SOCIAL MEDIA

3/3/12

Welcome to the March 2012 Bead Soup Blog Party!


What is a Bead Soup Blog Party?

 Each beader was paired up with another jewelry designer and tasked with sending the following:

A focal
A special clasp (not just a lobster claw)
Some coordinating spacers or beads

Using the focal and the clasp was mandatory, but we could use anything from our own stash to round out the rest, and choose to use the coordinating beads or not.


Here is another picture of the beads I received from my fantastic Bead Soup partner, Melinda Orr:


With so many amazing beads to work with, I barely had to add anything from my own stash, and I didn't even use up all of them!

I am sure the design process is different for every one of us, and so I'll give you a little insight into mine in this post:

Originally I had wanted to create three necklaces that could all be worn together or separately.  This seemed like a great plan, but after starting to work on the designs, I ended up throwing that idea out of the window and instead created one earring/bracelet/necklace set and 2 other necklaces.  

Here's the first necklace I made, using the  lovely Sue Beads lampwork beads from Sue Kennedy, the sweet bird charm from Lisa Petraka, some of the amber resin beads, the handmade bead caps, some of the copper and the stone beads:

"Bird"

A close-up of the bird charm
Originally this was going to be the shortest of the three necklaces, and I wanted it to be fairly simple, which it is.  It is actually the one I will probably wear the most, as I tend to wear simpler designs myself.

The second necklace took on a life of its own, and it was during the construction of this piece that I decided to create three very separate designs:

"Forest"
I absolutely love the handmade clasp Melinda made, and knew I wanted it to act as a focal in one of the designs, and it fit perfectly with the beads I used here.  The coin pearls and jade are both large beads with the holes through the middle.  I wanted to show the height of these beads and not the width as much, so I had to come up with a way to wire them to "stand up", and here's what I came up with:


Basically I put a small length of wire through the center of the beads and created a simple loop on each side of the bead.  Then I created a kind of wire cage by putting a length of 16g wire with loops on each end on either side of the bead and wrapped wire around each end, effectively sandwiching the beads between the wire lengths:


This added heft to each link and gave the necklace substance.  I worked in the large hammered hoops from Melinda to break up the links.

The last design I made incorporates the beautifully patinaed components from Melinda, along with one of the glass domes and one of the beautiful photographs she sent:


The colors in the patina and the photograph are truly amazing, and reminded me of out trips to Rocky Point, Mexico.  For the focal I riveted the handmade bands Melinda made to the patinaed copper base plate, sandwiching in the domed glass piece with the applied photograph.  I knew this would be a long piece, and I felt that the focal needed more substance, so I added strips of antique lamp banding to the top and bottom of the pendant and used that to dangle some charms on the bottom.

"Rocky Point"

Then I started in on an asymmetrical design that features the patinaed circle and square links on one side and  wire-wrapped stones on the other side.  The necklace measures about 35", so there was no need for a clasp in this design.

I had tons of pieces and parts left over, so I decided to make coordinating earrings and a bracelet:



I love this set, and will be wearing it to church this weekend!


Melinda, I want to thank you from the bottom of my heart for sending me such a treasure trove to play with in this bead soup.  I loved being your partner, and can't wait to see what you made with the beads I sent you!

Lori Anderson, thank you for being the mastermind behind this phenomenal event.  I know you put endless hours into making sure we are all taken care of, and I appreciate you so very much!

Please take some time to check out Lori's blog, Pretty Things, as well as the other participants in this blog hop:

