Beads

Here’s the result of the beaded bone bezel beads below; this is sort of a folk art rendition of a Laura McCabe design. Take irregular bone beads (18mm across), bezel and join them as instructed, and you get a 30mm beaded bead. This is too big for me to wear, so it’ll be a desk decoration. It could be a fan pull, but I don’t want to risk anyone actually pulling on it. There’s more than a little tension on this, mostly because of the irregularity of the shape.

Four of six beaded bone button beads done….

I was in Chicago, and spent some time visiting with Jan, a beading friend. We went to Ayla’s Originals, and Ayla has some beautiful things. If you like pearls, hers look especially lovely. Seeing Clasmeyer’s clasps in person was a treat. I did buy a couple of things, with this Bob Burkett bead just capturing my attention. He carves insects or animals in wax, and casts these creatures. This is an alloy with some copper in it, I believe, but he works in silver too. This frog is about 15 mm nose to tail, and the hole (created by the frog’s limbs) is slightly less than 4 mm in diameter.

The seed beads are too square to make the nicest right angle weave, but I love the colors and finishes together….

The last piece of jewelry I made for myself was olive too. I DO work with other colors, these are just the colors I am using right now. I bought these cubic zirconia beads and pearls from Baubles and Beads, a splurge for me. I’d like to knot them. The strand of cz’s is probably 8″ long, the pearls 20″? I’m thinking the cz’s, pearls, maybe some gold-plated seed beads. I’m not sure. I need to buy a nice clasp, maybe some of those knot cover things for by the clasp. I don’t knot much….