Lavender

Of course jewelry had been on my list since I tried my hand at hand embroidery for the first time. I was aware that it would be different from working on a larger project because the space is really limited, but when I got my first bezels, I found it was even more difficult to come up with a design of my own that fit the space.

I began with a small silk shading flower, but too many petals meant too much width.
Next I started a little fern, but I'm not sure about that one yet, it's a bit boring and I won't be able to fit in much more, so it's still in the stars if it's going to be finished.

Then I stumbled upon a picture of lavender. Long stalks with loads of small blossoms sounded perfect and there were at least three kinds of purple in my floss stash (which I only organized today asking myself why on Earth I thought I needed that floss lot, but I sure have a lot of green now - ferns for everyone! ;-)).

I really had fun and got wild with French knots (which I already love) and bullion knots (which I don't love that much yet, but think that's a matter of practice), added some brown specks here and there, and then it just needed a bit of a color pop on this neutral background - a bee, what else?

I think it's cute for a first own little design and am definitely looking forward to play some more.

Art Elements Design Challenge and Blog Hop - Bees

I have to admit that I went into this Art Elements challenge without a clue or inspiration once again simply because I loved the topic Niky chose - bees.
Here's an old picture from our little garden in the back and one from the wonderful Cambridge University Botanic Garden.

Now to the challenge.
I don't have many yellow beads. I have some Delicas, some Czech seed beads, and I had a bracelet that had been waiting to get ripped up, with wire crochet flowers of riverstone and yellow cat eye beads. I thought the cat eye beads would make nice little bee bodies, but I could hardly paint black stripes on. So instead I decided not to make bees, but to loom something inspired by bee colors.
The plan was a bead loomed base in black and yellow with cat eye embellishments. For contrast I used black seed beads and yellow thread, and because I didn't want the cat eyes to sit too high, I thought I'd leave neat little cutouts in the base for them.
So I loomed and then started reweaving threads. Nine beads meant nine cutouts meant 54 more threads to weave in. The number was not the problem, I don't mind reweaving, but although I left the warp threads quite long on both sides, most of these threads were very short. After all they were no extra threads. The one row in which three cutouts "met" - not the smartest idea I ever had - resulted in having to get eight threads out of one long one. So mostly I went back along the warp thread with the needle, threaded it then, pulled through, went through one of the horizontal rows with the needle, threaded it, pulled through .... for just one of 54 threads. Repeat, repeat, repeat ... I do have shorter needles, but they are a little too thick for my taste.
Finally I could sew the cat eyes in. When I was done, however, I looked at my bracelet and thought, wow, that is really, really ... BORING! Ugh.

What now? I had to come up with something to spruce this up a little. I tried this and that, and finally I gave all of the little yellow bees wings from clear AB size 15 seed beads. They are rather delicate, so I didn't want them flapping on the bracelet, and I fastened each wing tip to the loomed base.
Unfortunately I still wasn't happy. It couldn't be helped, those bees needed their stripes. What if I gave each one a stripe from size 15 seed beads? Of course they wouldn't sit tightly on the bodies, but you'd get the idea of bees. Only when I had "painted" all nine cat eyes, I thought a second stripe might be even better o.O

Ok then. Hm. Now I wished I had thought of that from the beginning and given the bees a green base to sit on. Not that I would have had the beads to do that. Not that I wanted to start all over again. Not that it even made sense to think about now. Night flying bees. Are there bees that fly in the night? Obviously there isn't that much known about bees and their sleep, except that they do sleep or at least take naps. Worker bees in the hive also work during the night, but bees don't fly at night.
Well, mine did now and it looked rather dark. I could at least give them some flowers? So that's what I did.
Believe me, there is a LOT of thread in those base beads and a lot of time in the bracelet!
Now I just had to add the findings, though, in a gold tone this time which works better here than my usual silver or copper tones.

Wow. I honestly wasn't sure if I'd make it in time. I'm almost impressed by my own patience :-P

This is a blog hop, so please check out the other participants' posts as well!

Guests
 
Alysen - Cat (that's me ;-)) - Evie and Beth - Hope - Kathy - Kelly - Sarajo - Tammy  

AE team members

Cathy - Jennifer - Jenny - Marsha - Niky - Sue


I'll end this post with a picture collage of bees (flying by day ;-)) sent to me by a friend. Aren't they beautiful?

Tackle that stash - Beaded spring flower necklace

So I have been a little flower crazy lately. I made earrings, a pendant, experimented with more petals, ripped up said experiment. Sorry, guys, I'm afraid this hasn't been the end yet.
Not even today's stash tackler has been the end.
First of all let me tell you the story of this seed bead stash. I have won these beads in a contest. They are seed beads of different colors and sizes. My problem were - the different colors and sizes. I don't work in opaque colors much. I didn't have enough beads of the same size for using them together in a nicely patterned loomed piece and off loom beading is not high on my list. A whole cup of transparent green size 15 seed beads? What on Earth could I make with them?

Over the years I used some of them in wire crochet and knit projects. The others I kept looking at, desperately waiting of a sign from the beady gods.
Once again a rope did the trick. A beaded rope would use up those tiny green beads very nicely, and then I could decide what to do with it. Herringbone. Herringbone spiral. When this was finally done, the flower idea jumped to mind.
One flower, two flowers, speckled flowers. How many flowers, though? After all my choice of color was limited. Leaves. Leaves and vines.
And last but not least ... hm ... a beaded butterfly? Wouldn't that be too much? And what colors? No butterfly, but .... hey wait, why didn't think of that right away? Perfect. A rotund, happy, cute as can be lampwork bee by Izzybeads.

A closer look.

An extra bonus was that this necklace qualifies for the JAC April challenge "Spring has sprung".
The necklace is not available yet because I am still waiting for some findings, but you can tell me how you like it, anyway ;-)

Bzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz

I know, I know ... Sunday is supposed to be reserved for quotes (which I have sadly neglected), but let's make an exception for the Fusion Beads 30 Day Challenge this month.

You might remember that I like to play from time to time, and today's piece for the topic "Make a wire wrapped ring" is one of the results.
When I first started with the Twin Beads, I tried a few things, and I ripped up a few things. I kept this one around however because it looked fun, and I like fun. It's not what I was trying to do, but the little beehive in bee colors started to grow on me, and so I finally put it on a wire wrapped ring. Bingo!

Beehive ring

When have you been a bit crazy the last time?