Bead Table Wednesday....a little late

I have been looking at people's intriguing posts about what they have on their table for some time.  I joined the group on Flickr - so what's my problem?  How come I haven't posted?  Well, truth to tell, my work space is a disaster most of the time, but I've realized that I'm not the only one.  I'm trying very hard to set aside 15 minutes or so every day for tidying and sorting, but there is a steady accumulation that resists this determined assault and, worst of all, there is always one thing that resists the pigeon-hole.  Those things add up daily...things I've made and can't part with yet, things I'd be embarrassed to part with, things I haven't finished yet, things I will never finish...and on it goes.  So that's it then - my bead table today is having to deal with pieces/beads I never dealt with completely or properly!

These include:  a set of grapey textured beads that just got some ochre highlights after sitting around here for ages ( now I  like them),  a new layered pendant ( how did that sneak in there before the old junk - tsk tsk), some pods I reworked because I really didn't like them ( better now), some layered, old and mysterious looking stacked triangles that I didn't like til I took the alcohol pen to them ( alcohol pens, my new best friends, I think that rhymes...), post earrings I 've had finished for yonks and haven't been quite sure about (only one way to test that out - list them, dammit!), a striped flat oval set which I 've been dithering about because they don't quite look like the ones I was supposed to remake ( so what, maybe they are actually better than the first ones...), and the list goes on.

 The focus of the table - above ( I did wipe up the black paint spills in search of proper contrast...)

Then the individual problems, now hopefully solved!

As I write this out it's actually a little frightening to see the amount of dither and worry that is generated by this stuff.  Don't efficiency experts tell you that you should only handle a piece of paper once?  I must have handled some of these pieces dozens of times in trying to decide what to do about them, this is not interesting productive or efficient....

I think facing at least a few of my dilemmas on Bead Table Wednesdays could be helpful. To say the least. 

Cleaning therapy

I know I've mentioned before that I'm a less than stellar housekeeper.  There are exceptions to that, though, particularly when I'm cleaning my studio space.  A very particular pleasure....Yesterday I spent the afternoon cleaning and organizing my space and evaluating work in progress.  I had made 3 or 4 dozen sturdy origami boxes over the course of the last two weeks to help me organize all of my stuff.  And while doing that, I made myself decide whether to keep something (continue working with it) or pitch it!

It was an interesting process!  I found a lot of stuff that I had parked/abandoned while I flitted onto some other idea - not surprising as my polymer mind is definitely a bit flighty these days.  This is stuff that I will rework/finish.  Also, happily, I did find stuff to pitch, which tells me that I have grown a little in this medium, or I have at least determined ways that will not work for me.  It was also sobering to look at the work I have to do, but also a pleasure to be able to find everything in an instant!  I will keep it like this, I will!  It had reached the point that I couldn't concentrate on one thing because of the other ideas intruding from all sides.  Now they are safely in their boxes on their trays ranked by urgency...to be tackled another time.

Come and gone

March break ( which started for us on the 26th of February) has come and gone and it seems that winter is going with it.  We only really had one snow storm so the cross country ski season ended last weekend - almost a month early for Quebec!  In keeping with this whirlwind arrival of spring (once we get rid of the disgusting gravelly snowbanks) my mind and work is also dashing from here to there and possibly forging ahead and also hitting brick walls.  I have to keep reminding myself of the exhilaration of learning a new medium which carries with it the down side of temporary defeat.  Usually, when your ideas get ahead of your skills...

I titled this post to remind myself to enter more stuff in my sketchbook, because the ideas seem to just multiply and then as quickly disappear until something reminds me.  More orderly exploration is needed - for me, anyway.

Here are a few things I'm working on at the moment:  the exploration of transfers continues - it's a process that is fraught with moments that can wreck your whole piece, but for some reason, I like it.  I don't cover them with paint, either!  I like playing with the images before the transfer process, gives me a sense of (dubious) mastery over the computer.
Things I have painfully learned:  Dark transfers are exceedingly tricky and always work with very warm soft polymer...

In a moment of insanity, I joined the Ring-A-Day pool on Flickr.  There are so many interesting ideas there, I just had to be part of it.  Never mind that it is becoming the ring-a-month pool for me...  I'm going in this kind of massive stone-like direction with this.

And lastly, I'm working on new nested or nestled pendants which are beads which fit together - hoping to list a couple of these on Etsy this week.

I realize that this kind of work starts when I try to put my own beads together and I can see the findings and connections - I hate that!  Soon I'm going to have to buy some copper clay and make my own custom findings.  Yet another thing to master...