Superstition Blog Hop Reveal

Happy Friday the 13th!  I am not a superstitious person normally.  So today I am going to wear my fun black cat necklace and walk under a ladder.  Just kidding....why risk it!  Lol

I was one of the lucky winners of our hostess, Tammy Adams of Paisley Lizard, focal black cat polymer clay pendant....so thank you for that!!!!  We could tell Tammy what direction we wanted the pendant hole or no hole at all.  I am really into tassels, so I chose a vertical hole.  She made the gray, black and silvery white backgrounds different as well.

Sorry I am not good at identifying gemstones, but I have all my beads stored by color.  So I reached into my black and gray drawers and found some great stuff!  The black gemstone barrel shaped beads were the perfect size and I loved these black and gray speckled gemstone chips.  I love to string with waxed linen.  It is strong and tying knots is easier than crimping, at least in my book!  I am a ceramic bead artist, so I always include some of my beads.  The 2 gun metal 10mm discs on the top and bottom of the cat pendant are my beads.  The tassel is made from rubber tubing cut into various lengths with the gemstone chips at the ends.  The tubes reminded me of the cats tail!  I used a large black lobster clay clasp to finish my necklace.  I hope you like it!

Please hop around to all the other designers blog posts to see what they designed with their black cat pendant!  And if you'd like to see more of my beads, please visit www.fireflydesignstudio.etsy.com

ammy Adams (Hostess) http://www.paisleylizard.com/blog/ Renee Hong  http://www.fineanddandyjewelry.blogspot.com Betony Maiden  http://beadwenches.blogspot.com/ Coral Law  http://abcoraldesign.blogspot.com/ Lee Koopman  http://stregajewellry.wordpress.com Jeanette Belmont  http://www.onecanvasatatime.com Shai Williams  http://www.ShaihasRamblings.com Beth McCord  http://ebbeadandmetalworks.blogspot.com/ Robin Lynne Showstack  http://heartsdesiresjewelryforyou.blogspot.com/ Lori Blanchard  https://alainnjewelry.wordpress.com/ Deb Fortin  http://www.mhotistudio.blogspot.ca Michelle McCarthy  http://www.fireflydesignstudio.blogspot.com Maria Rosa Sharrow  http://willowstreetshops.blogspot.com Kim Dworak  http://cianciblue.blogspot.com/ Divya N  http://www.jewelsofsayuri.com
	http://heartsdesiresjewelryforyou.blogspot.com/
Karin Grosset Grange  http://ginkgoetcoquelicot.blogspot.fr Mowse Doyle  http://mowsemadethis.blogspot.com/ Rebecca White  http://morganafeycreations.121hub.com/#sec-blog Shawneen Fagnani  http://blondespotpinkshoe.blogspot.com/ Catherine King  http://Catherines-musings.blogspot.com Brook Bock  http://artisticendeavor101.blogspot.com/ Kari Asbury  http://hippiechickjewelrydesign.com/blog Nan Smith  http://wirednan.blogspot.ca Carolyn Lawson  http://carolynscreationswa.blogspot.com Linda Anderson  http://fromTheBeadBoard.blogspot.com Ann Schroeder  http://www.beadlove.wordpress.com Melissa Trudinger  https://beadrecipes.wordpress.com/	http://www.jewelsofsayuri.com

Brave Angel Challenge Reveal

This is a special challenge hosted by Andrew Thornton of Allegory Gallery.  It is all about the fight against breast cancer....celebrating the women who have won the battle and never forgetting the women who lost the battle.  Pink is the color representing the hope of a cure one day soon.

I took a wonderful wire choker class from Staci Louise Smith at Bead Fest in August.  She is always encouraging her students to continue to use her design after the class is over, so I did just that for this challenge.  I used 16g silver plate wire to make the base of the choker.  There are 9 hand formed loops to dangle the beads from the kit off of.  I only altered 2 things this time...a second hole in Andrew's mystery component pendant and the multi tone pink ceramic spike that I made.

