Adventures in Bead Embroidered Art

I've been toying with the idea of doing a small, framed art piece that's bead embroidered for some time.  This winter I began the process of giving it a shot.  After the rush of holiday markets and gift making, it was nice to just sit back with a relaxing project with no firm deadline looming... something that I realized might end up just being for me.  I'd love to share a bit of that journey with you!

It all started with a frame that I've had for about 24 years that I never actually used for photos.  I loved the floral textured look to it and felt like it would be a whimsical addition to my first attempt at bead embroidered art.  I pulled out my supplies and got to work!  

I used the original glass to measure the size of the bead foundation and then used my white gel pen to trace the frame's opening that would be my canvas.

Next up, I began positioning my main focal as well as other larger decorative pieces to lay out the general design.  Since the cabochon I chose  featured butterflies swirling around a red haired maiden, I chose a selection of butterflies and flowers to fill in the rest of the space.  I included some lovely polymer clay butterflies (artist unknown) as well as a brass charm then added in a variety of coordinating Czech glass flower beads.  At this point, I only glued down my main focal and was just playing with potential spacing of other elements.

Once I got my cabochon bezeled, I picked out some coordinating crystal cup chain to go around the bezel.  I love the effect but am no pro at getting cup chain to behave nicely!  With that corner of the piece done, it was time to get serious about the placement of my other larger elements.  I positioned things again and got it all glued down with some E6000.  Next, to create a little movement across the piece, I sketched in some swirls that began at the little gap left between the two ends of the cup chain.  I then used gold size 15 seed beads along those swirls.

From this point, I started outlining the embellishments with various rows of seed beads.  I also sewed down the beads and butterflies for added security.  (I always hate relying only on glue!)

This became a fun exercise in playing with various textures as well as shades of metallic.  I used a variety of colors and finishes as I continued to build out the design.  Teacup beads, gingkoes, and bugle beads helped fill in awkward spaces.  As I worked I would periodically put the piece into the frame to make sure that I stayed on track.

After many, many hours of quiet sewing, my little artwork was finally complete.  I named this "Lady of the Butterflies" and entered it into the Arts Consortium of Carver County member awards show.  It's both exciting and a little bittersweet that that someone has purchased this little Lady from the gallery show!  Honestly, I would have been happy to keep her, but hopefully she is loved wherever she ends up.  

Overall, I'm really proud of the outcome and look forward to trying my hand at some more framed pieces in the near future.  It's fun to break out of your normal routine and try something totally new!  Is there something you've been wanting to try?  I encourage you to get out there and do it!  

Inspiration for the April 2024 Honey Do List

No fooling, it's time for the April Honey Do List Inspiration!!

2024 marks the ninth year that my husband Eric has been giving me a design challenge each month to get me out of my comfort zone and to help clear out my bead stash... The Honey Do List!  I know that I'm not the only one who loves a good design challenge, so I'm hoping folks will continue to play along with us!  Thanks to all of you who have participated over the years... it means a lot to both of us!

Lately no one has been playing along with us, but we will continue on since I enjoy having the inspiration to make something each month.

 

Here's this month's inspiration photo and what Eric had to say about it:

This month I wanted something colorful. I took a lot of pictures when we were on our Vegas trip recently, but have not gone through them all yet.  I really liked this wall of flowers and sexy lady/octopus from a seafood restaurant we walked past.  We didn't eat here, but they win for decorations!

The reveal date will be Monday, April 22nd.  To make it super easy for you to participate and share your creations, I'll set up an Inlinkz link up so folks can add their blogs or links as they are ready.  Just stop by my blog starting on April 22nd and join the fun!  I'll leave the link up open for a while... so you have plenty of time to add your links.  (Last month's is still open.  You can check it out HERE.)  No blog?  No worries!  Feel free to send me a picture of your creation and some brief comments and I'll happily share in my blog post.  You can reach me at sjdesignsjewelry@gmail.com  The more the merrier, so I hope you'll play along with me this month! 

March 2024 Honey Do List

2024 marks the ninth year that my husband Eric has been giving me a design challenge each month to get me out of my comfort zone and to help clear out my bead stash... The Honey Do List!  I know that I'm not the only one who loves a good design challenge, so I'm hoping folks will continue to play along with us!  Thanks to all of you who have participated over the years... it means a lot to both of us!

