bracelet crazy

The last day before the big ( and I mean BIG) Bead Soup Blog Party reveal day tomorrow morning.  Got your post ready ? Got your piece made? Got your piece started? Found your package in the rubble on your desk...you'll have to excuse me, I'm never ready, but strangely, this time, I am!  Perhaps this bodes well for future deadlines, I can hope!

 I've been continuing to work on my hollow bracelets and I've sent new ones to my testers Christine Damm, and Anke Humpert, so I 'll give you ( and them ) a preview of what's in their package.  I have so many ideas for these, but school break is coming next week so they will have to wait.  Oh, and read Christine's last post - very interesting!

 

 Hopefully they will have fun with with them and I'll find out how durable Premo and Pardo really are!

Have fun tomorrow everyone!  And Lori, thank you!  I wish you the best of luck with your book.

A small peek before Saturday...

Finally, I'm finished!  

I succeeded in completing my Bead Soup Blog Party piece two days before needed, which makes me happy as I usually go down to the wire on every deadline.  I won't say much about it before Saturday, except to say that it proved as much of a challenge as I thought would be.  Honestly, I'm hopeless at putting jewelry together, all huge thumbs and doing things five times over before I get it right.  I have such respect for the the people out there who do this successfully for a living ( ie. our hostess...).  I must have rearranged things a million times before even starting....please, someone, tell me the process CAN flow more smoothly than this!

It also gave me more insight into what I've been doing most of lately, that is, making components for other jewelry makers - how elements and components might be redesigned to work better, look better and attach better.  So, whatever my piece looks like (amateurish), the time spent doing this has been valuable for making beads and other components to sell to people who know what they are doing.  Not so shabby...

I've also confirmed what I suspected - I like to make every part of a piece of jewelry, even the findings - I guess so that it looks like a part of me ( though sadly, perhaps not like a wearable piece of jewelry).  Will have to get more comfortable with metal.

A little bit of fresco filtering from photoshop and Bob's your uncle!  Wow, I wish it really looked like this!

See you on Saturday...

A second thing -

Must be a record for me, two blog posts in one day. 
Yesterday I received my package from my  Bead Soup Blog  Party partner - she is Marie Cramp of Skye Jewels.  I'd  just like to give you a taste of things to come:

the mystery-

 After opening, I have a generous number of beautiful flat tiles with very evocative images.  I know this is going to to a true challenge for me because I rarely, if ever, use images in my work.  Oh , Lori.....

 What I immediately gravitate towards in these tiles is the sepia/magenta/blackness of them, because I work with these colours all the time.  Maybe I'll be able to find a way in...
Also included are lovely brass finish findings, bead caps, chain and a clasp - another challenge, I ususally make everything in polymer.  (Don't despair,  you'll find those pliers somewhere in the mess on your desk).

 And finally, these lovely little glass beads!  The way to an ex-glass blower's heart...something I can always relate to!

I will succeed, I will!  (But it will be difficult).

Thanks for everything, Marie!