Bead Arts

Only its temporary home though! In about a month, our collaborative charm necklace will be auctioned off to support breast cancer research.

For those who never heard our story, or who don’t remember it, here’s the summary:
Over the course of a couple months, a small group of my friends and I collaborated on a charm necklace project. None of us had ever met in person, but this project certainly made us feel closer in so many ways. The artists who participated with me were Wendy Van Camp, Illaya Brown, Bobbi Chukran, Leah Hitchcock-Ybarra, Dorothy Lueloff, Ellen Chasse, Amy Fraser, and Dulcey Heller.

Each of us made a charm in an “ocean” color palette that we all agreed upon. The charms were sent to me last July (2006), and it was my responsibility to get them all to play nicely together! Since we had spent quite a bit of time discussing palette and size issue, this did not turn out to be a problem at all.

Our necklace then made the rounds to all of us. We each wore it to a special event and had shared pictures and stories with each other. Some wonderful experiences resulted from the travels of the necklace. In the midst of this, Belle Armoire magazine put out a call for collaborative necklaces…could there have possibly been any better timing? As soon as we finished passing it around, I packaged it up and shipped it off to be photographed for the magazine. “A Charmed Life” should appear in the Sept/Oct issue of Belle Armoire!

So now it has temporarily come back to live with me until it’s time for the auction!

handmade-beaded-jewelry, wearable-art, beads, beading, jewelry, mixed-media

Only a few of my bead and jewelry girls had anything to report this week, but their links are quality!

Jewelry and Beading Blog
Tammy recently had the tough job of judging the Beads 4 You contest. The winners received two of her books as prizes.

Snap out of it, Jean! There’s beading to be done!
Jean shows off a fantastic sterling heavy guage Byzantine link with lampwork pendant necklace which she made to wear to Links book signings!

The Impatient Blogger

Bitten by the bead bug? Margot Potter gives you the straight you know what on the tools you’ll need to get started. This March post is part of her ongoing Adventures in Jewelry Making with the BQOTU (day) series.

Strawberry Moon

True to form, I did June’s page this month! I just don’t like to work on the current month…I have to think about what the previous month was like in order to really come up with imagery that suits both the name of the moon and my own quirks! You can find links to more of the Bead Journal Project’s participants on Robin Atkin’s blog.

Click on “Bead Journal Project” under “categories” in the right-hand sidebar to see last month’s beaded journal page.

bead-journal-project, beads, beading, bead-embroidery, journals

Art Bead Scene
Show off those art beads with a free earring project.

Jewelry and Beading
At Jewelry and Beading, Tammy suggests that you start planting your jewelry beads in July, so you can bead weave a cool beaded tree for the holidays.

Naughty Secretary Club
Jennifer searches world wide for the bits that go into her revamped vintage jewelry. This past week she ventured to the Brimfield, Mass flea market. Read her blog and get the full report as well as a few online jewelry shopping suggestions she discovered on her trip!

Snap out of it, Jean! There’s beading to be done!
Mother’s bracelets are true classics! Jean was comissioned (by her husband Jim’s pal, Rob) to create a very pretty one for his wife, due in October. See what they created together by phone, and find out if she liked it or not!

The Impatient Blogger
Margot whines about her “stupid thumb” and shares “fabulicious” photos and trend spotting thoughts from this year’s Summer CHA Show. Yipee!

Art Bead Scene
Art beads stow away on the next Bead Cruise, view a preview of classes that feature beads from our favorite designers!


The Impatient Blogger
Bitten by the bead bug and think you’ve got what it takes to sell your wares? Margot Potter shares her thoughts on turning your passion for beading into a viable business. Check in with This May 2007 post is part of her infotaining series: Jewelry Making with the BQOTU™ (day).


Jewelry and Beading
Tammy at Jewelry and Beading has been a busy beader reader. She shares some of her latest jewelry book reviews.


Katie’s Beading Blog
Uh oh. Katie has a new obsession: shells! Check out her latest creation, a lustrous shell bracelet.


