October 2021 Honey Do List

Keeping to our normal schedule has continued to be a bit of a challenge... but only one day late on the reveal!   We had a ton of travel on the books already... and then my mom passed away unexpectedly.  It's been a month, y'all.  

As most of you know, 2021 marks the sixth 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!

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

While in Chicago for our friend's wedding, I dragged my camera along and made Sj stop every 3 minutes in our wanderings to take pictures.  I was impressed with how much street art was around the city: murals, tags, etc.  I really liked this particular image painted on a wooden fence.  The colors and flowers should be a nice monthly challenge!

While I had tons of good stuff spread around my bead mat, I only managed to finish one piece of jewelry this time.  There's still a chance I'll circle back and get something else made, but I wanted to get this post up without any further delay.  

I had a few different ceramic components from Golem Design Studio that really fit the challenge this month.  Needing to also make more bracelets for a couple of upcoming shows, I started (and thus far, finished) with a multi-strand bracelet using one of the lentils as the focal.  

Editing to add one more design I managed to finish WAY late....

I had this partially laid out when I ran out of time.  It took a bit, but I did circle back to finish the necklace design to go with the bracelet I had already done.  Again, I've got a lovely ceramic pendant from Golem Design Studio.  I've strung it with a variety of Czech glass as well as some star cut matte quartz crystal.

Now it's your turn!  Please add links to/photos of your own creations below.  I love seeing what everyone else is making too.  Check back soon to see what Eric has in store for us this month!  

Sorry for the short post.  Hopefully Eric will have a new inspiration photo by the end of the week... we'll see how that goes!  Thanks for bearing with us!

You are invited to the Inlinkz link party!

Click here to enter

Honey Do List November 2020

Sorry to be posting this so late in the day, but at least I got it done on the due date!  I got a little caught up in our Five Friends Holiday Sale on Facebook that extended through today, Cyber Monday.  And I'll apologize in advance for my photos... the light hasn't been on my side lately.

Anyway, as most of you know, 2020 marks the fifth 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... it's the Honey Do List 2020!  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!

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

I went a little surrealistic on this one.  I took this from a moving car in England: a field with a bunch of wild poppies.  I like the blur and the pop of color here.  Good luck!

As soon as I opened the picture file from Eric I knew one of the art beads that I just had to use this time!  But I'll get to that design in a bit.  As always, I started by gathering all the possible beads that I might want to use for this challenge.  I had a nice selection of art bead options!

As is my normal habit, I started with a pair of earrings.  I snagged these pretty poppy enameled charms by Lindy's Designs in a Facebook sale before Eric chose this month's artwork and they came just in time!  As luck would have it, I also had just gotten some fun new acrylic that were sitting out on my bead table when inspiration struck.  I love the acrylic for being bold without being heavy.  The black and white floral pattern really was the perfect addition to this design!

Next up, I had to play with at least some of my extensive collection of Golem Design Studio poppy pieces!  For this first necklace I strung a collection of Czech glass beads in colors to coordinate with the pendant.  I even threw in some red flowers for fun.  I just love the mix of teal or turquoise and red!

While I was noodling on what to do with some of the other pieces, I whipped up a multi-strand bracelet using Lorelei Hill Eurto's design from back in the day of beading magazines being plentiful.  I used several different colors and sizes of seed beads, Czech glass, and bamboo for the strands.  Wood and a ceramic round round out the focal section of the bracelet.  

My next necklace was inspired by a series that my friend Erin Prais-Hintz made a couple of years ago.  I got my Now That's a Jig set back up on the end of my table and whipped up a little teardrop pendant frame that I could hang another Golem lentil bead off of.  A few coordinating rows of beads wire wrapped to the frame completed the look.  I just strung the pedant off of a long brass chain.

Lastly I've got my favorite piece of the whole bunch... with the art bead most perfectly suited to Eric's photo.  I had snatched up a pair of of fabulous enameled focals by Gardanne Beads a while back that really look like Anne could have taken her inspiration from Eric's picture!  I knew from the first that I wanted to do a multi-strand necklace with a variety of smaller beads pulling the colors from the pendant.  I hid the ends of the strands in brass cones topped with turquoise colored beads.  I added links with red and black flower beads to connect the front part of the necklace to the brass chain in the back.  This one still needs a little bit of tweaking, but you get the general idea! 

Now it's your turn!  Please add links to/photos of your own creations below.  I love seeing what everyone else is making too!  Check back on December 1st (omg, that's tomorrow!) to see what Eric has in store for us next month! 

You are invited to the Inlinkz link party!

Click here to enter

Inspiration for the November 2020 Honey Do List

Sorry for the delay (again) this month.  We've been a little preoccupied with other things here.  Better late than never!

2020 marks the fifth 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... it's the Honey Do List 2020!  (And today marks the our 19th wedding anniversary!) 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!

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

I went a little surrealistic on this one.  I took this from a moving car in England: a field with a bunch of wild poppies.  I like the blur and the pop of color here.  Good luck!

The reveal date will be Monday, November 30th.  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 as they are ready.  Just stop by my blog starting on November 30th 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... check it our 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!

Art Bead Scene Challenge: February 2015

This month's inspiration for the Art Bead Scene challenge is Amapolas, a lush watercolor illustration by Edward Julius Detmold.  You can read more about the artist and the artwork HERE.  I was really taken by these lovely poppies and the matching butterflies frolicking among them.  I love the look of poppies and have a few different beads that would be perfect for this challenge.  There's so much detail in the painting and so many the shades of red, coral, and pink... it's so yummy and lush!  Just one problem... I was a little short on time this month with the Bead Cruise and other things on my plate.  I was worried, and a little sad, thinking that I would have to sit this challenge out.

Amapolas, 1913

Illustration published in "News of Spring and Other Nature Studies

By Edward Julius Detmold

While taking a brief break from doing what felt like 1,000 loads of post-vacation laundry, I did take some time to gaze at my art beads and contemplate if I could pull something off.  For now, I have to postpone any super elaborate designs but I just couldn't skip this one!

First, I ended up grabbing two of the super cute poppy Humblebeads that Heather Powers made for this month's challenge.  I was lucky to snag these little beauties while on the Bead Cruise.  Erin Prais-Hintz inspired me to use a little Vintaj deco rivet that I had never really noticed before in my design.  She used them in one of her We're All Ears designs last November and you can see her pretties HERE.  I don't know why I never paid this rectangle piece any attention before since I regularly use several other deco rivet designs in my earrings, but that's how it goes sometimes.  Thanks for the great idea, Erin!

Determined to do something more than just a pair of earrings, I grabbed one of my beloved lampwork glass poppies from Tanya McGuire and whipped up this little necklace by wire wrapping it to a Vintaj brass ring.  I added some butterfly charms and a small Czech glass flower dangling from chain to balance things out (I wanted the poppy slightly off center).  I finally used my brand new two hole metal punch to add the holes in the brass ring!  

 
I couldn't end this post without sharing this necklace that I made last year when Erin Prais-Hintz invited me to be her Pretty Palettes partner for the Halcraft blog.  The pendant is by Skye Jewels and is just perfect for this inspiration piece!  You can see more about it HERE if you are interested.