Let Me Summarize (Some Drama)

This is what's been keeping me busy since Craft Camp (I can't believe I've been absent that long). Time-wise it's mostly Bead & Button preparation.

I'm teaching six classes, none of which was cancelled (I've had a class cancelled here and there along the way). I've taught of them before, so the instructions were already written but there are always colour-ways to be devised and stitched and I know how when I overthink colour combinations it's not as good as when I just grab beads semi-randomly and if I could overcome that when planning kits it would really save me a lot of time and frustration but there you go.

So in short (actually not that short) I've been:

Making samples for Bead & Button. (Not so dramatic).

Having some health issues (nothing life threatening, just annoying and time-consuming), still ongoing and resolving. (Drama, kinda).

Preparing for Bead & Button. (Not terribly dramatic).

I went to LA to visit my kids and we ate a lot of really good food. (Not even slightly dramatic except for the lines at LAX which I thankfully skipped because TSA Pre yay).

Bead & Button preparations. (Starting to panic. Is this drama?)

Immediately upon my return my drains backed up (raw sewage, to be quite clear) into my basement. The carpets were ripped up, drywall was cut away and it's all in the process of being repaired. (Very Big Drama at the time).

My studio is in my basement. The area where I keep my beading stuff and work on classes and kits and samples.

It's sort of all over my dining room right now.

With less than a week to go I'm in full-on panic mode. I mean, it's sort of justified for a number of reasons; in a word: time.

 

 These two (above and below) are two of my colour-ways for Lacrima.

 Two more samples for Chou-Fleur which as usual look way better in person than I can capture in a picture, especially the one on the left: it's very murky, just my jam

 A new colour-way for Buttress. I actually have another in the works but Time.

 Three new colour-ways for Pentamate.

 The one above uses purple-toned Czech mates (yes, all of them) but they have undertones and the other beads are reflecting off them so the purple is rather diminished. It's slightly nineties in person.

 Then there are kits, new kits not for classes:

 Kisa as a lariat - I've made a version as earrings, as a small pendant, and as a larger more elaborate pendant, but this is super-wearable (I have a couple). There's another colour way all made up, and another in the works but Time.

Then I discovered that I could make a smaller Horus, suitable for earrings perhaps, mostly by using smaller beads. I'd have a gajillion kits at Bead & Button if one of my suppliers were focused on MEMEME instead of whatever their actual priorities are.

Completed Sample

Each ellipse takes me almost an hour to complete and stitch to the previous one and as I was hurrying to complete my class proposals for the next trimester of classes at Lady Bug Beads because I was in a panic wondering if I'd be ready for Craft Camp, I didn't quite get to finishing this until last night - and then I ran out of grey seed beads so I added a couple of short lengths of chain to complete it.

No Big News or Anything

Actually I'm still pretty excited about the being able to knit thing. Beaded kumihimo is GONE baby!

 I made merino-possum-silk mittens from one of my New Zealand yarns. Yum yum!

I started disassembling my kitchen cabinets so that I could paint them.

 Turns out it's way slower than painting a room because this fancy fancy paint has to dry for at least sixteen hours between coats and is supposed to cure another three to five days (this part isn't quite happening exactly) so if you're painting backs as well as fronts of doors, two coats on the backs, three coats on the fronts (I have a gallon of the paint; I've used less than a third of the can) it stretches the joy out quite a bit.

And that's without sanding or priming.

 I'll spare you the endless pictures of my living room as painting station; you can extrapolate. Also the explosion that is a kitchen when most of the drawers and cabinets have been emptied onto the countertops. Just imagine the disarray.

 I'm very pleased with the colour even though it's not exactly what I had chosen because these fancy fancy paints have fancy fancy rules: the manufacturer will only let their distributors mix colours in their fancy fancy catalogue rather than any colour in the entire world like the big box stores which don't keep this fancy fancy paint which isn't quite as miraculous as I was led to believe but I guess we'll see once it's cured and hard as titanium or whatever.

