April's Beading Prompt

Hello and happiness, everyone!  I was thrilled that so many people enjoyed last month's prompt.  The FB group was really active, and many of the members went ahead and tried their hand at beading good ol' rocks with some really spectacular results, and there were also some really beautiful bezeled cabochons.  I thought that since there was so much lovely happening, I would share some here on the blog.   (Grab a cup of something you love to drink and scroll... and scroll... and scroll, lol!! It's a long post with a LOT of eye candy.)

Amy Blevins (in progress)

Audrey Gray

Judy Ball Reed

Barbara Pearson

Becs Dean-Skinner (in progress)

Caroline French

Caroline French

Christine Morabito

Christine Sincerbox

Dee Avril

Donna Louise Sanders

Donna Louise Sanders

Gabrielle Girgenti

Judy Ball Reed

Kate Larson

Kate Larson (in progress)

Mona Lane

Patti Parker 

Rebecca Kemp Brent 

Sarah Louise Gordon (ELEPHANT!!!!)

Tracey Lorraine

Wendy Heitzman

I think everyone deserves a huge round of applause - what a lot of gorgeous work!!  And here is mine, too - still in progress.

It needs some more coverage and then some embellishment... which brings me to this month's prompt!  RUFFLES.  Beady ruffles.  When the idea struck me to add some ruffles to my rock, it seemed like it would work as April's prompt as well as helping me finish the project. You would think there would be LOTS of ruffles out there in Planet Bead, but really, you'd be wrong, lol.  It took some digging to find ruffles, but I did come up with some you can try out, if you're of a mind to.

First off, there is a very nice basic (and free) tutorial by Mortira Vanpelt on the Inspirational Beading Blog for Ogalala stitch.  This was maybe the third stitch I learned, and it was a lot of fun.  You can add sooooooooo many different beads into this to come up with different looks!  You can find her tutorial HERE.

Then, if you're loving ruffles the way I love ruffles (only beaded ones, though - I look hideous in actual ruffles), you HAVE to love these wonderful tutorials by Shelley Nybakke of SturdyGirlDesigns on Etsy.  The first is called the Sparkling Waves Bracelet.

And then there is the EPIC Until I Can Breathe Again necklace...

And her Just Call Me Curvy necklace... 

If you'd like to make one of these delicious designs, you can find Shelley's shop HERE.

Another lovely ruffly design is this Atlantis bracelet by Hannah Rosner of HannahRachel on Etsy.  I can imagine this in so many different colors!  

If you'd like to try this out, the tutorial can be found HERE.  And, if you're going to be there, Hannah is also teaching a beautiful bracelet at Bead and Button called Royal Ruffles - photo below - and here is the LINK to her class if you want to sign up. )

Sabine Lippert also has a stunning bracelet full of ruffles, called Aattetur.  I LOVE this. 

You can find Sabine's tutorial for that gloriousness HERE.

Cynthia Newcomer Daniel has a beautiful ring in her book Modern Beaded Lace - and if you don't have the book, you SHOULD!  It's a staple for your beading library. 

And finally, the wonderful Beverly Herman of NoEasyBeads on Etsy has gifted our FB group with the pattern for her stunning Passion Flower Pendant.  It is incredibly kind of her, and this is a fabulous piece to bead up - especially if you're new to ruffles and want to see if they're for you.   If you're in the Facebook group, you can go to the Files section and you will find the PDF that Beverly has given us.  (You can also go to her Etsy shop and purchase this PDF if you would prefer to support her beady habits, or if you aren't a member of the group, HERE.)

Beverly was also kind enough to let me use a photo of a bracelet she made in a class with Gail Crosman Moore - this is called a Grapevine Cuff, and you can find Gail's tutorial on the Interweave site HERE.

That's actually a lot of ruffles to choose from!  But you can also just make your own ruffles, of course, or add some onto a rock... just because you can. I added some onto my Turtle Cove rocks along the bottom because I was hoping they would resemble waves.  I'm not sure what kind of thing they'll represent on my current rock, we'll have to see how it turns out.

