Lessons Learned Part 452

Yes, I made up that number; it probably should be 452,000.

Current Work

I have started a tag for this blog called lessons learned.  These are not tutorials.  I am not even sure anyone reads these and if they do if these are not lessons everyone else has already learned and I am merely stating the obvious.  Nonetheless, I will continue.

Lesson I: Choices
If you recall when I last posted I was not sure if I was going to decrease or start over.  I ended up starting over.  The decrease showed too much thread and in order to get the bezel tight enough the depth of the bezel was going to cover up to much of the pretty stone. I stopped work before getting the bezel tight enough.  (See picture below.) These are judgments you will need to make as an artist.  I started over. 

Unfinished rejected work

Lesson II: Choices Again
Choosing beads requires more than just color consideration.  As was pointed out in comments, these satin beads tend to cut through thread, so they must be used in a place with little movement.  I chose to continue with the honey colored satin beads because of their color, their added textural impact, and because they are relatively large beads for seed beads.  The size will make it easy to attach the neck strap.  Because these are Czech beads the size is quite variable, which makes it easy to fit as a bezel.  In hopes of lessening the depth of the bezel and exposing more of the stone, I chose a single row of the honey satin beads in my second try.  Below is a picture of the edges of the two bezels.

Bezeled jasper on edge

The single row of the honey satin beads is much cleaner visually. 

Lesson III: You can always laugh at yourself
I am laughing at myself because the depth of the bezel is still going to cover up more of the stone than I would like. Fortunately, I did decide to embellish so I think that will justify the extra depth.  Here again are the two works in progress at a different angle.

Bezeled jasper side by side

Lesson IV: Take time off
I had a bit of a back ache last week and took time off to give my back time to heal.  Be kind to yourself.

I always thought my beading choices were intuitive, but they are not. I make choices based on what I hope to achieve.  I hope these lessons learned are helpful. 

They Multiplied

Empress bead in cinnamon and honey

My Empress Beads have multiplied!  I thought I would use two for this necklace and I looked down on my work table and discovered I had three.  Now I need to make a fourth, I think.

Bezeled Jasper

I went for the jasper with the cinnamon.  I always want to save my best bits and pieces for the next masterwork. This time I decided there would be no next masterwork so I used the piece of jasper that I liked best.  Unfortunately, this bezel is just not working. It is just a tad to big.  I will either need to start over or decrease, and I am inclined to start over. 

On the other hand I might just decide to get fancy and add some embellishments to the bezel which would hide any threads exposed by a decrease.  

Stay tuned.

Beads v. Books

The Next Empress

I said it before, I really like the Empress Bead.  This is a new color palette.

The inspiration comes from this string of Jasper.

Inspiration

These are really large, measuring 40mm x 28 mm. 

Here are the beads comprising the color palette.

Gold and Cinnamon color palette

 I will need to choose between the pieces of jasper.  Should I go with a piece that is mostly golds with only hints of cinnamon?

Jasper mostly in golds

Or should I go with a piece that has plenty of cinnamon?

Jasper with cinnamon

I don't even quite know what I am making.  Usually I have a plan, or structure worked out in advance.  This time the plan is rather sparse, a necklace with a jasper focal and empress beads, and, and, and??? that is where the plan stopped.

Now as to the title of this post.  Right now I have a series of books calling my name. Like the structure of my necklace, it is not at all clear what will win out.

Thrice Blessed with Three Awards

 

Let me quote Bobbie, I need to go out and buy a lottery ticket.  

I have, in the past few weeks I have twice been given the honor of One Lovely Blog Award from Mandy of Beads for Brains: 365 and Bobbie, of Beadsong Jewelry and an Educator Award (part of Blog 5) from Therese of Therese's Treasures.  

I am both overwhelmed and honored. 