It's a little greener and a little bluer than I'd planned; I'd wanted something altogether murkier but I don't dislike this. And it looks good with the concrete countertops and the cork floor so I'm not actually complaining.

The cats were surprisingly respectful of the painting process, only rubbing up against cabinet doors and drawer fronts before I painted them, avoiding them while wet, and only walking on them once they were mostly dry although I fear before less than sixteen hours had passed.

But they are after all just cats so it's not as though I should be disappointed, especially as their sense of time is dictated only by their stomachs or my appearance in the kitchen: if I'm there it must be time for food. All other time is uninteresting and not relevant to any activities or lack of them.

I was also supposed to teach a class on Tuesday for which I prepared two samples, only to have it sort of cancelled: cancelled in the sense that no one was going to be showing up, but not in the sense that they didn't pay for the class nor expect the instructions. Which they were given.

Bead and Button Classes. And Other Stuff

So I mentioned last time that I'm teaching a bunch of classes at Bead and Button next June and I'm really pleased with the selection. They're all projects I've really enjoyed working on, and most of them cause strangers to stop and reach for my chest. Umm necklace.

So in no particular order, Buttress which really requires students to be comfortable with cubic right angle weave and especially with joining cubic right angle weave. It's fun because all the bits are smallish, and parts repeat so it's not as though every single thing is something new, and if you're good with three-dimensional things it'll all be very obvious. And there's a bit of peyote stitch of relaxation if you need it.

This is a full-day class and while the law of averages dictates that not everyone will finish, I'm pretty sure some will.

 Next up, Chou-Fleur. My friend Amy said it reminded her of cauliflower but I've yet to see a head in any of these colours. Perhaps I'll work on a colour-way in shades of white and the palest of greens.

This one is a lovely large pendant, about two inches across and it comes with one of those bead hanger bar thingies with a screw-off ball at one end and a loop on the other so you can put it on a chain RIGHT AWAY (because I know how important that is).

It's much easier than you'd expect actually, mostly because there's so much repetition (twelve chatons to be captured and embellished). You build the base and then start adding florets until it's full - so basically there are only two things to learn. It does require a little dexterity because it gets quite full towards the end, but that's the extent of the supercalifragilisticexpialidocious (by the way, spell-check agrees that this is a real word. Thanks, Mary Poppins!) skills you'll need.

 Lacrima is a newer project using mostly cubic right angle weave (for the bezel) and tubular herringbone (for the necklace and its clasp) with oddments of netting and whatnot thrown in for fun. What I enjoy about this one is that the crystal is an oval, but it's bezeled to look like an upside-down teardrop which I think is a fun trick.

 Pentamate are the cutest little beaded beads using three different two-hole beads - only one type per bead so your beads make a lovely varied yet related set. I think it's crazy easy if your mind naturally gravitates to pattern and structure and if you're good at reading your beading, but even if you don't roll that way, it's not extremely complicated, and I guarantee that by the second or third you'll not be bothering with the instructions.

I wore my Ribbon Necklace last year and it elicited quite a bit of interest because it's a completely new dimensional spiral: it's herringbone stitch with symmetric increases and decreases such that there appears to be an inner surface and an outer surface. There are two pattern rows that get repeated (though the ends taper) so it's one of these great zen projects - you just kinda relax into it, switching colours in and out. There's quite a bit of stitching! I like to keep the inner surface in one colour and use up odds and ends for the outer surface, and the kits all contain about six or seven colours for the outer layer.

 These Giza beaded beads work up fairly quickly and look absolutely gorgeous when strung somewhat sparingly in a necklace - I have a necklace in the metallic-y colour-way below in front and I'm delighted every time I wear it. Their holes are actually big enough for a fairly fat chain or a cord, but they can be strung on regular beading wire using beads just bigger than the holes to keep them even on the wire.

