Adornments Retreat

Once again, I'm a little late to the party as far as sharing my recent creative adventures... but I'll stick with the better late than never theme!  For the Adornments Retreat, the creative forces behind Vintaj, the Art Bead Scene, and Now That's a Jig came together for an event not to be missed!  Three days of mixed media jewelry fun with Heather Powers, Jess Italia Lincoln, Erin Prias-Hintz, and Brenda Schweder at the Chestnut Mountain Resort in Galena, Illinois made for the perfect birthday weekend for me.  The only bad thing about the retreat is that I had to choose just two of the eight classes and I wish that I could have done them all!!  

Galena is about a five and a half to six hour drive for me (depending on the traffic and construction), so I decided to head out a day early so as not to be stressed out about my arrival time on Thursday.  Luckily, my wonderful roommate Monica decided to join me earlier than she had originally planned.  We had dinner that first night with one of Monica's coworkers, got to watch an amazing rain storm roll through from the floor to ceiling windows at the restaurant, and had our GPS route us down a series of increasingly creepily named dirt roads to get home (Devil's Ladder, Irish Hollow, Cemetery)... Adventure!!  The nighttime rain cleared out and gave us a super muggy morning to explore the shops and restaurants of Main Street Galena before the retreat got going that afternoon.  (Galena is a seriously cute town if you ever get a chance to visit!)

Thursday afternoon kicked off the fun of the retreat proper.  We all gathered in our main meeting space to get our registration materials, name tags, and goodie bags.  This is always an exciting time at any retreat when you get to see old friends and meet new people... everyone is buzzing with anticipation of the fun to come!  After some introductory remarks from Heather and the other instructors, the group had the fun task of making and dividing out some bead soup!  

Before the retreat, we were given the following inspiration and asked to bring 16 inches of beads to go with the color palette.  We were also supposed to bring some sort of focal/pendant and any other beads and findings we might want to add to our personal bead soup portions.  The idea behind all of this is that each person was encouraged to make something made up of at least 60% of the bead soup and enter into a fun design contest to be held at the end of the retreat.  Each table made their own soup and it was fascinating to see the different mixes of beads we had around the room.  

My portion of our table's "soup" with the pendant I chose to use.

We broke for dinner on our own at the resort and then regrouped for a fun evening session afterwards.  Heather and Erin did a presentation about the Art Bead Scene blog and their monthly challenges as well as using art beads in your jewelry designs.  Fun and inspiring stuff!  One of the highlights of the evening was Heather and Erin doing a Chopped style competition where they gave each other a bead soup mix and a focal based on the July ABS challenge and then they had 20 minutes on the clock to make a design.  Nail biting jewelry making excitement!  To add to the challenge, Brenda gave them each a mystery component that they had to work into their designs.... and it was a plastic monkey with a sparkly crystal collar!!  Here are our lovely contestants and their designs at the end of the competition.  

While all those hi-jinx were going on, the rest of us looked on, mingled, and worked on our own beading projects.  I managed to get my Bead Soup competition piece completed that first night (probably a sign of the impending apocalypse!!).  Here's what I made:

This sweet pendant from Erin's Simple Truths Sampler Club was the perfect fit with my mix of pastel beads.  It is beautiful and had a lovely message on the back side that the wearer will keep close to her heart.

For day one, I chose Erin's INKsplorations class where we got to play with different alcohol inks and surfaces to put them on.  I probably didn't experiment enough but I think my brain just isn't great when it comes to really being freeform and just messing around.  I also stuck mostly to the Ranger alcohol inks since those are the ones readily available to me locally.  Before lunch we had time to experiment with the inks and substrates and Erin worked through lunch (naughty monkey!) to get all of our little masterpieces sealed for us so we could move onto the next step when we got back.  We spent the rest of the day cutting down small portions of our inked artworks and gluing them into bezels and adding in UV resin.  Now, resin is a tricky thing (at least for me!) and this class was no different.  I had some bubbling and what I think is the resin pulling away from the material underneath but I believe with some creative problem solving that I may be able to salvage these two.  While I had fun playing with the inks (and got some fun results along the way) I think this may be a little too freeform for me to want to pursue it too much... although I'm thinking about trying two part resin with it instead of the UV and see if it's any less frustrating for me.  Time will tell!