I am really happy with this statement piece.  It is 17" long, but with the fabulous middle focal dangle, that part hits at 24" long.  Put on a plain pink or white t-shirt, and get ready for the compliments to fly!  I will be auctioning this necklace to benefit the Breast Cancer Research Foundation next Tuesday and Wednesday in the Facebook Group, Art Beads.  I will be announcing that on my own Facebook page if you follow me there.  Please take a few minutes to hop around the other designers blogs to see their Brave Angel reveals. You can find the links at the bottom of Andrew's post at www.andrew-thornton.blogspot.com.   Michelle McCarthy from Firefly Design Studio

Danse Macabre Blog Hop

I am late on this reveal....so sorry to our hostess, Lee Koopman!   Danse Macabre is.... the Dance of Death, the dance we all must make through life on our way to the grave for we all must come to the same end, rich man, poor man, begger man, thief, priest and pope.  It’s the same end for everyone.  What we do with our lives is more important than what we have or acquire so we should all celebrate life by laughing at death and the fears of “things that go bump in the night”.   

I am late because of a fantastic weekend with my husband in Key West, Florida.  Key West is rich with the spirits of pirates and sunken treasure, with history of famous writers and politicians, with alcohol flowing in the streets (and it still does) all the way to a very haunted doll who is housed in a very secure glass vault.  The town celebrates Halloween with Fantasy Fest, a very grown up costume party or lack of costume as body paint usually does the trick!

I am a ceramic bead artist so I made the sugar skull pendant and three 12mm round black beads.  I wire wrapped red, white, black and clear seed beads on jangle findings.  These have so much movement and add fullness to my design.  I used red waxed linen to knot between the matte black crystals.  This 18" necklace closes with an antique silver toggle.  I can't wait to wear it!

 Please hop around to the other designers blogs to see what they made for their danse macabe!

Lee Koopman                           Strega Jewellry

Sam Waghorn                           Pale Moon Creations

Dini Bruinsma                            Angaza by Changes

Mowse Doyle                              Mouse Made This

Robin Showstack                        The Crazy Bead Hoarder

Amy Jorgensen                           Hoarders Corner

Nan Smith                                    Wired Nan

Tammy Adams                             Paisley Lizard

Catherine King                              Catherine’s Musings

Michelle McCarthy                         Firefly Designs Studio

Betony Maiden                             Beadwenches Blog

Becca White                                  Morgana Fey Creations

Kim Dworak                                   Cianci Blue

Tami Norris                                   Tamis Creative Spot

Inge Von Roos                               Inge’s Blog

Terry Jeanette Carter                    Tapping Flamingo

Deb Fortin                                       Mhoti Studio

Melissa Trudinger                           Bead Recipes

Warrior Stone Design Challenge

This challenge kit from our host, Andrew Thornton, is perfect for fall.  The beads

 included are warm shades of beige, brown and cream.  I love to pour the bead out onto 

my work table and sift and sort through all the treasures.  I began pairing up Czech glass, 

gemstones, glass pearls and crystals into earring sets.  I dug into my stash for some 

accent  pieces and I found some filigree leaves and ceramic round charms glazed a

 sandy beige.  Perfect!

This is my favorite pair.  I left the wire tail long, strung a crystal on it and curled it up for

 a fun accent.  I pressed it down on top of the stone to lay flat.

Andrew's mystery component is made out of polymer clay, so I decided to drill a

second hole at the bottom so I could add another layer of beads.  Once I was happy

with the layout of the pendant, I decided a simple antique copper chain was all it

needed.  I wanted it to remain the star in the design!

Please visit Andrew's blog to see the reveal of all the participants designs with

the Warrior Stone Challenge!  www.andrew-thornton.blogspot.com

Dreaming Tree Design Challenge

I am in the process of putting the last minute touches on my ceramic

beads for Bead Fest in Philadelphia next week, so I was totally last

minute on designing for this months Dreaming Tree Design Challenge.

Whew!  I made it....

This is the beautiful color palette chosen by our challenge host, Andrew Thornton.