 My hotel room is booked and I'm thinking about starting the increasingly fast slide into panic leading up to Bead and Button!

Of course I also teach at my favourite local bead store, and these are the last two of the classes I'll be teaching here February through May.

 It's funny how I always think I won't have enough new classes (they're always all new) and then at the last minute (or more precisely, the week before they're due) I have a burst of creativity and somehow come up with my favourite designs.

Like Swirligig above. I saw a slightly cupped peyote square which swirled, so I massaged it into a five-sided swirling bezel for a rivoli (you can see the back on the right above) and then extended the pattern to make a broad pentagonal flange which I stiffened with a cubic right angle weave frame. As usual, when I don't think too hard about colours, I just LOVE these (though the picture makes them look a little bolder than in real life).

I like the idea of setting a round rivoli into a square bezel (which I've actually done before) but I wanted some air between the bezel and the outer frame, and this just worked out so well. It's a versatile little component that can be used in many ways which pleases me no end.

Thanksgiving weekend I have Big Plans. I'm going to refinish my junky formica kitchen counters with cement. If I plan it just right I should be able to apply a few layers (sanding between each), seal and cure them, and apply a few finishing and strengthening coats of sealer by Sunday night.

In theory.

I thought my cork floor would take one weekend: Saturday to remove the old floor and Sunday to lay the new one and I couldn't have been more wrong about that.

I have done quite a bit of research on the countertops thing (and by "research" I mean that I read a bunch of DIY blogs. Quite a lot of them) and people said it took anywhere from two days to almost a week but naturally I'm being rather optimistic, in part because my kitchen is small and there's not a whole lot of countertop to be finished.

I'll let you know how it goes.

Actual Beading

I know. 

And I'm teaching a whole bunch of classes at Bead and Button 2016! I'll post pictures later.

A bracelet which is a bracelet because I didn't feel like stitching enough of it to make a necklace, but it could be, really. 

I should make samples in all the variations but even though it stitches up quickly, the thought makes me a little queasy. And yet contemplation of a very complex necklace using cubic right angle weave which would probably take me about seventeen times as long just fills me with glee. I suppose it says something about me but honestly I'm not sure what.

 Sample for the class I taught on Saturday. I adore these Paradise Shine rhinestones and ye I'm never perfectly pleased with the colours I pick to put around them. The students seemed to like this one, but I remain unconvinced.

 This confection is a little strange but I think it works. Those marbled-looking things inside are actually two-hole bead studs and I suppose you can barely see them so some might wonder what the point is, but I enjoy the architecture of this motif AND I know I could link them together to make a bracelet or a necklace or even a very dramatic long pendant so I'm not unhappy.

No pictures but I've been doing more work in the kitchen which is only emphasising just how pathetic my woodworking skills are, though in part the blame lies in my meagre collection of tools. I have hand tools but sadly minimal hand strength, and I have less power tools than fingers on one hand, and I definitely don't have the ones that would have allowed me to watch Netflix all day rather than to over odd prices of wood.

Also to be fair, the guy at Lowes did a really bad job of making ONE CUT in a piece of wood: one end was a full quarter inch narrower than the other which combined with the lack of perfect right angles in my kitchen meant way too much shaving with my jig saw (the only power cutting tool I have) and trying to sand the nasty edge smooth.

Fortunately the wood I was cutting and joining will be filled and then covered with concrete so no one will know.

Except you of course.

So Much

It's as if I've lived a couple of months since last I posted. I like doing things and going places but I like these events to be spread out with lots of down time between because otherwise I feel rushed and over-full.

But there's been good stuff.

There was Amy's sale at which some of the pieces I sold let to orders for other matching pieces and I filled one when I had a very small window of spare time but really, I have the usual deadlines looming so I shouldn't have and yet I did.

I spent a few days in Chicago with my very oldest friends in the world (we've known each other for so long that our earliest encounters were when we were too young to form meaningful memories) and the last time the three of us got  together was in the late nineties but none of us can remember exactly when. After so many years you can pick up and connect in minutes.