Lately no one has been playing along with us, but we will continue on since I enjoy having the inspiration to make something each month.

This month's inspiration is from the pearl factory in the Czech Republic that we visited last fall.  I loved the colorful metallics here and the drips were really interesting.  I only wish they had offered some for sale at the factory...Sarajo would have bought a bunch! 

Well, I had grand plans this month but the Bead Cruise fun sort of got in the way of my productivity!  I still plan to make some little cascading pearl earrings with a mix of pearls from this factory tour and some coordinating Swarovski pearls for the Lowertown St. Paul Art Crawl in April.

But how about I talk about what I did finish?  I was determined to make a special bead embroidered necklace for the costume party on the Bead Cruise.  Luckily for me, I had a polymer clay cabochon made by Kimberly Cherwaty that was a gift on the cruise two years ago.  It was perfect for my flapper dress with a green beaded and sequined peacock on it.  

The majority of the beads that I used in this piece came from our trip to the Czech Republic....  Mixed metallic size 10s from Matubo, two different sized green pearls from the glass pearl factory, and copper colored O beads from Rutkovsky.  Oh, and the laser etched daggers were from the trip too!  I don't have a good picture of it yet, but I used some gorgeous leather from Kinga Bledsoe for the backing.  

Now it's your turn!  Please add links to/photos of your own creations below.  I love seeing what everyone else is making too.  Not ready yet?  No problem, I'll leave the link up open until late next month.  Check back on April 1st to see what Eric has in store for us next!  

You are invited to the Inlinkz link party!

Click here to enter

Inspiration for the March 2024 Honey Do List

2024 marks the ninth year that my husband Eric has been giving me a design challenge each month to get me out of my comfort zone and to help clear out my bead stash... The Honey Do List!  I know that I'm not the only one who loves a good design challenge, so I'm hoping folks will continue to play along with us!  Thanks to all of you who have participated over the years... it means a lot to both of us!

Lately no one has been playing along with us, but we will continue on since I enjoy having the inspiration to make something each month.

This month's inspiration is from the pearl factory in the Czech Republic that we visited last fall.  I loved the colorful metallics here and the drips were really interesting.  I only wish they had offered some for sale at the factory...Sarajo would have bought a bunch!

The reveal date will be Monday, March 25th.  To make it super easy for you to participate and share your creations, I'll set up an Inlinkz link up so folks can add their blogs or links as they are ready.  Just stop by my blog starting on March 25th and join the fun!  I'll leave the link up open for a while... so you have plenty of time to add your links.  (Last month's is still open.  You can check it out HERE.)  No blog?  No worries!  Feel free to send me a picture of your creation and some brief comments and I'll happily share in my blog post.  You can reach me at sjdesignsjewelry@gmail.com  The more the merrier, so I hope you'll play along with me this month! 

February 2024 Honey Do List

Apologies for posting this so late... we were having such a great time visiting Las Vegas that I totally forgot to get this post done!  2024 marks the ninth year that my husband Eric has been giving me a design challenge each month to get me out of my comfort zone and to help clear out my bead stash... The Honey Do List!  I know that I'm not the only one who loves a good design challenge, so I'm hoping folks will continue to play along with us!  Thanks to all of you who have participated over the years... it means a lot to both of us!

Here's this month's inspiration and what Eric had to say about it:

This month's challenge is a little...frosty.  This is actually a literally frosted glass window from the museum of glassmaking in Jablonec in the Czech Republic.  I took a ton of pictures here and this one jumped out for a good Winter post.  Don't worry, I've got more color coming for next month!  

There's a tiny bit of irony that Eric chose this frosty picture as our February inspiration considering how bi-polar our weather has been here!  Who would have expected 6.5" of snow on Valentine's Day and then days in the 50's within the week?!  Crazy!  In keeping with the weather, my designs aren't exactly icy either... but yet somehow feel appropriate.

First up, a necklace featuring a pendant from Inviciti.  Both the whitewashed colors and floral burst design of the focal reminded me of the photo.  I paired it with the last of a strand of moonstone rounds left over from a special order a few years ago.  The soft, pearly colors playing nicely off the more rustic pendant.  Copper plated chain and findings complete the design.

The other thing I made this month features some of the new beads that I bought on our trip to the Czech Republic... fitting I think.  Again, the design on the glass beads isn't super frosty but the frosty white with AB finish sure is!  These are super simple but still have some charachter.  

