Mother, Mother...

Here's a little something I whipped up for my lovely Mum as a gift for Mothers Day. Nothing says 'I love you' like some shiny new beads, thoughtfully and lovingly woven together! ;-)

I seem to have developed a new lust for herringbone stitch lately. As such, Mum's necklace is made almost entirely of tubular herringbone (and its variations) and simple fringing. Nothing too fancy, nor difficult, but it was a satisfying piece to put together.

And most importantly (and very much out of character for me!), it is actually WEARABLE! *gasp* I seem to have a penchant for making over-the-top, completely unwearable pieces...so I'm rather chuffed that I managed to muster enough self-restraint to make something Mum can wear often. Yay me :-)

It is made of Czech and Japanese seedies (sizes 11 and 15) in muted tones of cream and pastel blue and hematite, Czech pressed leaves and rondelles, and some gorgeous Czech fire polished beads.

Here she is:


Detail of the floral centrepiece:


The floral clasp (I was rather pleased with how this turned out):


More detail of the clasp (can you tell I like it?):

My apologies for the el-crappo photos, but I'm without my usual light studio and digital SLR whiz-bang camera...and have to make do with our el-crappo happy-snap camera until we're home again *sigh* The photos don't do justice to the gorgeous Czech fire-polished beads, etc.

This necklace doesn't have a name as yet, and I'm stumped...any suggestions?

Sunshine, relaxation...and beading

Almost a month between posts?! Eep. Must be that darn time warp again...

The title of this post pretty much sums up my life for the next four weeks. How lucky am I!

Our little family has made the trek north to Queensland (the self-proclaimed 'Sunshine State') for the next four weeks while my husband completes his endorsement on a new jet for work. Not able to bear the thought of being away from our man for the whole time, India and I decided to tag along and treat ourselves to a mini holiday. After all, life will be once again very hectic in, oooh, about seven weeks time when the house will be once again resounding with the noises of a newborn babe.

I managed to find some self-restraint and only pack one shoebox full of beads for the four weeks. Yeah, laugh it up. You and I both know I'll never use that many beads in four weeks! But I girl can never be too prepared, right?

And of course, I may just happen to run out of a particular type/colour of bead whilst we're here. And that would warrant a visit to the bead shop, no? ;-)

So whilst I'm not to game to head to the beach in my bikini (the sight of my bare, 33 week pregnant belly is enough to scare young children and the elderly folk...not to mention bowl them over), I'm enjoying relaxing in the sunshine, putting up my weary feet (cankles, anyone?), and beading whenever I get a spare moment.

I whipped up a little somethin' for my Mum for Mothers Day...stay tuned, photos will be posted soon!

Happy days

It has been one of those happy, happy days today...

I was delighted to receive the news that my 'Symphonie de Tulipes' won the popular vote in the Dutch Spiral challenge on the Beading Forum.

*chuffed*

This doesn't mean it is the best creation (how can there be a 'best' when each piece is beautiful and unique in it's own right?), nor the most technically challenging or well-crafted, nor the best suited to the theme. It just means that my peers like my work. One of those feel-good moments, to be sure.

Also, I passed my Boat Licence test this morning. So you can now address me as 'Skipper'. Heh ;-)

A typical sunset over the bay near home

Now, if only there were a way to combine beading and boating...

Symphonie de Tulipes

My Dutch Spiral Challenge piece is finally complete. Six weeks of learning, experimenting, hair-pulling, frustration, elation...phew!

I had never 'engineered' a piece as complex as this before, so it was a challenge on many levels but I thoroughly enjoyed (almost) every stitch. During the construction of this necklace, it became apparent how little I really knew about beadweaving. The learning curve has been steep, but satisfying. And the end result is a piece I can be proud of:

Symphonie de Tulipes

(Symphony of Tulips)

My 'Symphony' contains no less than six different beadweaving techniques...four of which I had never tried, and had to learn for this challenge:

*Brick stitch
*Odd-count peyote
*Tubular peyote
*Two-drop herringbone
*Tubular herringbone
*Dutch spiral

The necklace can be worn a number of different ways, thanks to a tubular peyote loop which slides up and down the tubular herringbone 'stems'. As above, or like this:

Or like this:

The entire piece laid out:

I spent many hours working on the design of my tulips. The jury is still out on whether they actually resemble tulips, but I'm fairly pleased with the end result as it was my first attempt creating dimensional flowers. I had fun experimenting with colour graduation, each tulip contains three different shades of seed beads. No two tulips are the same...each petal is different!