Snap out of it, Jean! There’s beading to be done!
Jean displays her latest Party Dress Bracelet (once again, the first ones seen in Belle Armoire Magazine’s Salon), another never before displayed delight! This one is a sultry number called “Oil Slick”!

Jewelry and Beading
As part of her Christmas in July theme for the month, Tammy at Jewelry and Beading has a super easy beaded wreath that is perfect to do with the kids.


Naughty Secretary Club
Jen discovers episodes of her DIY Network show Craft Lab on You Tube including the episode called Beaded Jewelry with guest Maya Brenner author of Beaded Jewelry: Create Your Own Style.


Savvy Crafter
Tutti, Fruity, and Felty Pebbles! Candie can’t decide if they should be strung in a bracelet or magnets. See for yourself!

Snap out of it, Jean! There’s beading to be done!
Jean gets about as serious as Jean can get, and discusses what this past year writing her book, Links, was like.


The Impatient Blogger
Another fabulous free project? Can it be true? Yes! BQOTU Margot Potter shares a third free project from her sensational new book Sparkletastic! Viva La Sparkle!

I found the blog of a group of mixed media artist who certainly are! One might even say they are crazed about charms

Charms by Deryn Mentock

Just Simply Charming is the name given to this group of 25 artists, and their blog is full of wonderfully inspiring picture, quotes, and instructions for many of the charms!!

handmade-beaded-jewelry, wearable-art, beads, beading, jewelry, mixed-media, tutorials, charms

Is there any beader out there who has not heard about this project yet? If so, bookmark this site, and make sure that you get in on it next year (I am counting on this becoming an on-going event!). I was fortunate enough to be invited to participate before it was too late. Robin Atkins, beader extraordinaire, has modeled this project on the Quilt Journal Project that many are already familiar with. The blog homepage for the project is the 2007 Bead Journal Project. From the blog site:

About the 2007 Bead Journal Project
We are 239 women and 1 man who are dedicated and committed to creating 12 bead journal pages, one per month, for a year, starting June 1, 2007. We live in 13 different countries, including 37 states in the USA. Our primary goal during this process, is to stretch our creative and technical limits. The BJP is all about visual journaling using any media and techniques, as long as it includes beading. We are free to structure our bead journal pages any way we want, as long as all 12 are the same size.

I have chosen to do the names of the moon for each month. Researching this, I found that there were many alternate names for each month’s full moon, so I put together a list of the names I liked the best. I also decided to do the moon for the previous month each time. I’m not sure why…probably just because I really wanted to start with May, which is the “Flower Moon”. So here is my offering for June:

In July, I’ll be doing the “Strawberry Moon” for June!

bead-journal-project, bead-embroidery, beading, beads, mixed-media

Have you heard about the 2007 Bead Journal Project? It’s a group effort started by Robin Atkins, and I’m excited to be taking part in it. All I want to show you today is a little tiny corner of the piece that I’m making…more later!

bead-journal-project, bead-embroidery, beading

Lori Greenberg is hosting this month’s issue of the

Carnival of the Creators!!

Check out all the interesting blog links that Lori is sharing, and maybe you’ll even feel inspired to contribute to next month’s carnival.

blog-carnival, carnival-of-the-creators

This is it, only bigger! See it up there at the top?

I just need one teeny little favor from everyone! Almost everyone here at 451Press is going to add a tagline or slogan to their banner, and I’ve actually got too many choices. Usually I don’t have enough, but that’s another story. The tagline is going to go in small type in the bottom right-hand corner of the banner. So which do you like best? If you’ve got another suggestion, would you add it to the comments section of my blog (not of the poll)? Thanks so much everyone!

