get one with a root ball so if it survives Christmas we plant it in the garden, he wasnt up to potting it up because his back just wasn't up to it. So went shopping day before Christmas Eve and got it half price!  Good result!!!

Oh and see the glass bauble right near the top underneath the angel I made that this year at the Flame-off. 

It is glass blowing my very first attempt. 

I was quite pleased with myself.

Hope you had a great Christmas!  

I did!

Merry Christmas to Everyone

and

A Very Happy & Prosperous 

New Year

2015

xx Elaine xx

Finally snapped!

If you read my post of 12th May you will have seen I made some beads to match the dress my friend Rosemary was going to wear for a Wedding she was attending in June. The dress had lots of blues in it on a cream background, the beads were absolutely fine but they never really jumped out when put up against the dress!!

Now, on a closer inspection of the design on the dress I found some other colours that weren't so obvious but would stand out more so, when worn!

Back to the drawing board I went!!

I love the matching game!! I found some colours that seemed to work and here is the end result

 

Smoky Blue Trails  

 

 

I teamed it with sterling silver and I created all the clasp hooks and ear wires. I did enjoy creating this set as it is all my own work other than the chain and silver spacer beads, it was fun putting it all together, this was the main reason behind taking up lampworking in the first place.

Rosemary seemed pleased with them all, as this was her birthday present (all being a bit late) and I was pretty pleased too as all the large smoky purple beads are encased with smoky grey transparent glass, I seem to be mastering encasing!!!   Yay!!!

Happy Bunny!!!

E x

Birthdays

There has been a few birthdays in my world over the last month or so, all needing something special.  My friend Rosemary's birthday was at the end of March,  I wasn't sure what to get her, then I thought why not make her some beads as she is a novice jewellery maker, she loves gemstones and watches the Jewellery Maker TV channel constantly and buying various gemstones that catch her eye!

I wasn't sure what to do so I made some beads and they didn't go to well as I was trying to create a leaf as a focal bead but I need a bit more practice I think and it ended up I didn't have any beads finished for her actual day!  So lots of apologies were given to her and I promised to make her something very soon.

Oh dear it was difficult to get something sorted so I decided to ask her if she wanted any colours in particular. Ah well 'blues' really she said, as she has a new dress to wear to a wedding she is attending in early June.  She sent me pics of the dress and off to the workshop I went.

 

 

It is from Phase 8 and its called Edith Blossom Dress its very pretty, I tried to match the blue colours, so I picked some blue glasses in various shades and also included a new CIM colour Antique Lace which is a cream colour and some splashes of black too.

 

Edith Blues Set

I was quite pleased with the match.  I popped round to see Rosemary yesterday and we did a little match up with the actual dress and the transparent blue (Effetre Lagoona) was a bit dark but the other blue was really spot on, along with the cream too!  she liked the beads but they weren't quite right.

Now I have seen the dress up close there was a few other colours in it that seemed interesting so I am going to try and recreate those by doing a little colour mixing to see what I can come up with.  I will let you know when I have had a play and see what happens!



The next birthday was my Mum's, her birthday was last weekend she was 78 and I didn't have a clue what to give her.  She doesn't really want for much, I often make her something but wanted to do something different this year, so I decided that it would nice to take her up to London and go to the Theatre to see a show. I told her what I was thinking as I wanted to take her to see something she would like to see, so I gave her a little list.

I fancied seeing 'We Will Rock You' and few others but when I told her what one interested me she agreed that she wanted to see it too.  If you don't know what that is well its based around Queen songs but the story is set in the future when there are no musical instruments and everything is online including music.

 

 

I found some tickets for us both to go on Saturday (10th), its on at the Dominion Theatre in Tottenham Court Road.

We went up on the train and had a great time, it was really fantastic. It was like going to a concert really the singers were really good. She loved it and so did I.

 

 

 

Yes it really did have a motorbike on stage!

 

 

We had a bit of dinner up there too. She was pretty worn out when we finally got back home but she said it was well worth it.




I have been making lots of different headpins again, I love making them so much scope for using them with the glass finials on the end of the wire.  I use mostly raw wire like copper, brass, bronze and I will also try some sterling silver too. I won't use plated metal as it will be difficult to clean it as I think the plating metal will probably come off during the cleaning process.