Carol Wilcox Wells added some ruffles onto a decorative bottle in her Creative Bead Weaving book, too - another beaders' staple that I hope you have in your library.  :)  I hope some of these have inspired you, and that you have some fun ruffling!

Happy beading, see you all next month!

March Beady Prompt

Hellllooooo again!  I hope some folks had fun with last month's prompt - it's been pretty quiet in the Facebook group, but I continue to hope that the little ideas are helping someone's muse.  I wasn't able to get down to the beads last month, but I've sternly admonished myself that this month I shall make it work.

Getting down to business, this month's prompt is something that almost always inspires me - Bead A Rock!  Since I know  that not everyone is quite as excited about beading an actual, normal, boring rock as I am, I am including beading around a semi precious cabochon or donut as Beading A Rock.

In the last few years I have been collecting little rocks from places my husband and I visit, bringing them home, and encasing them with beads.  Sometimes I encase them with freeform peyote, sometimes with freeform right angle weave, sometimes with a combination of both.  If you're interested in photos of some of the ones I've done previously, you can find them all in a blog post HERE.  This month I plan on using a special beady soup I purchased to encase one in a combination of the two stitches mentioned above.  If you're interested in finding out how to encase your own rocks, Karen Williams of Skunk Hill Studios wrote a book on freeform beadwork  in which I have a tutorial explaining how I go about it.  (The book is also jam packed chock full of other awesomeness, so I recommend it even if you never want to bead a rock!)  You can grab the book HERE on Amazon, or you can get the quick download Ebook HERE in her Etsy shop.

This is the rock I made for Karen's book.  :)

I found some really fabulous tutorials/kits around this prompt for beading around cabochons or shaped rocks if you aren't into beading a rock from your driveway, so read on.

Have you ever seen those gorgeous semi precious egg shaped rocks? Should you happen to have one, or want to go and find one, Helena Tang Lim of Manek-Manek Beads has a stunning tutorial on creating a beaded version of a Faberge Easter Egg in her shop HERE.  (I'm sure you could use a different egg form rather than the semi precious one, which is likely to be expensive, but for this prompt it would really need to be a rock.)

Betty Stephan Beadwork has AHMAZING tutorials and kits which use semi precious rocks - I especially love this brooch kit.  You can purchase any of her things HERE.

Ella Dess of Ellad2 has a beautiful tutorial in her shop for beading around a semi precious donut - something I keep meaning to do myself, as I have a ton of donuts and Ella's tutorials are wonderful. You can find the tutorial HERE.

And the terrifically talented Lynn Davy has a tutorial on capturing a cabochon with right angle weave and peyote HERE in her Nemeton Etsy shop.

There are also lots of  tutorials which use lunasoft cabochons out there, and if you have a semi precious cab of the same diameter you could definitely substitute.

This is the ordinary little rock I'm starting with - hopefully I will have some in progress pics to show in the FB group, and a finished and ornate rock to show next month. I hope you have fun with the prompt, I can't wait to see what you all come up with!  Have fun and happy beading!

February's Monthly Beady Prompt

Helllllloooooo beady friends!  I have the prompt all set for this month, but don't have a piece that I actually beaded up yet, so I will be beading right along with you.  :)  I did have an idea, but it didn't work out for me and so I'm changing gears a bit.

So this month's prompt is to combine two or more stitches in one piece.  I have always had a good time trying to get two stitches to work together in a piece, whether it be a beaded bead or a rope or an object.  Combining stitches  was one of my favorite chapters in Carol Wilcox Wells' book Creative Bead Weaving when I first started; I was fascinated by how she melded right angle weave and peyote, or transitioned from peyote to herringbone, and it became one of my favorite beginnings when designing something myself.  I especially love layering one stitch on top of another - say, right angle weave as a base with netting as a layer over the top, which is what I did with my Trellis Necklaces. (Tutorial here.)

Transitioning from one spiral to another as I did with Triple Twist, also makes me happy.  I like how each spiral stitch is made differently from another, yet blend visually when combined in one piece. (Tutorial here.)