If you live in or near Maine, you might want to consider taking a class at The Beadin’ Path. Known for their great selection of vintage beads, this store would likely be a fun (and tempting) venue for learning!

handmade-beaded-jewelry, wearable-art, beads, beading, jewelry, mixed-media

There’s a brand new obsession sweeping the Wearable Art forum at Wet Canvas: finger-woven bracelets as taught by Robin Atkins. At first I said, “Oh, those are nice, but I’m not really interested.” Next I thought, “Well, maybe I should learn about the technique so that I can speak somewhat intelligently about it on Bead Arts.” And now…?

And now?

Well, I ordered a bunch of cord and am happily culling my larger-holed beads!

My first attempt came during the late-season nor’easter that we had two weekends ago, when I wasn’t going to be going anywhere for proper supplies. I just pulled out some embroidery floss and used that to get the basic idea. The biggest problem I encountered was that the beads I wanted to use had teeny tiny holes, so I couldn’t weave them on properly: I had to go back and sew them on afterwards, which kind of defeats the whole purpose! Also, embroidery floss stretches, so no matter how tightly you pack your weaving, it’s going to end up stretched and sagging at some point.

So I did what any explorer would do under the circumstances: I learned from my experiment, cut it apart, and ordered some high-quality materials to work with! The cords that I ordered are from Jewels in Fiber, which has a glorious array of non-stretching nylon cord. To learn this technique, you’ve got several options. Robin Atkin’s original article on finger-weaving appeared in Bead & Button magazine issue #11. More recently, a similar technique was published in BeadDreams 2003. Probably the easiest way to learn it is to get Robin’s book called Beaded Treasures, available on her website.

handmade-beaded-jewelry, wearable-art, beads, beading, jewelry, mixed-media

I am proud and thrilled to be hosting the Carnival of the Creators again this month! Last time I hosted, it was on my mixed media blog, Layers Upon Layers, but this time…right here on Bead Arts!

Conan Stevens tells about his lastest and greatest project: My First Day Shooting The Action Comedy Movie Bangkok Adrenaline posted at Conan Stevens Worlds Biggest Action Hero?. Conan writes, “I am actor and scriptwriter in this movie, this is my blog about my first day on set.”

Andrea Dickson shares some insider tips in Comics Curmudgeon: Filthy Rich Blogger Divulges Secrets to Wealth! posted at Wisebread Financial. Andrea interviews popular comics critic Josh Fruhlinger, aka “The Comics Curmudgeon.”

Wilson Ng cautions us that we may have to make a choice: The Merely Good and the Really Great posted at Reflections of a BizDrivenLife. He explains that the Pursuit of Excellence starts by a person understanding the difference between being merely good and being really great. Many skills are easy to learn, but difficult to master.

Mr. Besilly presents Creativity, The Hammer of Expression posted at Mr. Besilly - One Man’s highway. “The more we unleash creative ability the better we will become at expressing our own originality and imagination,” he explains. “It’s vital to use that which we posses.”

Christopher Kinniburgh treats us to the beginning of a free serialized novel called The Preacher And The Author - One posted at Emotion Part One.

Lola London is also writing a story in blog form. She shares a link to the first chapter: 1. Tell me a story, Jackanory… posted at L’undone. Lola writes, “Here is a tale of high-weirdness, big love, cyber-crime and the mutual insane obsession of two people that never even met. This blog is the true story of how it happened and how I got through it.”

Ruth Mitchell asks us to think about our priorities in her post Which Are You? Work or Play First? posted at Buy Outside the Box.

The Positivity Blog shares some great tips on how to get the creative juices flowing in 8 Ways to Spark Your Creativity posted at Personal Development with The Positivity Blog.

Ellen McDermott is an Irish artist who mixes painting contemporary art works with family life, all in the one kitchen. In this post, she shares about Audrey’s second fifth party posted at Keynoter March 2007.

Venetian wound beads

Don’t miss the Bead Database site. There’s a lot of information for the bead lover, including a discussion forum, an interactive database, and lots of articles of interest. The image database is also available as an RSS feed so that you can be alerted to new postings in your blog reader.

handmade-beaded-jewelry, wearable-art, beads, beading, jewelry, mixed-media