Day two for me was a polymer clay and metal play day with Heather in her Wings & Dreams class.  I really can't overstate how much fun I had in this class!  I never would have dreamed that I would enjoy polymer clay until I took my first class in that medium with Heather last fall.  I'm never going to be the genius artist that she is, but I really enjoy playing with it and learning new polymer techniques.  I was so busy making cute butterflies and flowers that I really didn't do a great job of documenting the day, but here are some pictures I took during and afterwards of my completed projects as well as some that are still works in progress.  I didn't realize this when I signed up for the class, but alcohol inks were a part of the coloring process for these cuties so I had all the supplies I needed to continue painting and playing when I got home!

Right after our day two classes, the entire group came back together for our Wrap Party where we got to see and vote on everyone's Bead Soup creations and officially say goodbye to the wonderful Adornments Retreat and our fabulous instructors.  The fun didn't really end there as many of us were staying over Saturday night.  After dinner Jess's mom, Trish Italia, opened up her lovely bead store Rustic River Finds in downtown Galena for us to do some more shopping.  (I forgot to mention that Friday night we had a private shopping event with our instructors and Trish at the retreat!)  Not that I needed anything, I found some treasures to treat myself with as a little birthday gift.    

Top: Our lovely instructors Brenda, Jess, Heather, & Erin; Bottom: Me with my two teachers and fellow participant Lin.

My birthday goodies!

If you're looking for a fun and inspirational jewelry making retreat, I highly recommend checking out the Adornments Retreat.  They're already starting to plan next year's event.  A huge THANK YOU to Heather, Jess, Erin, and Brenda for a wonderful weekend of jewelry adventures with a great group of folks.  Any time I can come together to share, learn, and laugh with my beady tribe is a blessing and a treasure I'll cherish.  

Inspired by Reading: The Ladies of Grace Adieu

This month's Inspired by Reading Book Club selection is a book that I've owned for quite some time but just never got around to reading... The Ladies of Grace Adieu and Other Stories by Susanna Clarke.  This is a slim volume of fairy stories by Clarke that is illustrated by the amazing Charles Vess.  The stories are presented as if they were written by various authors and are in a variety of 18th and 19th century styles.  I'm not sure that I loved the stories (although I still want to read Jonathan Strange & Mr. Norrell) but this is a truly beautiful book that was a delight to hold in my hands.

I feel a tiny bit like I cheated this month since I had already hatched the idea for this necklace and earrings before I started reading the book selection this month.  Each year for the Bead Cruise, Heather Powers chooses a theme for a costume/cocktail party.  This year she chose "A Midsummer Night's Dream."

Even though I'm not great at coming up with fabulous costumes, I hate to pass up a chance to let loose and be a little wild so I started plotting early.  I had a mask that I got a good deal on at sci/fi convention a few years ago and have never worn.  I thought the great leaf design would be a perfect starting point for my fairy costume!  I did some searching online and found some fun, leafy fairy wings in orange and red and a simple orange tutu.  I still had to make some minor adjustments to the mask and find a suitable under layer for the tutu, but I was feeling pretty good about my costume by November and then sort of forgot about things for a while... and I hadn't even begun to think about jewelry!  Lucky for me, the January edition of Erin Prais-Hintz's Simple Truths Sampler Club got my creative juices going... it was the perfect complement for the rest of my outfit!

I picked out lots of Czech glass flower and leaf beads in the colors of the pendant (and my new leggings that I bought to go under the tutu) and arranged them (along with a couple of rondelles) in an asymmetrical design.  I used brass chain and findings to go with the brass pendant bezel.  

Needing earrings to go along with my new flower fairy necklace, I got to work playing with some enameled bead caps from C-Koop Beads.  I bought a lot of different colored pairs of flower bead caps a while back with the idea of making earrings featuring vine-like dangles, but hadn't gotten around to figuring out how to make my vision reality.  This was do or die time!  I ended up using a skinny mandrel intended for making wire loops to wrap my long head pin around to form my "vines."  They aren't perfect, but I'm pretty happy with how these turned out considering they were a first attempt.  I'm eager to play with some of the other colors and shapes of enameled bead caps that I've been hoarding!

And here's a look at me in my full costume for our party night on the cruise!  It was a great night dancing and cavorting with the other Bead Cruise fairies!

Me in my fairy costume with my roommate Lissa.

Art Bead Scene November 2015

This month's Art Bead Scene challenge inspiration is a lovely muted fall floral silk screened by Marguerite Zorach.  I find the colors quite striking and have a number of art beads in my stash that would work well this month... this could be another month of multiple entries for me depending on how my month goes.  You can find out more about the artwork and the artist over on the ABS blog HERE.