I'm teaching a bunch of classes again at Bead and Button this year and my schedule is decently efficient as I have only two days of no classes (but the days have evening classes). I'll post pictures in the sidebar later. I'm tired right now - more about that further down.

I've started working on actual samples (as opposed to fooling around beading doodles that I hope will lead to actual beading projects) for the next lot of local classes for February through May. That's a deadline on the horizon.

 This open star pendant is fun because it's really a pentagon coerced into being a star. Also it could be added to the chain below.

Apparently I'm into stars lately. That's two classes out of six or eight so far.

There's also a rivoli idea that's in the percolation phase so no pictures and not yet on the list but maybe.

 This beaded bead (the green one in the front) is the culmination of a progression. I made the one in the back a year or more ago and there must be something particular about the beads I used as I couldn't get it to work properly on subsequent tries.

Truth is there's always variation between different colours of beads; somehow the nature of different colours of glass seems to lead to slightly different proportions or sizes among beads which are nominally the same size. For example, black seed beads are often taller and more irregular than other colours, I suspect because black glass melts much softer than some of the other formulations and so black beads may be more likely to distort. This is purely conjecture on my part having fooled around with melting glass from time to time; I could well be completely wrong (but I think I'm on the right track).

Anyway.

The beaded bead sat around for ages until I decided to try it using differently-shaped beads and it sort of worked but wasn't quite the way I wanted it so on the last iteration I mixed bead shapes at which it did what I wanted it to.

There's also a beaded bead from a few months ago (but no picture today).

My daughter flew in for the weekend to collect her very pretty cat who even after more than a year is the cause of much dissent among the felines in the household. There's still altogether far too much hissing and growling and swatting going on, not to mention the hunks of white fur everywhere. (The diva doesn't care to be brushed).

While she was here she got a rather elaborate tattoo.

 I'd never seen tattoos in action before so it was rather educational and illuminating. Also crazy long.

We did not get to spend a couple of hours while she got inked, then go to dinner, then go to Strange Donuts and then organise the cat stuff before getting an early night so that waking early to go to the airport wouldn't be heinous.

Instead we spent an hour and a half designing the tattoo, called in our food order, made a mad dash to get the food while the tattoo artist was setting up, and then spent many excruciating (mostly for her; but my hand was squozen almost into oblivion, poor thing. I shouldn't complain. She would have stopped if the artist wasn't fully committed to the vision). We walked out of there after one in the ayem (we had arrived shortly after six), at which point she required fast sugar therapy in the form of a shake. Yeah I dunno.

And then we still had to pack up cat stuff, try to get at least three hours of sleep (barely), drug the cat (you wouldn't want her unhappily in a cat carrier at full throttle on a crowded plane), take them to the airport and hope for the best.

Last I heard they were happily ensconced in my daughter's new apartment.

Apparently the tattoo still hurts. She likes it very much though. I'm definitely not getting one.

A Week

I really should post more often because otherwise it's past my bedtime and there are a gajillion pictures and I'm a bit tired for words, but there it is and I'm just going for it anyway.

I'll just say it's been a rough week between deadlines and medical scares and leave it at that.

 I made another sample for last week's class and then adjusted the other sample I'd made. In short: size matters, as the size fifteens on the first sample were much bigger than in the one above and it makes a difference - in this case, not good!

 I made various other samples of things.

 I'd only ever used this motif for earrings, but I think it works really well as a bracelet (and would have made a lovely necklace too only I was a bit pressed for time. My own fault).

 Loopy tassel!

 Earrings!

And then we had a long weekend and I was determined.

 I made progress with the stools and then found that I was yet again missing a few pieces.

 I made a sample for tomorrow's class.

 I sanded what seems like acres of wood and drilled some rather large holes rather well (if I do say so myself) until the very last one where something happened and I ended up with an ugly great hole. It'll go at the back. No one will see.

