It Only Took 5 Years….

Around 5 years ago, I went past my local bead shop (which no longer exists), and saw that they were offering beadweaving classes… I enrolled… and the reason I did so was because I wanted to make bags and incorporate some beaded elements on the bags…  that was 5 years ago!!! :-) My beadweaving repertoire has definitely grown since those early days and finally I designed (and made) my first bead-embroidered bag!!!!

It isn’t perfect… and there is definitely room for improvement, especially in the finishing and edging (which I’m not 100% happy with – yes, I’m a perfectionist! :-D)… but it’s good enough for me and I have been using it everyday!!! :-) I do love it!!! it’s the perfect size for walking around with enough room to fit my mobile phone, my keys, a small wallet, some tissues… you know, all the essentials! :-)

It wasn’t easy, and it took me way too long to complete… I think partly due to the fact that I was really worried about screwing up the suede (which isn’t cheap).. it took me about 4 1/2 days to complete, which is way too long, and am hoping that the next one will take about half the time…

I used one of Lisa Peters Art’s gorgeous large cabochons/tiles that I've had in my collection for a while and thought this would be the perfect project for it, and some lovely Swarovski crystals that complemented the colours depicted in the cab.

The beadembroidery was done directly onto the suede, which I’m not so sure I will do again, because when I wanted to unpick, it left holes in the suede (in this case it didn’t matter as the piece grew larger and covered the bits I unpicked, but in the future it might be a problem… I think next time I will bead onto beadbacking and then add it to the suede/leather.

I’m dying to make another one… although am a bit apprehensive about how long it took… well I’m a bit apprehensive as I’m not completely comfortable with how to finish it, so I guess the next one will be experiment number 2! :-)

Let me know what you think… .and if you have any ideas for the edging I would be very grateful to hear them! :-)

Happy beading everyone!!! :-)

Tudor Splendour

I was looking in my jewellery case today and realized that I forgot to post a necklace and bracelet I made sometimes in April or May. I made it straight after the Purple Rain necklace and had to wait a long time to take photos of it, because the light was really bad… but I did take photos, a few months ago, I just completely forgot to post them!!! Where is my head??? Frying in this incredibly hot and humid weather I guess! :-)

No more procrastinating!!! Here are the necklace and bracelet:

Tudor Splendour – Necklace

Tudor Splendour – Bracelet

Both were beadwoven in Right Angle Weave (RAW) with loads of gorgeous dark brown Swarovski pearls and embellished with bronze and orange Japanese seed beads and orange Swarovski crystals… I love working with Swarovski pearls!!! I really do!!! They just feel and look so good!!!

Time for bed now… the weekend is over here and tomorrow is another day… Sunday is a working day in Israel… I miss having a 2 day weekend!! but to all of you who have Sunday off…. enjoy the rest of your weekend!!! :-)

Princess Tia + BAO Items of the Week

Almost a week has gone by since my last post… I had a crazy work week (real job) and completely forgot to post the second necklace I made… where did the time go? … where is my head??? :-) so, apologies, and here it is:

Princess Tia – Necklace

The centrepiece for this necklace, believe it or not, came about from a mistake… well I was super happy to have made this mistake, as it led to this creation! :-) I was trying to make the neckpiece for the previously posted necklace Cleopatra by beadweaving a band in graduated herringbone stitch, but it just didn’t work… and as I hate wasting, I started playing around with the “mistake” and got the idea to use it as a centrepiece by adding to it this gorgeous triangle Swarovski crystal I bought not long ago… sometimes mistakes pay off! :-)

Sadly, since this was made I’ve had absolutely no time for any beadwork… as I said above, it’s been a crazy work week… hopefully things will quiet down in the next week or so and I can go back to beading!!! :-)

For now, let me show you this week’s BAO Items:

My item this week is:

Emerald Queen Necklace

Purchase and pay for this necklace between now and 31st December and receive 15% off + free shipping!

To see all the beautiful BAO Items of the Week visit:  
http://beadartoriginals.blogspot.com/

Wishing all of you hay holidays!! I hope you are all enjoying yourselves with your loved ones!!!

Truffle Trilogy - Cuff

I promised you the second piece I made… and here it is!

Truffle Trinity – Cuff

This was definitely inspired by the piece I posted yesterday, as far as the colours go, however design-wise, not so much… and I have quite a few ideas for some variations… am very exited!!! :-) especially as during the last few months I felt so uninspired…

Obviously I’m in a chocolate-kind-of-mood lately! :-)
I beadembroidered the centrepiece for this cuff using exactly the same beads I used for Truffle Temptation but this time I used the Jet Nut Swarovski Rivoli buttons I received from artbeads.com as my focals.

Instead of beading the whole cuff, as I usually do, I decided to use the Ultrasuede as a design feature rather than just to line the inside of the cuff, and I absolutely love the contrast between the dark chocolate Ultrasuede and the shiny beads!! Am very pleased with this piece and as I said have plans to make more in different variations and colour combinations… so stay tuned!!!

Tomorrow I will post the last of the 3 pieces, come back and check it out! :-)

Truffle Temptation

Remember I said, I’ve been quite busy beading three new pieces?…. well here is the first one!!! :-)

I received these amazing Swarovski components from artbeads.com at the beginning of September and I am so ashamed to say that it’s taken me this long to finally create something with them… but finally I did! 

Whilst I laid in bed with the flu this weekend, I had this overwhelming need to use these luscious Swarovski crystal components! I ordered an Octagonal Fancy,  a Fancy Pear and some Rivoli buttons, all in Jet Nut, a colour that I was not familiar with, but I thought would be nice to try…. well, the colour is just so gorgeous!!!! A deep, rich dark chocolate brown almost verging on black… just yummy!!! probably why I wanted to use these when I was sick, as chocolate is by far my favourite comfort food and I guess beading with this beautiful colour was what I needed! (I was too sick to go out and get chocolate ;-D)

Truffle Temptation Necklace

So I bead-embroidered around the Octagonal and the Pear shape Swarovski using these beautiful bronze-lined crystal Toho seed beads, and some yummy,  luscious  deep brown Swarovski pearls.  That was the easy part… the hardest part was trying to find the right necklace for this piece… that took me about two days of going through every magazine and book I have on beadwork before I decided to go with a lovely chevron stitch using the same Swarovski pearls but in a tiny 3mm… and I’m happy to say those two days of research surely paid off, as I’m really happy with how this piece turned out!!!

For the clasp I used one of the Rivoli buttons and then made a peyote stitched loop to accommodate the button.

As I said I’m really pleased with how this piece turned out, but let me know what you think! :-)

And if you are looking for Swarovski products, check out the extensive range  artbeads.com has.  Not only do they provide a great selection at great prices but they also offer amazing customer service, they are a pleasure to do business with!!!! Here are some links to their Swarovski products:

Swarovski crystal beads: http://www.artbeads.com/swarovski-crystal-beads.html

Swarovski rhinestones: http://www.artbeads.com/swarovski-flatbacks-rhinestones.html

Swarovski pendants: http://www.artbeads.com/swarovski-crystal-pendants.html

Yesterday, I received this lovely letter from them which included a card offering 10% discount.  They informed me that I could share this discount code with friends, family and of course my blog readers! :-) Did I not say they are great?!?! :-)

So here is the discount code: SCF10P-ARTBEADS-0424
There is no minimum order and it is valid until 31st December 2009
Free shipping to the U.S. and only $1 to Canada!
Check them out!!! I know I will be definitely placing an order very soon!!! :-)

To see what I made with the rest of the Rivoli buttons, come back tomorrow!!!

Wishing everyone a great beady day!!!! :-)