Now it's your turn!  Please add links to/photos of your own creations below.  I love seeing what everyone else is making too.  Not ready yet?  No problem, I'll leave the link up open until late next month.  Check back on Monday to see what Eric has in store for us next!  

You are invited to the Inlinkz link party!

Click here to enter

Inspiration for the February 2024 Honey Do List

Y'all, I can 100% say that being late this time is all Eric's fault.  He was super slow to come up with his inspiration photo this month.  Perhaps the unseasonably warm temperatures have him distracted.  But better late than never.  The good news is he gave me a few choices so next month we should be on time.

  
2024 marks the ninth year that my husband Eric has been giving me a design challenge each month to get me out of my comfort zone and to help clear out my bead stash... The Honey Do List!  I know that I'm not the only one who loves a good design challenge, so I'm hoping folks will continue to play along with us!  Thanks to all of you who have participated over the years... it means a lot to both of us!

Here's this month's inspiration and what Eric had to say about it:

This month's challenge is a little...frosty.  This is actually a literally frosted glass window from the museum of glassmaking in Jablonec in the Czech Republic.  I took a ton of pictures here and this one jumped out for a good Winter post.  Don't worry, I've got more color coming for next month!  

The reveal date will be Monday, February 26th.  To make it super easy for you to participate and share your creations, I'll set up an Inlinkz link up so folks can add their blogs or links as they are ready.  Just stop by my blog starting on February 26th and join the fun!  I'll leave the link up open for a while... so you have plenty of time to add your links.  (Last month's is still open.  You can check it out HERE.)  No blog?  No worries!  Feel free to send me a picture of your creation and some brief comments and I'll happily share in my blog post.  You can reach me at sjdesignsjewelry@gmail.com  The more the merrier, so I hope you'll play along with me this month! 

January 2024 Honey Do List

2024 marks the ninth year that my husband Eric has been giving me a design challenge each month to get me out of my comfort zone and to help clear out my bead stash... The Honey Do List!  I know that I'm not the only one who loves a good design challenge, so I'm hoping folks will continue to play along with us!  Thanks to all of you who have participated over the years... it means a lot to both of us!

Here's this month's inspiration and what Eric had to say about it:

This month I wanted to continue doing pictures from our amazing bead trip to the Czech Republic this Fall.  Here is the outrageous astronomical clock from Prague, which was under construction last time we visited.  So cool to see it in person and get to take pictures of this wonder of human technology and art.  There should be plenty of inspiration here: from clocks to astrological signs.  Good luck!

My creative efforts this month were heavily focused on one art bead maker... my friend Jenny Davies-Reazor!  What can I say... I had two pendants that really fit into the idea of the moon and other heavenly bodies and then some earring charms that worked well color wise!  

I've had this fun crescent shaped polymer clay pendant from Jenny in my stash for quite a while... it's nice to finally get it out into the world to be enjoyed!  The crescent moon and stars on the focal just felt right here.  I made bead links and a little dangle for the pendant with some fun shaped new beads that I got while visiting the Czech Republic last year.  Actually all the beads except the green little "o" or spacer beads were purchased at Rutkovsky during that trip.  

This second necklace is also strung entirely with beads from our trip!  Fun to get to put those to use for this particular challenge for sure.  This pendant is also by Jenny... a lovely gemstone cabochon encased in polymer clay and featuring the phases of the moon.  The blue wash on the pendant is also a nice nod to all the blues in the Astronomical Clock too.  

These first earrings also feature some fun polymer clay charms from Jenny.  Sensing a trend yet??  I felt like both the color and the patterns of the charms work well for this challenge.  I paired them with some fun shaped moon glow lucite, some dyed agate, and copper plated findings.  Ear wires here are niobium.

My second pair of earrings are all about the stars!  Stars on the adorable beaded links by my friend Anna Pierson of Saga Hus Components and Greek bronze star charms.  These were simple to pull together but a lot of fun.  

Well, there you have it!  Considering I was in the throes of Valentine's Day gift creating, I'm pretty happy that I was able to make four things this month.  Now it's your turn!  Please add links to/photos of your own creations below.  I love seeing what everyone else is making too.  Not ready yet?  No problem, I'll leave the link up open until late next month.  Check back on February 1st to see what Eric has in store for us next!  I know he's got tons of new photos he's been going through.  

You are invited to the Inlinkz link party!

Click here to enter