Another piece that strikes me always when I think of combining stitches is Sabine Lippert's Bokhara bracelet, a gorgeous combination of peyote stitch with an overlaying layer of fringe that has always made me swoon.  SO PRETTY, people!!! (You can find Bokhara here.)

An ingenious and beautiful piece of work which marries prismatic right angle weave and Pondo stitch, is the Goosebumps bracelet pattern designed by Heather Collin.  This one amazes me in lots of ways... Pondo is so lovely, and PRAW is so much fun - not to mention Heather's fabulous use of color! (You can find her tutorial here.)

Tracey Lorraine of Crystal Star Gems has combined peyote, brick stitch and herringbone in her Patience Daisy tutorial, which results in a truly stunning flower.  (Tracey's daisy can be found here.)

Cynthia Newcomer Daniel has used modified right angle weave and lacy netting to great effect with Moroccan Melodies, creating a structurally sturdy yet visually fragile piece.  This bracelet is full of paradox and pleases my nerdy brain no end.  (You can find Cynthia's bracelet  here.)

Freeform beadwork is also a wonderful way to combine stitches, you can use ANY of them together and just have a blast.  One of my favorites is to combine peyote and right angle weave - you can go back and forth without a trouble in the world.  But I have run across freeform in herringbone and even St. Petersburg stitches before as well - if nothing else, you can put the St. Pete's on top of the other stitches for a fern like effect.  Right angle weave on top of bead embroidery is one I like, too - I did that in my Reflections necklace.

It really doesn't have to be complicated when combining stitches - one easy way would be to make a rope of one stitch and then beaded beads using another.  My Meld necklace is a combination of so many stitches I don't think I could remember them all!  The rope is a version of Trellis, and the beaded beads are by various different designers including Cynthia, Callie Mitchell and Heather.

My original idea was to combine herringbone and hubble stitch - I wanted to do a herringbone base rope and do hubble on top, but I couldn't figure out my connections to make it happen smoothly - if you decide to try this, please do show the results!!  If you aren't familiar with hubble stitch yet, please let me point you to Melanie de Miguel's Let's Hubble and Hubble Stitch II books.  FUUUUUUUN!!!

So, grab two stitches you adore and smack them together and see what happens!!  If you're part of my Facebook group, I will be posting a coupon code for half off of either my Trellis or Triple Twist if either of them intrigue you.  :)  I would love it if you would come and post your combinations in the group if you're on Facebook, it's always fun to see what others come up with.  I will definitely post my results both in the group and here on the blog when I come up with March's prompt.  Happy beading!

Monthly Beading Prompts!

Wow, almost a year to the day since my last blog post.  Hey again - it's nice to see you, if you've stuck around this long!  The last year has still been that uphill struggle with my beads, ever since my Standing Rock post, and I have still been art journaling and taking mixed media classes.  There ya go, you're up to date, lol!  But I have been noticing my beads more and more, and had an idea that came directly from my art stuff.

In art journaling, sometimes there is either an overabundance of inspiration (it comes at you in droves from Pinterest, social media, anywhere you look online, and most especially in art classes and your brain simply can't hold it all) or a complete absence of it (omg look at that very blank white page and my brain just turned off completely), and lots of artists use prompts in many forms to help themselves get going.  There are artists who provide a weekly or monthly (sometimes daily) prompt in their blog posts, and some who make up decks of cards with ideas on them which they can shuffle and choose from, and some who make sticks (like popsicle sticks with words on) they can choose from, there are books devoted to them, classes devoted to them, there are timed challenges and weekly challenges devoted to them.

This got me to thinking that perhaps what I needed, and what some other people might enjoy too, was a beading prompt.  So I thought I could come up with one beading prompt a month and share it here on my blog, and everyone would be welcome to play along if they liked.  :)

My plan is pretty wide open; it could be something as broad as 'herringbone stitch' or 'earrings' or as narrow as 'bead a tree' depending on what hits me at the time.  Some months (like this month!) I will have something free to gift with the prompt, and some months I will maybe just have the blog post and a photo and a few links.  The big thing is that *I* participate and make something that matches my prompt, even if no one else wants to play along - but I hope you will! 