I love the subtle color combination of soft shades of purple and green.  The

mystery component pendant features a tree of life made by Andrew.  I hope he

doesn't mind that I got my power drill out and added another hole to it!

But first, my earring design:

 I am a Czech glass bead junkie, so the flower beads were screaming my name.

I paired them with 2 of my hand made 10mm ceramic grape purple round

beads, crystals and silver spacer beads.  I found these cool post earring findings

in my earring drawer.  I like that they didn't add any length to my already

quite dangly earrlings.  Now to my bracelet design with the tree of life focal:

I really like the way it turned out!  I used the waxed linen in the kit along

with an assortment of the smaller Czech glass and knotted in between the beads.

I made some dangles to give the bracelet some movement and used another one of my 

ceramic beads to form the clasp.  Fun and flirty!

If you'd like to see more of my ceramic beads, please visit my etsy shop at

www.fireflydesignstudio.etsy.com

Please hop around to all the challenge participants blogs to see what they designed!

Alison Herrington http://alisonadorns.blogspot.com/

Tammy Bowman http://innermusejewelry.blogspot.com

Gloria Allen http://www.wingsandbeads.blogspot.com

Ann Schroeder http://www.beadlove.wordpress.com

Dolores Raml http://craftydscreations.wordpress.com

Shaiha Williams http://www.shaihasramblings.com/

Andrew Thornton, Nancy Noyes-Ward, Laurel Ross, Cheryl Lee Tucker, Dawn Berkebile, and Melissa Wynne http://andrew-thornton.blogspot.com/

Beading Back Before Time - Early Civilization

When in Rome.....

I have a beautiful strand of ancient Roman glass and a fun ceramic Roman

coin impression, so I started with those pieces as my inspiration for early

civilization.  I went onto Pinterest to research what authentic Roman jewelry

looked like.  I discovered lots of turquoise and blue tones as well as gold, never

silver.  I normally pair blue tones up with silver, so that became my first challenge.

Next choosing the glaze I wanted to use to capture the perfect blue tone would be

important.  I went with blue lagoon which has a green under tone.  It also looked

great with the Roman glass.  I also made some ceramic accent pieces in the same glaze.

I used butterscotch colored wax linen for my stringing material.  The gemstones

are Aventurine and I used some manufactured sea glass as well.  I really like

how the ceramic tubes give the necklace some width and the fun tassel accent 

under the Roman coin is playful.  I used gold tone spacer beads, waffle discs,

chain and a large lobster claw clasp.

Here is a close up of the ceramic Roman coin that I made and here are the

coordinating earrings.  I made leaf charms for the earrings because of the pattern

I discovered with the constant use of leaf designs by the Romans.

Thank you for following along with my Beading Back Before Time Blog

challenges.  If you'd like to learn more about me and my ceramic beads, please

visit https://www.potterybeads.com and be sure to hop around to all the 

other blogs to see what other great jewelry designs of early civilizations.

We're All Ears Challenge - African Quilt Art

This months challenge is based on Primitive African Art and

story telling.  Stories can be told in many ways, and these folk

art patch work quilts tell a wonderful story of color and patterns.

This is the quilt I really was drawn to.  I love bright colors and the block

pattern is random and fun.  Even though the earrings that I created don't match

this quilt, the beads I chose to design with all reminded me of it.

The millefori glass beads look like mini quilts to me.  I made two heavily textured

ceramic round beads to pull the green out of the glass.  I used 24g silver tone wire

to loosely wrap around the beads and hold them tight.

Don't these lamp work beads also look like little quilts?  The artist is unknown.....

I pulled the purple tone out of the glass and made two 10mm hand rolled spacer

beads, crystal and silver spacers.  20g wire is loosely wrapped around the top beads.

These hand made paper beads are very colorful, like the quilt.  I twirled the

bottoms of 20g wire to make a head pin and simply strung every thing together

for a fun and happy pair of earrings.

This challenge was a bit more of a challenge for me than the beachy vibe 

last month.  But that's why I enjoy participating...to get me out of my norm

and try new things.  If you'd like to see more of my ceramic beads, please

visit www.potterybeads.com  Thank you!