 I spent what seems to be an inordinate amount of time washing pipes, but then I got to partially assemble and paint some, so that was fun.

 Sanding again, and staining. I liked the staining part better, though now I need to sand again. It's so humid it feels like nothing really quite dries. Everything is still tacky.

 I made (or tried to make) whipped body butter which wouldn't whip and last time I checked wouldn't solidify either and I have no more stuff with which to start again and more importantly, I'm out of time.

But look!

All those pipes!

All that sanding! (But not yet staining and/or finishing. I haven't quite settled on what I want to do). Perhaps I'll just oil it.

I have a sweater bench for the foot of my bed. My design was slightly deficient so I need more parts but it's pretty much what I wanted (bar the wire baskets that are supposed to be in each section and which I do not yet have.

I'm not quite a woodworker and I fear my disposition will prevent anything meaningful in that department, but I'm not utterly and entirely useless. Needless to say I'm not unimpressed with myself .

They Don't Seem New

Only because I've been making samples and reworking, but the truth is that I haven't yet taught either of these, or published the patterns or kits or anything so I guess technically they're new.

 I had been thinking that I'd make an entire coordinated necklace of these but now I'm wavering a little - I can't decide if they'd be more appealing as an unconstrained collection like to roll around and get lost or tidily organised on a necklace chain. Yeah I guess I'm leaning back again.

I've reworked the pendant itself at least four or five times until finally I found the right combination of bead sizes (Czech size eights make the magic work) but until today I hadn't been more than marginally satisfied with the whole bail area where it splits into the two halves of the necklace. Turned out the stitch variation I was using just didn't look good and when I switched to a different stitch with different beads it all fell into place.

The whole necklace took forever to stitch as it's longer than I usually make (the pendant sits in the cleavage area) because a bulky non-flat pendant just doesn't sit nicely on the bony part of the chest ad looks much better when it's hanging more vertically.

It just does, you'll have to trust me on that one.

Things I Made

I started this blog in large part because I wanted a way to encourage myself to keep track of the things I made, and to that end it's been quite effective, especially for beaded things. I've been pretty diligent about at least photographing my projects, even before they've actually been successful (and of course sometimes they never are), but certainly as soon as I have something that I neither plan to cut up nor set aside for more work.

Until a couple of weeks ago. Or more, I'm not sure I can keep track.

Beaded kumihimo has replaced knitting as my go-to keep-my-hands-busy activity, not because I love it so much, not because it's so very satisfying or tactile, but because it hurts to knit ad my hands do better with gentle activities to keep them lubricated. The hints that is, not the outside.

It's fine and a useful technique and excellent for doing something with the excessive quantity of lamp worked beads I've acquired over the years, the ones I can't seem to find a way to use with stitched seed beading (and no, stringing seems like a pathetic copout; not to mention it's over too quickly to enjoy it) but it turns out that most of the beaded kumihimo I do results in something perfectly nice that I have no need nor desire to keep for myself, except occasionally.

 It's not that these are my colours (pastels? I think not) or that this style of pendant rocks my world (no pun intended but I'll claim it, why not) but the stone is one I bought from Peri's stash sale and even though it's not a colour or shape or tone I associate with her, it's a little connection; a remembrance of sorts.

I braided the rope, stitched the clasp and wore it immediately, but somehow forgot to photograph until this morning.

What's that about.

In service to my preparations for Bead and Button (next week!) I finished a sample for a new kit and am crazily trying to get the last colour-way for this design stitched before I leave, but I've run into a bit of a snag: I don't like the colour of the fringe beads I've packed, there's nowhere to buy them here before I leave (and in time to finish stitching) and they may not get delivered in time.

We should all have such first-world problems, right?

And related to nothing I've said today and even though I didn't get any pictures at graduation (it rained and we rushed for cover. Lunch actually), I managed to get the kids to stand still for a moment before they both went home.