Grrrrr! Purrrr!

It's funny the things I find in my bead bowl. Last week I discovered a whole set of Tiger beads and a gorgeous long skinny Tiger focal I had apparently saved for myself for some project(?) a long time ago!  Now, I have no idea what they were for! So they are moving to the glass bead website starting today!

I have a dear friend in town and will be running the streets a bit next week. He seems to be my only "see-a-great-art-film-and-try-a-new-restaurant" buddy and it's nice to get out of the shop and see the world once every six months or so. I will be shipping every day though!

Beads of Courage May Bead Drive

Back in May, Beads of Courage sent out a call for bead donations, asking artists to donate at least 50 handmade beads by the end of month of May. The charity is an arts in medicine program that allows children with serious illnesses to tell their story through beads.

 I cleaned out my donation drawer and bead bowl and came up with more than 60!

What was cool about this year's bead drive is that Beads of Courage mailed all the bead makers who donated a Beads of Courage t-shirt!

I'm so happy to have the shirt to wear to our upcoming Beads of Courage fund raising event in September!

Bead Bowl - The Most Perfect Hollow & LAUGHTER

I'm having a really strange week and running behind prepping for class this Thursday. Let's see...this week it's stolen credit cards, a humongous stamp order that requires access to some files I no longer have the software for and and "almost" broken printer which turned out to be a power outage in the shop! And that was just MONDAY!

Thank goodness I can laugh! I actually force laughter breaks sometimes and last night I was enjoying a favorite website that had me laughing so HARD, I thought I was going to pass out! And all night long, everytime I woke up all I had to do was say the key phrase from the funny post which was "Horse Whisperer" and I would get wide awake with laughter! And all this led to a funny dream. I was teaching a cookie bouquet class and I was saying to my student, "You know what would go perfectly with this??" (I was pointing to a cookie in my dream.)

The student looked to me waiting for an answer. And I said, "PANTS!" Like... what do pants and cookies have in common??? So half the time I woke up saying "pants" and laughing and the other times it was "horse whisperer." Either way, I'm in need of some sleep!

Laughter puts me in a great mood and gives me ideas... and I have no time to torch. UGH!

And I don't have time to blog so, I dug through my bead bowl for something interesting and decided to show off the most perfect hollow I've ever made... DON'T LAUGH, ok???!!!

I made this in a Heather Trimlett class at the Mandrel. I LOVE this bead because it is SO perfect... the ends are puckered beautifully, it's perfectly round and hollow... but... How would you know??? It's NOT made of transparent glass. You want to make hollows from transparent to show off their hollowness... and this is black and orange and opaque gray!

I have an excuse. It was the end of the day and I was hot and tired and on total mental overload from all that Heather had inspired. I watched her demo and I sat there... debating going outside to cool off. But Heather walked by and told me to "Make a bead, try the hollow technique!"  Feeling lazy and drained, I decided to make one but... the only glass that I had long rods of in front of me were the ones you see.

At the time, I thought, "I don't care about the color... I just want to try Heather's method..." and her method turned out to be the best ever!  And so... I'm the very proud owner of one opaque hollow!

Bead Bowl - Sarah Hornik Barbie Focal

Sometimes the bead bowl has beads that...there's just something wrong with. We had a strange batch of dichro in this class and I've noticed that over time, the bead has some hairline cracks. It's a good reason to hang onto any bead you are unsure of - for just a little while - to make sure cracks aren't developing.

My jewelry box is actually filled with beads I wouldn't dare sell because of a hairline crack...pieces I've worn for YEARS! It gives me one more piece to wear in my "rotation" of my own hand made work but I do get a little nervous when someone inspects them closely. I feel the need to tell them "I only keep my boos boos!"

But this bead -I hang onto it - in the bead bowl - for other reasons. This bead taught me about gravity and extending the length of my bead. I also ponder creating a realistic looking bone with this technique. It's a fascinating study in the way hot glass moves! And the temperament and control the artist needs to make a bead like this... and courage! I could have never made a bead like this when I started!

It's also a visual reminder of the way I over work rubino...HATE the devit! I will probably try to get the devit off and make something for myself with this one.

Bead Bowl - The Sarah Hornik Focals

Still working on taxes...UGH. I sometimes feel Uncle Sam should pay ME for all the time it takes to document my life! OY!

Today, we're taking a look inside my overflowing bead bowl. I use my bead bowl for different things... In that big bowl is a stash of HUGE plain beads and vessels in case I ever decide to study electroforming! I have the kit... but no time to learn one more skill! Then there are wonkies and fuglies  - just-not-quite-perfect-but-still-really-cool beads. Those often end up in my Beads of Courage stash. I keep beads that I made one or two of as a sort of journal or a reminder to make more and turn them into a set. There are also beads that are one offs that I often use as freebies for repeat customers.

Finally, there are beads from classes. I hang onto them because I think they're cool and I hope to turn them into something for me to wear. But I often hang on to them to reexamine what it is I really like about them and try to find a way to adapt that to my own work...thus making the bead more my own. I know many feel that if a teacher teaches something in a class - a class that costs lots of money - it must be o.k. to make the beads she taught in class. But I feel a little weird about that... I want to take what I learned and use that in something that is mine.

I simply adore how far the webbing ran down the length of this bead.  This makes me want to play with droopy silvered ivory!

These are two of the beads I kept from a class with Sarah Hornik. I adore Sarah...she's an excellent teacher. But I adore her as an artist because she breaks the rules! Who says a bead has to be round? Who says the ends have to be even? Who says the two ends of a bead have to look alike? Just taking a look at her work can expand your thinking of how beads should be....why not break the rules? It's way more fun!

Here, the gold leaf work mesmerizes... I want to play more with leafing under heavy crystal!