BSBP 8, The Reveal

Hello dear friends! As exciting as ever was this 8th international bead swap!
Suomenkielinen versio tämän postauksen alapuolella!


As a reminder the photo of the soup I got from my partner, Nicole Valentine, from Canada.

The colors are very pleasant to my eye and I had a lot of ideas what to make. The first piece I completed was the bracelet with the toggle made by Nicole and everything else from my own stash, lots of small faceted czech beads linked with sterling wire. I decided to replace the hook of the toggle with a bar.

This is mine :-)

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I also had many ideas how to use the lovely lampwork set made by Nicole. The first necklace combines the biggest lampwork bead from the soup with the small faceted glass beads and turquoise lampwork bead from my own stash. I have lately become an enthusiastic of braiding kumihimo and so the half of the necklace is a kumihimo braid and the other half is a sterling rolo chain; the pendant moves easily on either.

"Méduse"

My sister was so kind to lend her neck for the photos, you see how the mood changes if you have the kumihimo braid or the chain in front.



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For another necklace I continued the same colorway, I really love this combination, olive green and turquoise, but added white to it. I had the turquoise lampwork and some light blue chalcedony beads to go with Nicole's lovelies. I did not want to link them with wire nor I wanted to use the beading wire. I tried a cord (Toho) and was happy with it. I tried the knots, and was very surprised to find freshwater pearls with big enough holes to have that Toho cord getting through them. Did you know how "soft" a necklace with knotted cord is? Lovely to wear!

 "Aqua garden"

I was already very happy to have used so much of the soup I got. Well, the toggle and, let me count... okay, 4 lampwork beads... Was that not enough?


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Hmm... all right, a difficult part, magnesite beads from Nicole, quite big ones but nice :-)
I just happened to find my copper beads and jump rings, I don't often use copper but I have some of it. That was a charming combination. I also had a magnesite donut in my stash and had a very interesting metal link given from a beading friend, Vikki (she takes awesome photos in finnish nature!).

All these elements combined, I'm quite content with my F.O.X. necklace. The Jens Pind chainmaille is not at all difficult to weave and I must get myself weaving more of these chains!

 "F.O.X."

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Finally, after finding the copper, I began to think about gold, too!
So I made a pendant of one of Nicole's lampwork beads, which had both gold and silver dots in it. The
bead cap, closed ring and chain are vermeil.

"Treasure"

That's all from me! Please, visit my swap partner, Nicole, here

 The soups I sent to my partner:

And you'll find the list of links to all, about 500 international participants, on our great and one of a kind hostess Lori Anderson's blog, here.

If you have time and interest, you'll find all my earlier bead soups and reveals, links here!
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BSBP 7, reveal 2, welcome!

Hello my friends! It is the partytime, once again, 4th time of bead soups for me, and as you sure know, our hostess is Lovely Lori Anderson, click -here- to find all the participants on reveal 2 today! But, please, look through my long post with many pieces of jewelry before you jump to Lori's!

All the pics can be clicked to see them larger if you wish.

(Suomalaislukijoille: sama teksti suomeksi alla)

-Where to begin - My partner this time, Kay Bolton from blog Toodles and Binks, is a very talented ceramist from England and of course she sent me a lovely soup including her own art :-)
Here you see her charming soup

Oh, I had it very difficult in the beginning though I liked every  bead and bit!  But, when getting the flow I ended up making a total of 8 pieces of jewelry!

Well, I started with the ceramic flower-charms, but I used the darker one as a pendant in this necklace.
In it I tried to catch a glimpse of a cherry tree in blossom with the sparkling pink crystals from Kay. I used my favourite silk ribbons braided, and some fresh water pearls in pink and olive green.

"Blossoming"

In the bracelet, there are carved agate beads and natural aquamarine heishi from my own stash. I patinated a brass twig for the toggle, which is the other one of Kay's lovely ceramic flowers.

To complete the set I made a pair of earrings of course, using ceramic bead caps made by Kay. These are so fun and surprisingly light to wear.

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For the second set I used these grass green beads and cotton string from Kay, and the sterling toggle and charm from her, too. The silverplated tubes I had for ages not knowing what to use them for. They just found their way in here.

 

 "Printemps"

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And then for the pendant made by Kay. It was not an easy one though so original and gorgeous!

But, I found some hues of light blue in its glaze and that made me take some of my blue Preciosa glass beads to play with. The lovely ceramic heart charm is made by Kay, too!

"Reach out"

I like this one a lot, am I allowed to say that aloud ;-D

 

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And lastly, I wanted to make something from the other little heart charm, too, something simple and a bit romantic. It became a pendant with a vintage lucite bead, crystal rondelle and faceted onyx bead, in a  short leather cord.

"Black lace"

Thank you for your patience, if you made it through all the pieces till here :-D 

And, have fun cruising over all the other blogs, too!
Continue the round by my partner, Kay -here- !

I greatly appriciate your comments on my pieces, I will try and visit everyone on reveal 2 during this weekend!

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Bead Soup Blog Party 6, reveal 2

Sama postaus suomeksi -täällä-

OMG! Getting a Horn of Plenty of bead soups from my swap partner, Rita from Toltec Jewels / Jewel School Friends, I was just extatic making my pieces :-)

Yes, I got two Soups, tropical and fossil. Thanks to our hostess Lori Anderson/Pretty things for pairing us! Rita is such a wonderful, warm person!

I'm showing these necklaces first and then earrings and bracelets. I have still ideas for remaining soup, but I hope you enjoy these numerous pieces today! (You can click all the photos bigger and I'm sorry we did not have sun and bright on all of these days.)

'Tropical flight'

' Tropical Garden' 

Polymer hibiscus pendant from Tina Holden, you cant't see the half of it's beauty in the photo! I gave the small brass keys some vintaj patina to match them with the colours. This tunrned out even better than I thought.

Shamballah rounds with stamped sterling links on the left. I also got those lovely genuine rubies, not treated, a great plum colour in them!

I fell in love with the Iris-toggle by Jill MacKay the first moment I saw it! And because I made the necklaces without clasp, I paired this LovelyOne with a huge Lapis slab I had just waiting, add of the bold green silk - colours of Iris in this bangle don't you think? The bangle has not left my wrist since!

For the other one I had the blue coral links made with my own 12mm beads (I got small coral rounds from Rita and they will be a necklace! She did not know I fancy the blue coral, I was lucky!) I just added the most charming hill tribe flowers from Rita and the big sterling bead for a bracelet.

That was tropical, do you still have strength for Fossil? Please, do!

I got the sunstones and the most lovely 'painting with fire' - heart and the fabulous copper toggle (Lisa Liddy). Added some czech glass beads and a wooden bead from my stash.

Do you remember this fossil pendant ( Wrapped up in Magic by Audrey Allen) from the post when I first told you about my soups?! Amazing and one of a kind, rare and rough beauty!

I repeated the swirls of the copper frame with the vintaj wire swirls around the smooth sari silk and

this silk jus happened to have the embroidered paisley pattern with the same leaf motif which is highlighted in the fossil stone dating back 30 million years! This did not really need anything more but I added one sea urchin spike there.

Now, thank you for visiting, thank you if you had time for all the photos, and hop for another blog now!
Remember to visit my friend Rita to see what she made out of these, I tell you, she made wonders!