Autumn flowers

by Marguerite Zorach

I've been a member of the Simple Truths Sampler Club that Erin Prais-Hintz offers through her company Tesori Trovati for quite some time now.  For the last couple of years, Erin has committed to making something inspired by the Art Bead Scene monthly challenge for the club each month.  Sadly, many of her little treasures are languishing in my art bead cabinet (mostly because I want to keep them all for myself!) but that is not the fate of this month's offering!  (By the way, Erin does currently have spots in the Sampler Club... find out more about it HERE.)

This month Sampler Club members got a tiny peak at the November artwork a couple of days early since she sent them out with the October selections.  Because I had such early access to her pendant, I knew I wanted to make something with it before attempting anything else.  Here's the pendant that I received... she calls them "Love, Autumn."

It's hard to tell in my photo, but there is a fabulous pearlescence to the pendant that helped drive my bead selection for this project.  I really wanted to break out of my normal design mode and play with a mix of bead shapes and colors... all in a (gasp) asymmetrical design.  I chose a mix of mostly Czech glass beads that pulled out the various colors from the pendant and the painting that inspired it.  I was fortunate to have some plated hematite beads that echoed the pearly blue in the pendant with their metallic sheen.  To round things out I also threw in some brass beads and gemstones (red wood lace stone?).  Originally, I was thinking I'd use waxed linen for my stringing material, but it was quickly apparent to me that I would be better off using beading wire. 

Without further ado, here is my finished necklace!  I'm pleased as punch with how this one turned out.  How do you think I did?

The Simple Truth About Why I Love the Simple Truths Sampler Club

The first time I saw any of Erin Prais-Hintz's work it was in a beading magazine (Stringing? Bead Style?) when I was still pretty new to jewelry making.  They had done a little piece on her Simple Truths Sampler Club and I was intrigued by both the club and her lovely creations.  Here's the idea in a nutshell: each month Erin makes an limited edition piece just for the Sampler Club.  It's usually a pendant but sometimes a set of beads (as you will see in my photos below.)  You can choose from a 3, 6, 9 or 12 month subscription... and the longer your subscription is for the more you save!  If she has open spots in the club she will often add any extras to her shop, but there are only 20 members at a time.   

When Erin first started her Simple Truths line her creations all had a similar style and feel to them... many of them including words or sayings... "simple truths."  I love that as time has gone on, Erin has used the sampler club as a way to stretch her own creativity and experiment with new techniques all while staying true to her artistic vision.  Currently each month's special creation is Erin's inspired response to the monthly challenge artwork over on the Art Bead Scene blog where she is an editor.  (If you aren't familiar with that challenge, you can check out all the details for this month HERE.)  

Each month is a delightful surprise... her creations are a joy to create with!  You'll see some of my designs featuring Simple Truths throughout the rest of this post.

January 2014

May 2014

Rewinding back to my personal experience with Simple Truths... I SO wanted to join up right then and there when I read that article, but I couldn't quite justify the cost at that time.  I was only making jewelry for myself and hadn't yet become the art bead addict that I am today.  The article did introduce me to Erin's blog Treasures Found and she became one of the bloggers that I regularly followed.  I continued to drool over each new piece that Erin shared and would look often at her shop, but never pulled the trigger to sign up.  

All that changed when my sweet husband had the winning bid for a 6 month subscription during a charity fundraising blog hop... What a wonderful surprise for me!  I enjoyed my monthly works of art so much that he extended my subscription for another 6 months as a Christmas present.  Best Husband Ever!  I just signed up for another year of Simple Truths and couldn't be happier... I know I will continue to me more in awe of Erin's talents with each month's design.  She hasn't disappointed yet!

April 2014?

March 2015

May 2015

I'll be honest, the only problem that I have with the Simple Truths Sampler Club is that I want to keep them all for myself.  Don't laugh, this is a real problem!  Erin's creations are so lovely and special that I don't want to give them up so they sometimes end up languishing in my hoard of art beads for far too long.  I don't know about other folks who sell some of the jewelry they make, but if I know something will be for me to keep then I have a tendency to push it to the bottom of my to-do list in favor of more profitable projects.  Here are just two of my pretties that are just waiting for me to give them some design attention.

If you love art beads and the thrill of getting a surprise in your mail box each month, Simple Truths might just be for you.  If you do decide to give your self the best gift ever and sign up, put my name down as referring you and we will BOTH get an extra month on our subscriptions.  How cool is that?  You can see the different club options and sign up HERE.

Thanks for stopping by today.  In Erin's words "Enjoy the day!"