Hostess, Lori Anderson Special Book Sneak Peeks, Cindy Wimmer

1.  Adlinah Kamsir (Singapore) and Hajer Waheed (Kingdom of Bahrain)
2. Adrienn Lukacs (Hungary) and Agata Grygiel (Poland)
3.  Agi Kiss (Hungary) and Carolien Muller-Genger (the Netherlands)
4.  Agnes Asztalos (Hungary) and B.R. Kuhlman
7.  Alicia Marinache (Canada) and Dita Basu
15.  Bonnie Coursolle (Canada) and Fay Wolfenden (Canada)
16.  Carmel McGinley (Australia) and Tracy Stillman (Australia)
21.  Cheryl Brown (Canada) and Diana Ptaszynski
22.  Christina Stofmeel (the Netherlands) and Eva Kovacs (Hungary)
24.  Cilla Watkins (Canada) and Elaine Robitaille (Canada)
25.  Sabrina Straub (Switzerland) and Kathy Combs
32.  Dee Elgie (UK) and Joanne Lockwood (UK)
33.  Dian Hierschel (Germany) and Eniko Fabian (Austria)
37.  Doris Stumpf (Germany) and Eszter Czibulyas (Hungary)
39.  Elke Leonhardt-Rath (Germany) and Marjolein Trewavas (UK)
41.  Erika Nooteboom (the Netherlands) and Giorgia Rossini (Italy)
43.  Evelyn Duberry (Canada) and Gaea Cannaday
45.  Ginger Bishop (military, Okinawa) and Martina Nagele (Germany)
48.  Helene Goldberg (Australia) and Karen Vincent
54.  Joanna Matuszczyk (Poland) and Julianna Kis (Hungary)
55.  Joanne Tinley (UK) and Michaela Pabeschitz (Austria)
65.  Kristina Johansson (Sweden) and Penny Neville (Canada)
66.  Krisztina Erlaki-Toth (Hungary) and Nicole Keller (Germany)
76.  Lori Finney (Canada) and Marie-Noel Voyer-Cramp (Canada)
78.  Marta Kaczerowska (Poland) and Milla Starchik (Canada)
81.  Melinda Orr and Molly Alexander (you are here!)
83.  Michelle Jensen and Sandra Young (Canada)
92.  Rosa Maria Cuevas (Mexico) and Tejae Floyde
93.  Sabine Dittrich (Germany) and Sally Russick
95.  Shanti Johnson and Tracy Mok (Canada)
97.  Sonya Stille and Traci Zeller (Canada)
98.  Stefanie Teufel (Germany) and Tania Hagen (New Zealand)
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2/9/12

Bead Soup Has Arrived And Other Awesome Things

I am SOOOO excited!  My bead Soup Mix has arrived and it is AMAZING!  I have been blessed with the most amazing artist for a bead soup partner - Melinda Orr.

For those of you who aren't familiar with her work, Melinda is a phenomenal metal smith and jewelry artist.  She makes handmade copper components with the most amazing patinas, and I've gotta say, her style is right up my alley!  I received her package yesterday, and boy, am I spoiled!

Here is where I started unwrapping:

Such cute dragonfly paper...

Oooooo!  Look at these fun little baggies chock full of goodies!

From the peach baggie:  gorgeous beads to compliment all the other components.

From the top blue baggie, handmade copper components that turn over to reveal...
This stunning patina!  (Sorry - my photo editor just plain didn't want to get the colors right in this  picture - the colors are so incredible rich!)


The top baggie also had these wonderful  components:  handmade bead caps, fasteners, copper rivets, and large oval connectors along with the domed glass circles to go with the cool artwork for mixed-media pieces.

The bottom baggie contained a beautiful handmade clasp with the gorgeous patina of the other components, 2 fun textured copper circles, copper beads and spacers, lovely Sue Beads lampwork beads form Sue Kennedy and a sweet bird charm from Lisa Petraka.

My Bead Soup cup runneth over!

Now that you've seen what I received, I can show you what I sent to Melinda:

I made the focal and clasp using seed beads and copper; the large lampwork beads are from EB Bead and Metal Works; the small turquoise lampwork beads are from Blue Seraphim; and I sent some cute hot pink Czech pressed glass bellflowers and some funky blue and yellow glass beads I found on an out-of-town trip.
The focal I sent Melinda is from a new series I am making using mixed media collage with seed beading techniques.  Here's some of the others I'll be putting up in my Etsy shop soon:


I love how these turned out, and have some more in the works right now.  In fact, I made one that completely reminded me of my friend, Patty Gasparino, and I sent it to her, asking if she would be willing to make something with it and post it on her blog.  Here is her gorgeous design:

Love's Letter Lost
Isn't is fabulous?  You can read more about this piece on her blog, My Life Under The Bus.

So, BIG thank yous to Melinda and Patty - you ladies are completely amazing!

For more information on the Bead Soup Blog Hop, check out Lori Anderson's blog, Pretty Things.

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