With regard to the One Lovely Blog Award, I am to name 7 random facts about myself and link to 15 blogs.  This is very similar to the Kreative Blogger award I recently received.  Instead of repeating myself I am going to add 39, yes 39, new links to my already lengthy list of blog links on my second tab.  I think each and every one of these links is extraordinary and have added them to my RSS feed.  When any of these 239 bloggers creates a post I view it.  (See my post about The Next Button to discover exactly how I navigate to all those blogs.)

As part of the Blog 5 Awards Therese gave me an Educator Award.  I love to teach; I honestly believe teaching enriches both student and teacher.  I hope my love for sharing knowledge extends beyond the tutorial.  As a recipient I am to name 5 bloggers in the following categories:

Artistic: A blogger whose work is consistently beautiful.  Every blog that I follow needs to be in this category.  I am, however, going to limit myself to just one who is part of the 39 new blogs on my list.

     Artful Living on the Bluff, Designs by Cindy Caraway

Style: A blogger who uses style to inspire; a blog that is photographically beautiful.  This is actually a tumblr, not a blog and I have given it an honorable mention before.  I find this art inspiring for many different reasons.

     Blog Posada

Journalistic: A blog that is really well written, informative and inspires discussion.  I have named these three bloggers for their writing before.

     Nichole Hanna 

     Beadsong Jewelry

     Olive Bites

Educator: A blogger providing great usable tutorials that are easy to follow.  There are multiple blogs I could include on this award, but I am going to mention only one because I just love her "I Might Make That" series.

     Torque Story

Newbie: A favorite new blog (less than 100 followers; blogging less than a year).  I am going to refer you back to the Kreative Blogger award where I set one of my limits to bloggers with less than 100 followers and I mostly stayed within my own rules.

Honorable Mentions: These are some of the 39 new blogs that I want to draw your attention to.

If you love big and complex seed bead jewelry be sure to visit Caroline Fung and Crimson Frog Designs by Kinga Nichols.

If freeform peyote inspires you hop on over to Ibolya-gyöngyei.

I love to look at wire weaving and maybe one of these days I will give it a serious try; for inspiration be sure to visit Mar Ya Morevna a Russian artist.  I also added Taniri Design to the list, although this blog has not been updated for the last year.

For unique and romantic jewelry be sure to look through the posts of Edera Jewelry who does the most amazing work with lace and beads.

A special shout-out for My Bead World who has been most supportive in comments.

One final thank you to Mandy, Bobbie, and Therese for the awards.  I feel blessed, validated, and empowered.  I grinned from ear to ear when I saw my blog listed with other bloggers that I admire and respect.

Beautiful Failures

Cabbage Rose Bracelet

This is a finished Cabbage Rose bracelet.  Of all the things I have made over all the years I have been beading this ranks as one of my favorites.  This is based, very closely, on a pattern that can be found in the April/May 2007 issue of Beadwork.  I love the pattern.  I love how romantic the finished piece is.  I love the colors.  I love the embellishments. 

Cabbage Rose Detail

Having said all that, this piece is not wearable.

First, there is an issue with the weight of the piece.  When I planned this piece I bought a fairly substantial sterling magnetic clasp.  It was an etched square that matched the overall romantic aura of this piece.  Unfortunately since the piece is rather weighty the magnetic clasp did not hold. 

I am resourceful.  I bought a lobster claw clasp to replace the magnetic clasp.  As it turned out the bracelet was still to heavy.  It pulled my sterling clam shell, which attached the lobster clasp to the bracelet, out of shape.

Weight deformed clam shell on the Cabbage Rose bracelet

I really do love this bracelet and I would have bent this clam shell back into place until the metal was so fatigued it broke but that was not the only issue.

Cabbage Rose shedding

Did you notice that pink leaf on the right hand side of the picture?  This piece was woven with Nymo thread and for whatever reason the embellishments keep dropping.  Again, I can fix these losses as they occur.

What I cannot do is fix this bracelet permanently.  Each cabbage rose is made individually.  Rather than begin with a new thread, I used the tails to weave the cabbage rose to the peyote base.  I don't think I knotted the cabbage rose before using the tail ends to attach it to the base so I can't just clip them off. 

