Sparkle heart

Some weeks ago, I explained why my blog suddenly seems to be all hand embroidery (my arthritic thumb joint), but also talked about having a plan for bead embroidery.
Now I'm back with the first piece resulting from this plan, but you wouldn't even notice without my saying it because it's just a tad different from my previous pieces.

In the blog post about how my thumb influences my work at the moment, I also mentioned getting myself an embroidery set with a second stand and exchangeable hoops in different sizes.
This made me wonder why I didn't just do my bead embroidery pieces like that, too?
I glued my cabochons on like always, then I put some thinner fabric in the hoop and sewed through both the fabric and my embroidery foundation when making the bezel for the cabs.
Making pendants has always been my favorite and the smallest hoop I can use with the stand isn't that small, so the plan was to work on two pendants and then cut them off together to finish them.
You know what? That actually worked rather well and although it didn't mean my thumb joint could rest completely, I avoided at least some of the movements it hates. Now I would just have to see if the fabric would be thin enough not to mess up my edging.
Spoiler alert - it was.
I'm sure the idea isn't new, I didn't look it up before trying it out, but all that counts for me is that it works.

Here's the first pendant which I have finished now, my muse is still thinking about the other one.
I didn't use a cabochon for this one, but a marble heart. It's really smooth but not shiny and still has kind of a raw, unpolished look to it which I wanted to counterbalance with a smooth look for the bezel, with a dark sparkle for the edge as opposed to the subtle light sparkle of the marble (which doesn't show too well in the pictures).
For the bezel I chose grey seed beads with a light shimmer of gold, blue-grey Delicas for contrast, and a row of tiny silver seed beads, the edging is from black crystals, also with a shimmer of gold, in combination with real hematite rounds and matching seed beads.

This pendant is off. You might not even notice right away if you just give it a quick glance, but if you look closer, you see it.
The stone is asymmetrical and I didn't try to hide that.
So the bezel is asymmetrical as well and also the crystal edge. I had to place the bail so that the pendant would still hang right and the two beads at the top - a button bead and a faceted moonstone - only sit kind of in the center.
The back is a real surprise in its bright berry color. Turned like this, you can also see the asymmetry very clearly.

Well, aren't we all a little "off"? One eye bigger than the other one, one ear a bit higher, one foot larger, or what else there can be, and sometimes there's a surprise on the back ;-)
I hadn't planned it that way from the start, by the way, it just happened by following the stone with the beads, but the more I worked on it, the more I thought that I finally seemed to be embracing assymetry, something I have always been struggling with very much, but haven't given up on. I find it's easier going completely wild with freeform.
Does it still make me a little nervous? It sure does, but I like the idea of someone wondering what is different about this piece and finding out step by step and maybe embracing it, too.

Now I need to find the next step for the other "hoop" piece, so I can finish it.
There's a nagging feeling that I have painted myself into a corner with that one, but miracles happen, so I'm not going to give up hope just yet.

Tackle that stash - Mod Heart

Usually I start a stash tackler by going through my stash to see if anything is talking to me.
This time I started with a leftover piece of bead embroidery foundation. When I made my little hedgehog (that I didn't blog about), I didn't know at first what it would be become and how big it would be. Well, not very big as it turned out, so I had a piece of foundation with a hole in the middle and no idea what to do with it - until I cut it in half and ended up with two quite weird shapes.

I took one of them to my cab drawer to see if I had one that was right in size and would give me a good idea when a small rhodonite donut jumped into the way - not the slightest idea how this ever got to me - and thus turned on the experimenting mode.

This was a rather interesting journey. The first steps were easy. I glued the donut on, then I looked for bezel colors. Funnily enough, I had matte seed beads that matched the color of the rhodonite almost perfectly. They came from one of the surprise bead mixes that I like to order, and until now I had been pretty sure I would not be able to use them anytime soon. Does the bead store know my stash better than I do? ;-)
Now what colors to use with them?
I wanted a bit of color and a bit of shine (my way to say that I love to use metallic accents). Was it coincidence that most of the colors I picked were already waiting in my work area? And was it coincidence that I had just found the dark red fire polished crystals again? Of which one fit perfectly into the hole of the donut?
This was almost getting a little spooky!

From there, I was just following the flow. I had cut the edges of the foundation randomly, now I needed to fit a pattern into that.
After doing a few swirls I noticed that I was reminded of clothes patterns from the mod era, almost a little psychedelic, although those clothes would probably have been a lot more colorful.

In the end, the focal needed a chain, and there was really only one way to attach it.
I struggled a bit with the temptation to add a drop dangle to the tip (which isn't really a tip, it's just an illusion thanks to the crystal, the back looks more like a member of the Barbapapa family ;-)) or a fringe from tiny seed beads or fine chain, but then it seemed to me that would have been too much.