SO, January's prompt is 'Bead A Flower.'  (I have no idea why flowers, it just seemed like a fun and cheerful sort of thing, and we all definitely need some of those.) I have started a Facebook Group for my prompts, and will be including a PDF to download in the group; a tutorial of how to create the same flower I did.  These are 'In Bloom' flowers, which are part of a tutorial I have for sale in my shop, but divorced from their native necklace (the PDF only includes directions for the flowers, NOT the entire In Bloom necklace).  Use them however you like - you could turn them into brooches, or  pendants, or leave them as is or make stems for them and stick them in a vase as a pretty decoration.  Mine is as yet unfinished - I know I won't be making a bunch more to make another In Bloom necklace, but it may yet turn into a pendant.  :)  If you'd like the PDF, and want to join in, come to Facebook and ask to join the group HERE.  Here's my January In Bloom Flower in purple and teal!

This is the original In Bloom Flower, on the necklace. I am really enjoying how it looks in the brighter colors, though.  :)

In case my Bloom doesn't tickle your fancy, but you'd still like to make a flower, I thought I would also provide a few links to beaded flowers I love - these are flowers by friends, and the name of the flower is the link to their shop/tutorial.

These are gorgeous - Bleeding Heart Earrings by Cynthia Newcomer Daniel - so dainty and sweet!

And this beautiful Ruffled Rose by BeadsbyBecs - so pretty and so much fun to make.

And then there is this stunning Clematis by Ella Dess!

And these fabulous Cellini Flowers and Leaves by Gwen Fisher.

And also, these stately and elegant Crown Flowers by Carol Paris of Bumblebead.

Now, you don't have to use one of these tutorials or my Bloom to play along - you can bead any flower you like!  Come up with one of your own, or find one out there that really makes your heart sing.  As long as it's a flower, or a flowering plant, or a weed that looks like a flower, it counts.  :)

I would love to see any flowers you make for this, and it would be great if you came and joined the FB group, I hope to see you there!

At about the same time I was thinking about putting these prompts out, Marcia DeCoster had been thinking about spreading bead love in a much bigger way: in case you haven't heard about it yet (which is hard to imagine, but possible), she has started a blog called BeadLove, and it's all about our love for beads and beading, and encompasses many bead artists who feel the same and want to contribute something to the overall beady love in our world.  Marcia is currently gifting the beading community with The Love Letters - literally, the letters that spell love, created in cubic right angle weave.  If you  haven't started beading your letters yet, head over to the BLOG and get going!  I am honored to be a participating member, and will be offering something up in the course of a few months on the BeadLove blog, too.  ( This post and the prompts are just me, spreading my own little brand of beady love, and aren't affiliated, but I wanted to include mention of this fantastic initiative. )

Here are my L and O... looking forward very much to V and E!

Happy Beading, everyone!

Rocks! And on Color

Good morning,  I hope everyone is having a good start to the day!  Yesterday I finished and photographed my latest beady rock.  I was calling it the Rainbow Well Rock, as it is a rock that came from digging up our water pump last year, but it has morphed into Standing Stones rock because of the finished beady 'rocks' sitting on top.  We have a brook nearby where folks have stacked many standing stones, and I love to visit them even if it's only passing by in the car on our way somewhere. They always make me think of magic and peace and fairy folk.

When I went to place Standing Stones with my other beady rocks, I had a bit of an eye opener!  My husband has been insisting that although my beady block has been painful and scary for me, the art journaling and art classes I am taking would eventually impact my beading and bring me back to it, too, and that the break wasn't all bad.  This was really hard for me to hear, especially during those times when I completely despaired and thought that I would never be able to bead again...  but I think that he was right; the art has made me approach my color choices in a very different way, one that I like a lot!  So I am posting photos in order, of beady rocks I have made from past to present, just as I saw them in my studio this morning, to show you what I saw.  :)

Below is a photo of my very first ever beady rock - it doesn't even have a name, so we'll just call it Rock #1 - and I made it using freeform peyote stitch and a bead soup that someone had given me as a gift.  This was years and years and years ago now...over twelve or thirteen years, I think.