The clam shell is part of the woven peyote base.  I cannot just clip it off.  I could bend the metal and fatigue it until it breaks, but that would leave ugly exposed threads.  Plus, the bracelet is rather small and by the time I attached a new clasp it would be too large to wear.

I have avoided knots in the past as I saw them as a point of weakness.  Unfortunately, my integral weaving makes this bracelet unsalvageable.  The major lessons learned on this bracelet is to make use of piece work.  If each cabbage rose were knotted, I could salvage them and make a new base.

Nymo is great, I love the colors, I love the supple weave, but now I work with Fireline which seems to hold up better.

Side view Cabbage Rose

Even something well made and beautiful can be a failure. I have considered turning this into a hair barrette, but it is rather long.  I might be able to sew it to leather and attach it to a cuff; I have never made a cuff before.  What is most likely to happen is that some day I will remake this bracelet and plan appropriately.

Beaded Joinery

Mercurial

I know I have said it before, I have enough beads, but I never have quite what I need.  I need some gold toned headpins to add some fobs for the end of the extension chain.

There are lessons learned in every project.  I had intended to use tried and true pieces for this bracelet; instead I created a new beaded bead.  I must say that was serendipitous.  I love this beaded bead and will make it again.  It is rich, highly textured, and substantial.  It can be incorporated end to end or side to side.

One of the lessons I need to learn over and over is joinery. This was actually the lesson I set out to learn on this project.  The cinnabar bead is drilled along the length, but I wanted to join to the sides for this bracelet.  That was easily accomplished with the bezel and a few 4mm bicones.  I simply wove the cinnabar focal to the elongated embellished beaded bead with bicones.

Mercurial main join

If you remember my color palette for this piece it included quite a few bigger beads in gold.  I think they were 8mm and 10mm rounds.  Those did not fit into the final design; they were replaced by the elongated embellished beaded bead. 

Bracelets are more wearable if they are flat on the back of the wrist.  I made two embellished ribbons of peyote.  The bracelet is reversible.

Mercurial Red Embellished Side

Mercurial Gold Side

I bought a few reduction bars, but they did not fit the spacing of my peyote ribbon to match the beaded bead.  I thought I would match the bicone connection but just could not line up the bicones on both sides of the join in any balanced way.  Instead, I wove the ribbon directly to the elongated embellished beaded bead. (I really need to name that darn bead!)

Mercurial Peyote Ribbon Join I- from an angle

Mercurial Peyote Ribbon Join II- straight on and close up.  Red bicones are 4mm

The final lesson was on joining the clasp to the finished bracelet.  Last week I made a trip to a well stocked bead store and bought a ribbon crimp end.  Lesson: it did not work, I broke a few beads.  It would have looked really pretty had it worked.  I need to learn how to use ribbon crimp ends.  I reverted to a tried and true method; I decreased the peyote to form a point, attached a jump ring through my 10/0 delicas, and attached a chain on one end and a lobster claw on the other. 

All in all I am pleased with the way this turned out. I would have liked it better had I been able to attach the peyote ribbon to the elongated embellished beaded bead with the bicones as it would have made the piece better balanced.  I suspect I am being too picky with my own work.

Two final pictures for perspective.

Mercurial Measuring Up

Mercurial Adjusted

Tutorial Elongated Embellished Beaded Bead

Last week I told you about eating my words because the plan for the cinnabar bracelet wasn't working.  Lesson 1: Right Angle Weave (RAW) works much better with round beads instead of cylinder beads. 

I designed some elongated beaded beads from a base of Cubic RAW for the cinnabar bracelet.  The first one turned out so well I thought I would make a tutorial to share.

Here are some pictures with the bezeled cinnabar bead.

Cinnabar Bracelet Beads Side by Side

Cinnabar Bracelet Beads All Stacked Up

The top of the stacked elongated bead is just a tad different than the picture I took for the tutorial, so you may want to come back to this picture.