A close-up of the tubular peyote loop:

And the herringbone 'bell':

I was planning on making a beadwoven clasp, but simply ran out of time. Instead, I tapered off the dutch spiral ends using peyote stitch, and used a simple silver clasp. Voila!

If you managed to make it through all of those photos, you deserve a gold medal! Thanks for looking :)

The Karma Award

I have finally managed to snatch enough time to post about The Karma Award, bestowed upon me by my gorgeous friend Sharon of Mana Moon Studios. Sharon is a beautiful person in every sense of the word, she has a warm and giving personality and has a knack for making everyone around her feel great! She is a talented artisan to boot who creates beautiful wirework and fiber jewellery. Thank you for the kudos dear friend, I just love the sentiment behind this award:

Karma Award

These blogs are exceedingly charming. These kind of bloggers aim to find and be friends. They are not interested in self-aggrandizement. Our hope is that when the ribbons of these prizes are cut, even more friendships are propagated. Please give more attention to these writers. Deliver this award to eight bloggers who must choose eight more and include this cleverly-written text into the body of their award.

This award epitomises everything that I love about blogging. When I first started Bead Fetish, I had in mind that it would be nothing more than a convenient place to store and share photos of my work. I never imagined that I would *meet* so many wonderful, generous, talented, amazing people from all over the world. These new and dear friends have enriched my life and opened doors previously unimagined. We may never meet in person, but we share an understanding and respect for one another that transcends borders, languages, and cyberspace!

I would like to pass this award on to the following bloggers. I understand that many of you will not want to pass it on, nor post about it on your blog, but it's just my little way of thanking you for your friendship, connections, support and inspiration! :)

Bianca of Bianca Velder Creations

Karyn of Releases by Rudydoof

Steph of Atelier Aqualuna

Vicki of Dragonfly Creation Jewellery

Julie of Meanderings by Julz

Anna of Il Mondo di Redanny

Rachele of Rachele's Originals

Neglectful

Sometimes I'm convinced that my life exists in a time warp. How else can two weeks vanish in the blink of an eye? Time has never really been on my side, and that seems to be becoming ever more apparent as I grow older.

So what have I been up to in the last few weeks (aside from neglecting my blog)?

A little bit of boating...

Our 17 month old daughter, India, playing Skipper

And a little bit of beading...

An as yet unfinished and unnamed botanical experiment created with RAW (right angle weave)...perhaps "Belindaflora Bigbellyus" would be appropriate?

I finally got my lazy pregnant butt into gear and also started working on my piece for the Dutch Spiral challenge on the Beading Forum. In a moment of beading madness, I decided that it would be a good idea to bead a 3-dimensional tulip.

Have I ever made a 3-dimensional flower before? No.

Have I ever beaded a tulip before? No.

I know the point of a challenge IS to challenge oneself, but sheesh, why do I always set the bar so high?

A tulip is one of those deceptively simple shapes. I thought it was going to be a breeze, but I was kidding myself. Did you ever have to draw a dolphin at school? You think, "A dolphin is a simple shape, how hard can it be to draw?" The answer is HARD! Unless you get the lines and the proportions just so, you end up with a creature which looks more like a hotdog with fins than a dolphin.

I was having the same problem with my beaded tulip. I estimate that I spent more hours unpicking stitches than I did actually stitching them. After a number of prototypes, I think I'm finally on track. My 3D tulip is looking more like a tulip and less like a deflated umbrella having a crisis of identity.

I attempted my first sample of dutch spiral last night and, much to my surprise, I really like it. If it weren't for the challenge, it would no doubt be yet another stitch on my 'must try that one day' list.

In other news, my darling friend Sharon of Mana Moon Studios has bestowed a lovely new award upon me and I haven't had a chance to blog about it yet. I'm sorry Sharon, I haven't forgotten! There is a really nice sentiment behind this award so I will dedicate a whole post to it :)

A Fabulous Award

It is always humbling to think that a talented artist believes my blog is worthy of an award *blush*

This fabulous award was bestowed upon me by the lovely Anna of Il Mondo Di Redanny all the way from beautiful Italy! Anna is a multi-talented artist, who creates in many different mediums including polymer clay, paint, and fabric. Her polymer clay fairies and pixies are unbelievably life-like...I'm certain they come alive in the middle of the night, while the rest of the world is sleeping :-)

I now have the honour of passing on this award to five of my most deserving blog friends.

*drumroll please*

And the nominees are:

Sharon of Mana Moon Studios

Karyn of Releases by Rudydoof

Nicole of Beadwright

Julie of Meanderings by Julz; and

Julie of The Jewellery Goddess