Sunday, February 22, 2015

Titles - Naming Your Pieces - How Do You Do It ?

I find it hard to come up with a title to these posts.  Sometimes as I write, something will come to me.  Rarely does anything pop into my brain in the beginning.  Like now.   :)  I usually know the subject I'm going to blog about but never the title.  I wonder if writers of books and articles do the same or have problems coming up with titles ? 

As a lampwork bead maker, jewelry designer, etc, etc, I have never had luck coming up with names/titles to my pieces.   I sort of envy those that the titles/names just seem to flow off their tongues.  lol !  Does it really work that way for those folks ?  I even tried a baby book of names.  A couple of times I got paint color sample cards from the local paint store to see if THAT would spark something in my brain to make it easier.  Nope.  lol !  Eventually I just gave up.  If, and that's a BIG if, something pops in my head at the time I post the photo wherever that might be, then I put it up with the photo.  That is a VERY rare occasion to be sure.  lol !  So, on that note, here's what I did all this past week or so.  Enjoy.

I ended up doing 2 beaded Kumihimo necklaces for the focal piece shown below.  I couldn't decide between the two which looked best.  They're basically the exact same pattern and same seed beads HOWEVER one color was changed.  The one on the left has silver beads and the one on the right has gold beads.  All the rest of the beads are the same colors.  I've pretty much decided on the one on the left.  The one with gold beads actually looks perfect with another pendant I've had for many years !  lol !   Hopefully both pieces will be finished up by today.  :)  And yes, that pendant is a shell with artwork added to it !  This artist is on Etsy and this is her shop link  Sculpted Windows  Tell her Debbie sent you. 

  
I finished another beaded Kumihimo necklace before the one above.  Gotta say, I STILL can't make up my mind if I'm going to keep it or sell it.  lol !  I LOVE LOVE LOVE this little dragon !  Something about her just calls to me.  I have more coming because of her.  lol ! The artist gave no name in particular so I hope to come up with something - someday.  lol !  

                                

I had one more project I worked on last week and will be continuing that project into this week so will blog about that next time hopefully.  :) 

If you are interested in a dragon necklace, please let me know by posting a message below.  I get the messages via an email so they are not posted automatically.  This keeps spammers off my blog.  I then post them here if they are appropriate to the blog post. 

Thanks much for coming by.  I hope you come back again soon !  Have a great week !   

Thursday, February 12, 2015

Kumihimo - Beads - Fun & Failure

Can't believe the second week of February is almost gone.  Man, wha' happened to the week ?  It really flew by.  It's been a crazy week for sure.  I didn't realize it's been over a week I was here.  lol !

I had a few projects going over the last week or so.  One in particular drove me nuts.  I knew it was going to be a total failure but kept on going thinking I could fix it.  Didn't work out that way at all.  There was more than one fix too which made it all the worse.  Finally had to walk away from it before tearing out my hair.  lol !  Came back and tore it apart.  I should of taken photo's first to show those mistakes but was so frustrated...........  :(  I did have a good outcome on two other projects pictured below and have started another one.  :)  Looking forward to the finished piece of the one I'm working on now.  :) 

I also tried to draw up my own Kumihimo pattern using a grid.  I found it very hard to follow.  Gave it several tries before I had to walk away from that.  lol !  Not a good week for trying new things evidently.  It happens.  But it was a learning experience and I have a solution in mind.  There is a digital program someone invented that's suppose to be easy to use to create your own patterns in Kumihimo.  I am considering it.  This is the link HERE to that pattern maker.  I need to decide if I will use it enough to justify spending the money.

So here are the two projects I finished up this past week. 
The first photo is a flat braid and it's LONG.  lol !  I think it's 82" long !  lol !  Would be perfect for handfasting and that's what I made it for.  Now in my Etsy shop.  :)  I LOVE the colors of this braid !  They work so well together.


The second photo is of a necklace I made the other day.  This is the second BRIGHTS necklace I've made using Greek ceramic beads and my own lampwork spacers.  This one is a bit shorter than the first and this one has a clasp.  Something bright to wear on a cold, dreary winters day.  lol !  It's 29" long and very lightweight.  It is for sale - $40.00 plus $5.80 priority flat rate small box shipping.  Send me a message here if interested. 


Thanks much for coming by.  I hope you come back again soon. 

Monday, February 2, 2015

More and More Kumihimo

This past week was filled with a couple of projects and one I'm still working on.  I don't have much to contribute with this post other than to show my projects so here goes.

First necklace I made a couple weeks ago and finally got it finished up.  It's now listed in my Etsy shop.  I really do enjoy it very much.  LOVE the look.  This has 5 different shape beads in it both metal and glass.  The "focal" in the center is actually 40 separate glass drop beads braided in.  Pretty dramatic necklace.


This next one, the OWL necklace is actually a "re-do".   The before and after is pictured below.  The first one was too short so I needed to make it longer.  Then decided I wanted to do a different braid pattern as well then added third color bead.  I like the latest one (second photo) MUCH better. Will be for sale in my Etsy shop later today. 



Next time, there will be more to post.  It was just one of those weeks last week.  lol !
Thanks very much for coming by.  I hope you come back again soon.  :)