Latest Bead Sets and Adventures

Good morning bead lovers...
I have a couple of new sets listed in my Etsy shop today. For starters, this Aurae encased set with a beautiful ethereal look in purple and blue pastel colors:These beads are decorated with Psyche stringer designs. Psyche gets nice oil-slick colors if I put it through a couple of reducing/oxidizing cycles. At least that's the look I was going for here:I made this set over the weekend for a custom order. I used a Double Helix odd lot of Terranova called TN-212. The scroll designs are Triton:
The weather is getting a little nicer here. Last week it was freezing cold, 10 degrees, which I've never seen in Sedona before. We're having highs around 60 now. Nice enough to spend time outside again. Here's a photo of my daughter at her riding lesson on Saturday:and the stables with the Tuzigoot ruins in the background:Today she's off to Belize to vacation with her dad for a week. Then off to Grammy and Pop-pop's in Florida for another week. What a life :)And therefore, Mom is going to have lots of bead time and quiet times these next couple of weeks, which is always a welcome luxury!
Have a sparkling Tuesday!

T-218 Accent Beads

A favorite Double Helix odd lot glass of mine is T-218. I'm not sure which production glass Double Helix considers it an odd lot of, or whether it's called a "test batch," but I think of it as an odd lot of Terranova. It strikes in a very similar way, only it strikes faster. It takes only short cycles of heating and cooling to bring the amazing colors out of this glass.

I've made a simple set of accent beads from T-218, and they're available in my Etsy shop:
Here's a previous post I've written about T-218:
http://beadabundant.blogspot.com/2008/10/odd-lot-t-218s-and-triton.html
The post features some beads I made with T-218 and Triton, pictured below. For some reason I didn't get the bright colors out of the T-218 in this set, but I like its earthy tones anyway:Now I'm thinking that the reason they don't have the bright colors is because my striking skills weren't as good back then. I've found that with striking glass in general, whether it's Terranova, Luna or Terra, etc., the bead has to get VERY COOL before it goes back in the flame for striking. I let it get very cool during each cooling cycle, and for the heating cycle I twirl the bead far out in the flame (8 inches from the torch face) so the surface heats up slowly and I can keep a close eye on the progress.

Keep having fun and have a nice weekend :)

More New Sets on Etsy

I've been away from blogging and Etsy for a few days because I had to have some dental work done. I am a true dento-phobe, yet every time I leave the dentist's office after a visit, I feel great and realize it wasn't all that bad. What was I so afraid of? The dentist is such a nice guy! Well, heh heh, lets just say this last visit confirmed every dental fear I've ever dreamed up from the deepest of my twisted imaginings!

Luckily two days have passed, the pain is not so intense, the blood is drying up, I'm feeling better and the horrific experience is beginning to fade from my mind. Back to the beads! :-D

I've just listed these three sets on Etsy. This first set has a base of Terranova2 with 'threads' of Triton:This is a set of spacers made with Double Helix test batch M-232:And this set is a favorite of mine. It has a base of Triton with Kronos frit, encased with Aether. The bead holes have metallic glass around them, which you can see more clearly in the second picture:Hope you all are having a nice week! Don't forget to floss, trust me! :-D

Purple-icious Pandora

I had to try some disk beads with Pandora, of course! These two came out of my kiln yesterday. I'm loving this stunning purple color!This is the purple glass color I've been searching for... it's like a dark EDP without the E or the D!

I've seen this purple in my other Pandora beads, but somehow it looks more deliciously purple-icious in disk form.

I've tried disks with other 104 striking silver glasses, but usually only get a brown disk. Double Helix glasses like Luna, Terranova, Terra and Khaos stay dark brown unless the color is developed with a lot of heat and/or repeated heating. Thin spiral disk beads don't hold up to that kind of heat. Pandora, however, requires no excessive heat so it is the perfect striking glass for disks.

There are several more annealing in my kiln right now!

More TN-200 and Triton

Here is a set of spacer-sized beads, made with Double Helix odd lot TN-200 and Triton glass. These are similar to the beads in my last post, yet smaller and without the swirls:

TN-200 and Triton

Here is another set with a Terranova odd-lot glass, TN-200. I'm getting a better range of color from the TN-200 than I got from the TN-202. These beads have a base of Triton with TN-200 swirled over the top:I'm crazy about the color on these, and the way the metallic Triton peeks through the swirls and at the ends. Last night I did an experimental encased TN-200 bead, and WoW, even more incredible color! The next time I torch I'm going to make a set of them.

I got another big batch of Double Helix odd lots in the mail today that I ordered from their new September sale! Right now the bundles are laid out on the kitchen table where they are being lovingly caressed... but tonight, it's into the flames with them! heh heh heh!!!

TN-202 and Triton Necklace Set

These beads are made with Double Helix Triton and odd lot glasses TN-200 and TN-202. I love the colors in this set. I think I'll keep it and make it into a necklace for myself... not sure yet. I rarely keep beads for myself! It's one of those sets I carry around with me for a few days and just gaze at it!The colors remind me of the ocean, and also the painting "Starry Night."

DH Odd: TN-200

These beads are made from Double Helix odd-lot TN-200 which was a test batch for their re-formulated Terranova glass.
I've encased these beads in clear. I love the blues and purples! It's very easy to strike, too.

(These beads are sold)

DH Odd: TN-202

Here's a set of small beads made with a base of Double Helix odd TN-202 and Terra frit. TN-202 has beautiful rainbow colors with a lot of blue and purple. You can see it showing through on the sides of the beads.

This set is in my Etsy shop.

Landscape Bead

This one reminds me of Sedona... the red rocks, sunset and starry sky. It's made with Terra, Terranova, and some odd-lot Vetrofond colors. It's in my Etsy shop right now:

New on Etsy - Etched Terranova!

Here are three new sets I have up in my Etsy shop.
The first two are organic sets with large 3.5mm holes:

Silver Cinnamon, silver foil and Silver Plum "rivets"

Ivory with silver dots:

This third set has an Ivory base with silver foil and Terranova scrollwork. Like its cousin Terra, Terranova does not etch easily. So, I put this set into the etch bath and got a nice matte Ivory base with shiny, un-etched blue-green Terranova designs:

Click on any of the images to visit my Etsy shop!

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.

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!