All the pictures for the tutorial can be found on my flickr photo stream which can be found here.  I hope this link works, as I am logged in and I obtained the link by a simple cut and paste.  Please let me know if you try it and it fails.

Tutorial for Elongated Embellished Beaded Bead

I used the following beads:
Toho size 6/0 gold colored beads for base
Delica 24Kt Gold Iris size 10/0 (DBM501)
15/0 24Kt Gold Plated Charlottes
12 Swarovski Dark Red Coral 4MM
10 Swarovski Dark Red Coral 3MM (this includes optional top embellishment)

Cubic RAW Base for Elongated Embellished Beaded Bead

To begin, create a Cubic RAW base from the 6/0 beads that is 4 units long.

Tutorial Elongated Embellished Beaded Bead Step 2 Beginning X Embellishment

The first embellishment is an X pattern made with the 10/0 Delica beads.  Exit the top Cubic RAW unit and add three beads to your needle.  Crossing to the bottom 6/0 bead of that unit enter through the opposite side.  That is, if you exited the right hand side, enter on the left hand side.  A misstep will be obvious.

Close Up of First Step of X Embellishment

Here is a close up of the first step of the X embellishment.

I used 6/0's and 10/0's because that is what I had on hand.  I am pretty sure this pattern could work with 8/0's and 11/0's which are more common.

Tutorial Elongated Embellished Beaded Bead Step 3 AKA X Embellishment step 2

Here is the second step of the X embellishment.

Add 1 10/0 and go back through the middle 10/0 you added on the first step.

Tutorial Elongated Embellished Beaded Bead Step 4 AKA X Embellishment step 3

This is the best picture I have of this step.

Now add 1 10/0 bead and go back through the opposite side of the 6/0 from where the X embellishment began.  You can just see that added bead underneath my thread.

Tutorial Elongated Embellished Beaded Bead Step 5 Thread path to next X Embellishment

The X pattern embellishment is going to be repeated 4 times per row, and then again on all 4 sides.

After exiting the top 6/0 bead you are going to go back through the side 6/0 bead on the underlying Cubic RAW unit and then through the bottom 6/0 bead of the underlying Cubic RAW unit.  This will set your needle at the top of the next X embellishment.




Below are pictures of the second X embellishment and then the completed row.

Tutorial Elongated Embellished Beaded Bead Step 6 Repeat step 1 of  X Embellishment

Tutorial Elongated Embellished Beaded Bead Step 7 Repeat step 2 of X Embellishment

Tutorial Elongated Embellished Beaded Bead Step 8 Repeat step 3 of X Embellishment

Tutorial Elongated Embellished Beaded Bead Step 9 X Embellishment Row Completed

Tutorial Elongated Embellished Beaded Bead Step 10a Adding Bicone Row

Tutorial Elongated Embellished Beaded Bead Step 10b Adding Bicone Row

After adding the X embellishments on 4 sides add the 4mm bicones.

Follow a thread path through the 6/0 to exit at a side bead on the Cubic RAW base.  Notice the X embellishments at the top and bottom of the beadwork to the right.












Add a 4mm bicone and go through the next 6/0 bead on the base.  You will repeat this 3 times for each side.

Tutorial Elongated Embellished Beaded Bead Step 10c Adding Bicone Row

Tutorial Elongated Embellished Beaded Bead Step 10d Adding Bicone Row Repeated 4 times

Repeat until you have added 3 4mm bicones on 4 sides of the Cubic RAW base.

Add 3mm bicone beads between the top Cubic RAW unit.

 

Tutorial Elongated Embellished Beaded Bead Step 11 Repeated 4 times

Repeat this step 4 times until there is a 3 mm bicone between each of the 6/0 base units.  This is going to be the top or bottom of your bead, or maybe the left/right depending on how you orient the bead.

You are going to repeat this on the other end of the bead.  If you have a long tail end you can add the 3mm beads now, or you can wait until you add the 1st row of 15/0's in the next step.