Next is Woodland Whimsy... the first photo shows it encased and the second (horrible!) photo shows what it looks like with the flower embellishment added.

Then came the Jelly Mill Rock...

And Turtle Cove, which is three rocks woven separately and then woven together to form a sort of reef, with lots of little surprises hidden in it, turtles and shells and a fish based on Karen William's fishies.

Then Froggie Knoll, a freeform peyote rock made specifically for a short tutorial on covering rocks in Karen's Explorations in Freeform Peyote Beading book...

Then a rock I made for my dear friend Julie Cowan, which has a tiny bit of bead embroidery on it to hold the little mushroom house securely...

My Totem Rock, which I made with freeform right angle weave and fibers added in just to see if I could...

And finally, Standing Stones.  Do you see what I see?

I have always been comfortable and easy with darker, more subdued shades and almost monochromatic soups, but I'm getting better with color!  I can't take the credit for this bead soup at all, the soup was a gift from my wonderful friend Marcia DeCoster, and so it uses all her glorious color ways together  - but I have put the colors in patches that really make me happy, and even though it's random, it is nothing like the kind of chaotic randomness I started from with Rock #1.   And these days I can even work with Orange a little bit without freaking out!! (Someone who knows me pretty well knows that orange and I don't get along - we make each other very anxious and sometimes even panicky.)  In the past I have used some brighter colors, but always tentatively and never with abandon.  I greatly envied people such as Suzanne Golden and Betty Cox, who effortlessly use color in joyously wide swathes which make their pieces sing and dance, and not just dance but BOOGIE.  My 'style' has always been antique-ish and quiet, which is also nice and quite classic, but not as exciting or startling.

My own exploration into more colorful beading started from Beverly Ash Gilbert's wonderful book and her outstanding bead soups (which she is destashing and will no longer be making - if you see some in her shop, GRAB THEM, cause when they're gone, they're gone for good).  Using Beverly's instructions on soup making and how to add low lights and dark lights, I started making some of my own soups up and luuuuuuuuuurved it!  Then along came a lot of sadness, and a block which made it so that all of a sudden, I just could not bead.  I would stand and stare at my bead mat, and it would sit and stare back at me.  Nothing.  I kept it out, and I kept beads on it, and sometimes I would put those beads away and get out a new set of beads to see if they would be happier... and put out mixes and beautiful beads that friends sent to me to help inspire me, and it would still sit and stare at me.  Last month I stood and stared at it and desperately wondered if I should just put it away, not just the beads but the mat and all the tools, too.

During the mute, staring time of the last seven months, I began taking art classes and doing art journaling, dipping my toes into the Mixed Media community (I have more craft/scrapbooking supplies than any human should, and it made sense to me to go for something arty that kind of encompassed everything at once)...  and discovered that I am MUCH braver with color when it comes in the form of paints or pencils or pens or paper.  As with beads, the mixed media art started off as a form of therapy, to try to help me with my grief.  Like beads, I started to immerse myself more and more... and would get scared and back away because I didn't want it to take the place of the beads.  And my husband would tell me (and my therapist, and my friends) that it was a bridge, not a destination.  And that there was room for both.    And I kept on happily/anxiously/desperately/depressedly/hopefully slopping paint and texture paste and taking more classes and making more journals... and one day I looked at Marcia's soup, and the well rock that was sitting there, and picked them both up and it worked.  Standing Stones makes me grin, and it says COLOR - POW!! all over it, and I love it!!!!  I am hoping I will eventually be able to bring some of my new color bravery into some jewelry pieces, but that is thinking ahead too far, and right now I am concentrating on right NOW and just making some rocks while my beads are being friendly.

A friend commenting on Standing Stones said that it looked like a visiting rock from a rainbow universe... and so now my brain is wondering what a 'nebula' rock might look like...  :)