7th Bead Soup Blog Party Reveal

I received the most wonderful soup from Susan of Libellula Jewelry. (She has a shop called Cicada Silver too.) She wrapped each ingredient individually in tissue paper and packaged it all in a handmade box. She labeled everything so beautifully, it was so hard for me to take it all apart. I just loved looking at it and going thru it again and again. Susan does really wonderful metal work. She etches and solders and makes her own jump rings and head pins.  Along with all the metal, came glass, ceramic and gemstone beads.

The first piece I made was this necklace using one of the focals she sent. This etched pendant is colored with a pretty shade of turquoise and bezeled beautifully.Inside the pendant is a little piece of paper that says 'seek peace'. I love that it says that. I also used one of the clasps that she sent. It is a hand formed copper hook. The beads are beads I made out of bright green, turquoise and ivory and then etched. I love this necklace and have worn it already many times.

The next piece is a bracelet using most of the pink beads she sent. The cherry quartz, the pink opal and the pink adventurine carved focal. I just had to add that pop of green with the flower bead. I like that it echos the flowers in the main focal.

 The next piece is a simple pair of earrings. Using the earwires, headpins, hammered rings and turquoise Susan sent. I love how well the balled ends of the ear wires, matched the color of the orange sea foam quartz.

Susan sent me so many wonderful pieces and I just couldn't get all of the pieces done that I want to make. The button clasp is one of my favorite things she sent. I just couldn't make up my mind how to use it. Over the next couple of days I am hoping to get two more pieces done. I will post pictures as soon as I can. Susan was lots of fun to work with. I wish we lived closer because I would love learn some of what she knows about metal. 

Here is how you can get to Susan's Blog to see what she made with the beads I sent her. Here is a link to the rest of the participates in the blog hop

Stacked Bracelets

A while back I ran across the blog of Tracy Statler Make Bracelets. She was hosting the blog challenge Wrapped, Stacked and Layered. Although I didn't participate in this challenge, it really got me thinking that I wanted to do this! I loved the idea of all the different bracelets all layered together.

So this is what I have come up with so far. All in copper. I hammered out the copper bangles first and connected them with a brass rivet. I had gone to a local shop that had a class on making the bangle with the coiled rose. The bracelet with the cream beads uses waxed linen and copper chain that I attached a bunch of cream flower beads to. The light turquoise wrap bracelet is made of larger seed beads and copper split rings. I found a tutorial to make this bracelet on The Gossiping Goddess blog. This bracelet is so easy and really has a nice feel to it. The last bracelet is the bracelet I made last month that has some of my lampwork beads and the names of my husband and both of my kids on it. I love how they all jangle on my wrist. I think I will keep making bracelets to add to this stack, maybe I can make it go up to my elbow!! The next stack I am going to make is going to be in black and silver....I can't wait to get started!

Mother's Day...sort of

Wow! I can't believe I haven't posted in two months! Time flies...I guess.

So I have had an idea for a bracelet for my Mom for awhile. She has grandchildren that range in ages from 23 to 8!! When each of the grandchildren were born, my Dad would get my Mom a charm with each kids name on it and she wears these on a necklace. I wanted to do kind of the same thing on a bracelet. I also wanted to incorporate my lampwork beads, because she loves them! (Although not as much as her grandchildren...lol)

I thought I would make it in sterling but got a little nervous that I might ruin a lot of silver when stamping the names, because I haven't stamped with letters that much. I thought I would practice on the copper first. Eight grand children names are a lot to fit on one bracelet, but it is nice that it is an even number. So it works  really well as two of the chains. I added the string of seed beads with some copper spacers. I actually really love how the copper turned out!

 I loved it so much I decided to make one for all the Moms in my family! (These projects always grew bigger and bigger!) This one is for my sister Sue.

This is for my sister-in-law Dana

And this one is mine

I am so happy with all of them! And since it is a few weeks after Mother's Day, I think they will all be surprised!!

Etching Some Metal

I took a class on etching not too long ago. So this week I thought I would play around with it. I took some copper and nickel sheet metal and a few copper washers and stamped some designs on them. Then I put them in the etch and waited. This is how they turned out. I think they look pretty good. I have put some of these items on my Etsy site www.snazzydoodle.etsy.com

These are a couple of the washers and I added some Amazonite and Spectralite.

A pendant I am working on.

This is a 1" copper square that I drilled a few holes in, added some sterling silver chain, pearls and copper spacers to make a necklace.

Fall Bracelet

I'm going to put this bracelet up on Etsy tomorrow.  The colors are perfect for fall!  Which I hope doesn't come too quick!

My bead soup arrived!!

I got all my beads today and it was so exciting opening up that package. Everything is in purples and coppers with some blues and turquoise thrown in. My partner is  Natalie McKenna and her shop name is Grubbi. She lives in Liverpool. She makes really cool clay beads and likes to work with copper and brass.

A lot of the items she made herself. A number of polymer clay beads: some are swirled with different colors, one is painted in copper, and one has been covered in metallic powders. She also sent 2 squares that have designs embossed into them and then they are covered in resin. They are so pretty, great colors,  I really love the leaf!  The toggle she made is out of copper and has stars stamped onto it. It is really a nice size. She sent some white leather cord, some purple sari silk and a piece of Louisa Harding Sari Ribbon.  And then a lot of accent beads that are czech, toho, pony and seed beads. So much stuff!!

I already have some ideas. I can't wait to get started!