This was a fun experiment. Maybe I should try this more often, after all I still have the second half to begin with. I'll let you know how it goes.

Oldies but Goodies - Valentine's Day

I know Valentine's Day is already over, but today's Jewelry Artisans Community Oldies but Goodies Challenge happened to be in the week of Valentine's Day, so that's what it was all about.
Of course the first thing to think of for this day are hearts, but these pieces are so much more than just simple hearts, in fact a gift doesn't always have to be a heart and still be perfect for that day ... You'll see what I mean.

1 Cat's Wire
2 Jewelry Art by Dawn
3 RioRita
4 Betoj Designs
5 MC Stoneworks
6 Violetmoon's Corner

Oldies but Goodies - More hearts

Wait ... we already had hearts before, didn't we? Indeed we had, last year in the week of Valentine's Day. Believe it or not, there was another Valentine's Day this year and another Oldies but Goodies Challenge on JAC ;-) None of these hearts were in last year's selection, however.
Hearts don't go out of style, not only on the 14th of February. They come in all colors and, well, not in all shapes obviously, but in variations. There are the symmetrical ones, there are the embellished ones, the ones that lean to one side, there are even lifelike looking ones (none of those came up in our challenge, though).

Let's see what the Jewelry Artisans Community members came up with this time.
I give you the Hearts of JAC - episode 2.

1 Echoes of Ela
2 MC Stoneworks
3 Jewelry Art by Dawn
4 Cat's Wire
5 Violetmoon's Corner
6 The Crafty Chimp
7 2 Fab Fristers

Tackle that stash - Beaded blue hearts bracelet

The other day I made a pair of earrings for the monthly Jewelry Artisans Community challenge, shoulder dusters, larger deep red firepolished crystals, black and golden seed beads and red crystal drops, very gothic.
I figured the design that had come from a slightly messed up filled netting bangle would also work for a bracelet ... and how about using bicone crystals ... silver and blue maybe ... what do I have in my little drawer ... hey, wait!

It's amazing. I go through that crystals drawer a lot, sometimes just to take in the sparkle, but I hadn't seen that small bag of blue firepolished crystals in months. How they worked their way to the front all by themselves, I don't know, but they were certainly looking for attention.
At first I wanted to make another pair of earrings, but the longer the line of little "hearts" became, the more those crystals wanted to be a dainty and sweet bracelet. Who am I to disagree?

These are the earrings, by the way.
Due to technical reasons which caused a lot of hair tearing, hitting my head on the table and sobbing uncontrollably none is listed yet, but let me know if you would like to see more in this design, maybe with some other colors, too?

Oldies but Goodies - Hearts

The topic of this Jewelry Artisans Community Oldies but Goodies Challenge has been inspired by Valentine's Day.
Have you ever wondered where the heart shape comes from? You can find a few theories about that here. No matter if you believe any of them, hearts have been around for a while, and not just on Valentine's Day. You see them in pictures, in jewelry, replacing the dots on the i in some girls' handwritings (no, I was never one of those who did that) ... and of course in the Oldies but Goodies!

1 Cat's Wire
2 RioRita
3 Jewelry Art by Dawn
4 2 Fab Fristers
5 Violetmoon's Corner
6 The Crafty Chimp
7 MC Stoneworks

Mary Poppins, incomplete hearts and a witch

Since I was a child, I have loved the Mary Poppins books by P. L. Travers. I can't say how often I read them. I still read them regularly. I always wished I could have been one of those children, and it's impossible for me to pick my favorite adventure.

When looking at the pendant I just listed I remember the story about Mary's relative. He could repair all kinds of porcelain things, cups, figurines, but he could also repair something much more important - hearts.

Have you ever wondered how to repair a heart that is not just broken, but missing a piece? I just couldn't help myself, this beautiful green freeform cab reminded me of an incomplete heart, so I went on a mission - I made the heart complete by crocheting fine silver wire into the missing piece. I hid the "scar" with rainbow moonstones. And yes, you have seen it before, but I didn't explain anything about it then, AND it's listed now. Progress!

Make my heart whole, now on Zibbet

I also have a confession to make. I don't have enough time. Now that I'm not only married to my crochet hooks, but have also caught the looming bug, I'm probably doomed.

Let me show you my latest cuff. Can you see I'm looking forward to Halloween? And here the circle is closing. I first read about Halloween in a Mary Poppins book. Yes, it's true, I swear!

By the way, even if I don't have any loomed cuffs in my shop (yet?), let me know if you want to talk about one.