My pictures are not quite right after this step because there is an additional 10/0 Delica embellishment, which I found worked better if done at a later step.

Exiting out of a 3mm bicone, add 4 15/0 Charlottes to your needle and go through the first 4mm bicone.

NOTE: the next row will contain only 3 15/0 Charlottes.

Tutorial Elongated Embellished Beaded Bead Step 15 Adding the Charlottes Row

Add 3 15/0 Charlottes and go through the next 4mm bicone.

Tutorial Elongated Embellished Beaded Bead Step 15a Second Row

The pattern between the 4 mm bicones is 4 Charlottes, 3 Charlottes, 3 Charlottes, 4 Charlottes.

At the top/bottom, go through the 3 mm bicone and add 4 Charlottes and repeat. 

Tutorial Elongated Embellished Beaded Bead Step 15b Repeated 4 times

Add the double row of Charlottes on all 4 sides of the Cubic RAW base.

Tutorial Elongated Embellished Beaded Bead Step 12 Embellishing the Top

Now to embellish the top.  This is the step I have out of order on my photography.  I had done this step earlier when photographing my tutorial; the weaving is easier if done at this stage.

Exit from the 3mm bicone and add 3 10/0 Delicas.  Go over the 6/0 base bead and enter the next 3mm bicone.

Tutorial Elongated Embellished Beaded Bead Step 12 Repeated

Repeat the 3 10/0 Delicas 4 times.

Tutorial Elongated Embellished Beaded Bead Step 13 Beginning the Netting

This step begins the netting for the top/bottom (or left/right) of the bead.

Exiting out of the 3mm bead, enter the 1st 10/0 Delica and add 1 10/0 Delica.  Enter the 3rd 10/0 Delica.

Once you have exited the 3rd Delica, enter the next 3 mm bicone, then the first 10/0 Delica on the other side of the bicone and add the next 10/0 Delica, keep repeating.

This picture is only through the exit of the 3rd Delica. 

 

Tutorial Elongated Embellished Beaded Bead Step 16 Netted Top

Repeat the above step 4 times so each bicone has 4 10/0 Delicas between them forming a diamond pattern between each bicone.

Go back through the next bicone, and retrace your thread path to exit at the top 10/0 Delica.  Add 3 10/0 Delica's and enter the next top 10/0 Delica.  In other words, exit the 3mm bicone, add 3 10/0's count 1 10/0 Delica, 1 3mm bicone, 1 10/0 Delica and enter the next Delica.

Repeat 4 times.

Tutorial Elongated Embellished Beaded Bead Step 17 Netted Top Pulling it Together

In this step you are adding no beads, just tightening the netting.  Your needle is going to go through the middle beads of the last rows you finished above.

Tutorial Elongated Embellished Beaded Bead Step 17a Netted Top All Pulled Together

Now pull your thread tight and you can call it done, or you can add one more embellishment depending on how you want to use your beaded bead.

The final embellishment is a 3 mm bicone.  This picture is not quite accurate of my finished piece.

This is a final X pattern.  Exiting out of a 10/0 Delica, add 1 Charlotte, 1 3mm bicone, 1 Charlotte and enter the opposite 10/0 Delica from the side opposite that which you exited the 10/0 Delica on the other side.  Gesh, that is confusing.  Put simply, you are making another X.

Now add 1 Charlotte, back through the 3mm bicone, add 1 Charlotte, and back through the original 10/0 Delica. 


I did not add the Charlotte the first time I did this and had too much exposed thread.  Thus, the picture is not accurate and you should look at the finished piece at the top of this post.

Here are the elongated embellished beaded beads nearly done with different ending embellishments.

*sigh* this took me all day and I am anxious to hit "publish."  No doubt I will read over this a week from now and realize how I could have polished it more.  Nonetheless, I am going to publish this.  If you try this beaded bead and run into issues, let me know and I will do my best to clarify.