Who Knows Where the Time Goes?

That's one of my favorite Sandy Denny songs from the 70's... a good song for this time of year:

Across the evening sky, all the birds are leaving
But how can they know it's time for them to go?
Before the winter fire, I will still be dreaming
I have no thought of time

For who knows where the time goes?
Who knows where the time goes?

I love to write in my blog as often as possible, every day if I can, but the past few weeks have flown by. I've had family visiting, I've been sick, I've gone out of town, all kinds of distractions to take me away from blogging! But I'm back, at least for today!

I have a favorite bead of late, made with Terranova glass. I've been wearing this one on a Bead Hitching Post pendant for the past week - I think it's a keeper! It's a landscape, with the Terranova at the top making the starry night sky. In addition to Terranova the bead has Vetrofond Odd Olive, Effetre, ASK Caramel Apple and Raku.

I love this new Terranova glass and I've gone and bought more of it already. I'm still practicing with Luna, too. Having a harder time getting a lot of color from Luna. This next bead has a Luna base with pure Terranova and Terranova/Luna stringers on top. The picture is a little low-res, but you get the general idea of what the bead looks like. I'm getting a lot of red and purple colors from these glasses.


I guess you could look at the Luna bead and say it does have good color, but I'm hoping to get more in the blue-green range and not just the orange. If it weren't for the addition of Terranova stringer on top, the bead would be mostly yellow/orange.

Jewelry on Etsy

I love the "Bead Hitching Post" pendant findings made by Bronwen Heilman of Ghost Cow Glassworks. They are changeable bead pendants, meaning you can remove the clutch at the bottom of the post and switch the beads out. The style can be changed to match what you're wearing. I've made a few necklaces with them and posted them in my Etsy shop. Here's a photo, click on the image to see the Etsy listing:

Etched Button Set on eBay

Besides the Terranova set I have listed this week, I also have this set of etched button beads listed. They are made with ASK104 glass. Here's a photo... click the image and it will take you to the auction page:

Terranova Set

I've gotten some nice color from Terranova by using it as a stringer with some silver foil. The foil seems to bring out the brighter colors, or it strikes faster in the flame when there's some silver added.

I've made a huge set that has been my obsession over the past week, and I've listed it on ebay. It's been forever since I've posted an auction! Here is a photo of the set. Click on the picture to see the auction!

Terranova and Luna

I'm a big fan of Double Helix glass and use many of their colors in my beads. One of my recent beadmaking challenges was learning to use their Terra glass. I'd finally practiced with it enough that I was getting good consistent color, and I was loving the bead sets I made with it. Terra had become my favorite glass.

I now have only two 3-inch pieces of Terra left on my bench! I tried ordering more last month but was sad to hear that Double Helix had discontinued making it. Instead they've come out with two new silvered glasses, "Terranova" and "Luna." I ordered a 1/4 pound of each to try them out.

So far I'm finding them tricky to strike, but then Terra was really difficult in the beginning too. Since I've practiced so much with Terra, I now have a little bit better idea how to strike color with these new glasses but it's still going to take practice. Here are my very first experimental beads, first the Luna:

And the Terranova:

The large button focal is Terranova and Luna swirled together and encased. The white speckles on the beads are silver deposits that are part of the color of this glass. ...okay and probably some dust too :)

I've made some more beads with Terranova since these photos were taken. I can understand now that I had not been getting the glass hot enough in these practice beads, and so the range of color is not as broad as it could be. The glass didn't reach a good striking temperature, mostly because I'm used to working cool. Still, the translucent honey-amber color of the Luna is nice, and you can see more color in the Terranova beads when you look at them in the sunlight.

The color is not bad for a start, but the beads I made yesterday with Terranova really blow these practice beads out of the water. I'll show photos of them in a future post.

My main inspiration to keep practicing with Terranova and Luna is that Double Helix has offered to make the old Terra again if we can make these new glasses "sing."

Yay!!!

Back to the torch!
Have a great day everyone!

Cell Phone Charms

I don't usually make my beads into jewelry, but I had fun making some cell phone charms recently. The charms can also be used on zipper pulls, as rear-view mirror charms, etc. It's like having a fancy piece of jewelry for your accessories that makes them unique and stylish.

Generally I get frustrated making jewelry because it's so tedious, even though I used to make a lot of it. I really like making the beads now, and leaving the jewelry designing to the pros.

Still, when I make a bead or set of beads, I have to think ahead and become a jewelry designer for a moment. I try to visualize how my bead set could be used in a piece of jewelry. I try and think what jewelry designers need: eye-catching colors, unique designs, beads with good holes and beads that are weighted correctly. Still, I never know what creative ideas that a jewelry designer might come up with, and so I make beads that I love and hope they work for someone else, too!

Now I'm off on a tangent... I loved having the opportunity to make a small-scale piece of jewelry with these cell phone charms, and I realize how fun it can be to design jewelry with my beads even if they have a 'wonky' shape. The Kronos disc beads in the photo are lop-sided with an off-center hole, but they look great in a charm like this.

(I will be writing more on wonky/fugly beads in an upcoming post!)

I have a few charms up in my Etsy shop if you'd like to take a look.
Enjoy your day!

Ancient Beads Unearthed

Something ancient and Egyptian must be hanging around my studio... is it the Halloween season, or just a sign that I need to clean up in here?

More disks.... these ones are a new style I'm attempting, the thin textured disk. It is more challenging than the chunky disks I have been making. I love the look of these, like old weathered copper. They are made with Double Helix's "Nyx" glass:


And, the sacred scarab. There are many interesting stories about scarabs. Winged scarabs, also called "heart scarabs" were worn on the chest of Egyptian mummies to protect their journey to the afterlife. The god Kephri was said to take the likeness of a scarab as he pushed the solar disk across the sky. A scarab amulet provides the wearer with healing and protection. Here is my metallic scarab bead made from Double Helix's "Psyche" glass:


Both of these are posted in my Etsy shop today.