Thursday, December 18, 2008

1 Week to go before Christmas!

Well there is a week to go before Christmas. Where has this year gone?


I have a celini update - I have not worked on it for almost 2 weeks but I've been busy with other things.

Here is a pic of the progress. I told you - it might be done by Easter! LOL







Another thing that has really hit the bead waves so to speak are Permanent Galvanized beads! My local shop got in 8 colors:




I remember when I started beading and fell in love with galvanized beads, only to find out that they had a finish that made me crazy! The pretty color came off once I wore the earrings a couple times. Those pretty metallic beads.... People said - oh - you coat that with Krylon and they will be fine. I did that only to have the beads feel just awful and the holes got clogged with the spray paint. Now Toho has finally perfected the galvanized process and you too can have these little beauties. I got these at my local bead shop but Charlene at http://www.cbbeads.com has them! She has more colors than my local shop too! And more sizes as well as cuts in some colors!!!! The Permanent Galvanized can be seen here: http://www.cbbeads.com/permgalvanized.htm

So now you can have that lovely glow that only comes from galvanized beads without the worries that your work will lose color.


Charlene has great prices and even greater service!
She is also having a beadwork sale to help with her son's medical bills.
http://www.cbbeads.com/jewelrysale.htm

So make her an offer hopefully higher than she is asking if you can spare the cash. Nothing worse than having your child be ill and during the holidays makes it even harder. She is parting with things she would probably rather not part with but when it's your son, you do what you gotta do.

So have a safe Holiday. I hope it's filled with beady dreams. Hope you all stay safe and warm.





Tuesday, December 02, 2008

Celini Spiral Take 1

Well I have done Dutch Spirals and Spiral ropes. I have mastered the African helix spiral and netted spirals. But Celini had avoided me or maybe it was the other way around... I have admired them but I was finally tempted ot make one when I saw one on Bead-Space.com.

http://www.bead-space.com/beadsforever

It's in her photos on the last page. Here is a link directly to the pic on Beaders Showcase - I could not get a link for the bead-space one

http://tinyurl.com/greencelini

Even though it is green and I am not a green person, I completely fell in love with it. Linda was kind enough to tell me the recipe she used and even the instructions she adapted for it, so all I needed was the right beads in shades of purple and I too could have a lovely bracelet for me! I already owned the book, so that was a bonus too.

So Celini is just peyote right? I can do peyote. So I bring scans of the pages and a print out of the recipe to with me on the trip. I don't like to bring my books on trips with me. It has me start with dummy rows. I still am not sure I understand why but I tend to follow the directions the first time I do a project. I will do it my way the next time if I figure out a way to simplify it.

It has 8 colors so that messes up my nice neat 6 triangle tray on my wooden plate... First a dummy row and now this! Can I do this? hmmm





So I set out the beads on the lap table... in the car no less on my way to San Jose for Thanksgiving. So I put on the dummy row, I later realized that if they had me go though one bead more, I could have left them in. I know dummy rows are for even tension and seamless zipping the ends together. Ok - it beads up nice. About 8 rows in the fireline cut into my skin where I pulled on it, so I put a bandaide on. It finally is starting to look like something that might resemble the picture. In the evenings I have been beading a little on it every day. It's about 2 inches mong now. It sure is slow going. I might have it done for Easter! LOL