Hoping to get some of the headpins listed very soon in my etsy shop, here is a bit of a preview for you

 

Marbled Ice Headpins

 

Multi Leaves and Drops Headpins

(previously seen but now annealed)

Also a nice pair of round beads in the new colour from CIM called Poseidon

Great for a pair of earrings, loving these may need to keep them for myself!!  80))


Till next time

E x

Having fun with Headpins

Yep I've been making some headpins.

I love making headpins, I wasn't sure how to make them in the beginning as I didn't know the best way to hold the wire while I added the glass. So I chatted to a few fellow lampworker friends and came up with using scrap wire and wrapping them onto a mandrel with it.

This works really well but is a bit time consuming getting them prepared. I saw Linda from Earthshine Beads on fb showing a photo of her demoing at a show at the weekend and she was using a pin vice to hold the wire. I think I might try it out and see how that goes!  So thank you to Linda for that idea, very helpful.

Dark Multicolour glass by Riechenbach

I love this glass one of my favourites at the moment, made by Riechenbach Dark Multi is a reactive glass but it just reacts in the flame with not much or no effort at all really, it just does what it does, just like MAGIC!!

                                    

Right then, I made drop headpins first the browny/red ones at the top, then I made the bluey, greeny, purpley ones next (Yes it really is the same glass) then I made the leaves at the very top of the above photo and they had more greens in them, with some brown and purples too.  In the first photo at the top of this post you can see some ivory beads and these have some d.multi dots and trails on them.

Now I went off to this years Flame-off in Uttoxeter a couple of weeks ago, had a great time because it is a lampworkers convention which happens once a year (not often enough).  It is an event for glass beadmakers hosting demos, supplies, beadmakers selling their own beads and the torch area, so we can get our fix if necessary and beginners can try out torches and have a go at making a bead or two possibly for the first time! I took a turn at helping out on the torches this year and really enjoyed helping some complete beginners make their first bead and a few others who needed some help with how to control the glass and even reshaping a bead for a lovely lady called Beryl.  It was such fun I may do it again next year. Some of the demos were fabulous and I did end up buying a few 'keepers' from some of the many artists there!

I stocked up on many different things but of course I couldn't come away without buying some lovely glass!! Oh boy was there some lovely, gorgeous and definitely delicious glass. 

CIM glass is my favourite glassmakers and they have some lovely new colours, below is one of them but its not quite come out a very good colour likeness. It still looks gorgeous but I will try and get a better photo tomorrow.  Sadly both of these headpins have cracked.  I don't think I got them into the bubbles quick enough as well as I may have pushed them to far into the bubbles and maybe they were touching the side of the bowl.  I always batch anneal my headpins as I always put them on the bottom of the kiln floor, instead of putting them into the kiln while I am making them.   

CIM Poseidon 

Must make some more as I love this new colour, which the name escapes me right now!!!  
Updated above ....

There are some lovely new oranges, pinks, lilac and all with great names for them as well.  Sunset, Frangipan (pink), Alleycat (orangey/yellow), Trade Winds (very dark blue), Gypsy (very dark purple), Rudolph (red), just to name a few!


So lots of making to do and some photos to take as well.


I will see you again very soon.

E x

Updated with names!   8.5.14

Latest Bead Magazine

I know its a bit late but I am in the latest issue of Bead Magazine

here is my tutorial piece(s)

Swirling Tempest

Its wild and stormy - this issue was a special issue with the theme Back to Nature.

I decided to use one of my seascape beads as the focal I dont use my own beads very often but as I am also profiled in this issue of the magazine as well,  I was able to use my beads in the project, so the article had a 2 page spread and the project had a 4 page spread so lots of pages - huh!!!!  80))

It was quite a large advanced project and it took me a while to write it so my next one isnt so large but I did enjoy making it and I am pretty pleased with it.   I hope the readers will like it.

 

 

I also made the connectors and the beads on them too. Its my first major project where I made the majority of the components, so I am pleased with this achievement and one I have had on my long list of goals to fulfill. So thats another tick in the box!!


Next time I will show you what new ideas I have been working on.

So till next time

Toodleoo

E x