Favorite Colors - Desert Sky

One of my favorite color combos of the many bracelets I've made from my original pattern "Ahead of the Curve" which was published in Step by Step Beads Magazine in 2009 is this combination I call Desert Sky. I am always partial to turquoisey-aqua-blue beads and this combination used a matte bronze 8/0 hex and a bronze 8/0 metallic bronze hex from Beadin' Path.

It's amazing how bead sizes differ, even with beads marked 8/0s. But the graduating sizes is what really makes my pattern work - the changing bead sizes and thread tension make the curves curve....

I also used this bronze hex bead in another color combo I called Amber Sky. It's in there between the 11/0 amber round and the bronze twist hex. Someone purchased this one so it's gone, but I'm trying to be fanatical about taking photos of every piece finished.

New Fish

Spending most of my time working on my hand-made pages for our gallery's new cookbook, so my beading is slower right now.

But I have managed to finish two more fish while watching "The Pillars of the Earth" with Dale. Introducing Toni the Tiger Fish....

And her cousin, Rooster. Not sure what kind of fish Rooster is, but he sports a fancy raku tail I found at Shepherdess Beads in San Diego on our vacation in July.

BTW, our gallery (Eclectics Gallery in Kansas City) occasionally publishes a hand-made, limited edition cookbook that is a piece of art. The unveiling will be sometime this month....we only make 40 copies and all recipes pages are hand-made by gallery member artists. They are unique and amazing and also have good recipes! Curious??? You should be. The cost is $65 - a real bargain considering the hundreds of hours we are spending. My studio is a blizzard of papers, inks, glue, ribbons, and other mysterious elements that you'll see on my pages. Stay tuned....

Braided Peyote Bracelet

The recent August/September issue of Beadwork Magazine included another of my peyote beadweaving projects....called Braided Bands.

This design grew out of a curiosity question: what happens if I stitch narrow peyote strips and braid them? It didn't work -  the bands slipped around too much - so I added small tubes of Delicas to hold the "braids" together. The article is called "Braided Bands."

What is very cool is that a reader already has not only made my bracelet, but come up with her own variation. Vicki-Anne Carter from Australia sent me a photo of her creation (and gave me permission to post).

The pattern is simple, basic even count peyote stitching but the trick comes in keeping track of several narrow pieces. Vicki-anne added two more strips and created a very cool bracelet. By the way, Vicki-anne does a lot of beading. Check out her Fickr pics - do a member search for Vickiannec.

One of the things I like about this pattern is that if you use 3 bead colors, weaving in stripes, the two outside colors swap places from one end to the other.

Now I'm working on my sculptural peyote fishies, taking a short break from bracelets. The fish actually take more time and use a lot more beads than the bracelets.

One Fish, Two Fish, Red Fish, Blue Fish

Dr. Seuss was right - you can't have JUST ONE fish. Today we say good bye to Alpha Beta, who has been adopted and is on his way to Etna, New York.

bye bye Alpha Beta

Here are the next two fishies to join my beaded aquarium:

Little Nemo - just because Clown Fish are so adorable and my granddaughter Anastasia loves anything orange -

Little Nemo

He not shy and loves the camera.

Little Nemo mugs for camera

And this little Green-lipped Frillery, who sports little diamond shapes on his sides and back.

Green-lipped Frillery

Green-lipped Frillery

Meanwhile it was 103º today in Pleasant Hill - not too pleasant, but at least the driveway isn't icy like last January! I'm going fishing, with my beads in my basement.

What I did on my summer vacation...

We escaped the Kansas City summer heat for a couple weeks by DRIVING to San Diego, going thru Kansas, Colorado and Nevada on the way out and through Arizona, New Mexico, Texas, Oklahoma and Missouri on the way home. It was nearly 100º most days - except for our stay in San Diego, which was heavenly at 75º and breezy. I shop for beads when I can and spent half a day in Gallup, NM, buying beads and tools.

In the air-conditioned car, we listened to "The Girl with the Dragon Tatoo" on cd and watched our enormous and diverse American landscape speed by. And as always, my beading tray was on my lap every day.

Alpha Beta Fish

Here's what I completed this trip....

Alpha Beta

I always bring a huge (like 2 of those plastic storage boxes full) stash of seed beads when we travel. You never know what color scheme will inspire me, so I come prepared.

Zebra Fish

But I didn't bring any dagger beads - those longish little paddle beads with the hole at one end - so I was shopping for them everywhere.

Zebra Fish Tail

Daggers make great fringe and fins and tails for fishies.

Carl Carp

This black and yellow guy was the first one - see, no daggers on him at all.

Carl Carp

I think he's a carp or goldfish, like the kind who live in Japanese garden pools.

Neo Neon

I soon found a bead shop in western Kansas and started buying dagger beads, chippies and potential fish eyes.

Neo Neon 

Some of these guys had to wait till we got home to get their eyes.

Scary blond with eye makeup!

And this guy has movable eyes - they can look in any direction.

Blondie

Actually with those black eye lashes and pink fins, I'm pretty sure this blondie is a girl.

For the record, the fish idea is NOT mine. But my fish do not look like those from the Bead and Button Mag. article in 2001 by Georgia McMillan. The idea came from her - I try not to forget a good idea - and I have several much cruder fish I made that year who live with my Christmas tree decorations.

I hope to come up with a great way to wear a fish as a pendant or pin. They are so 3 dimensional it seems wrong to pin them flat....maybe a mobile with several, although that may price it too high for "afishianados" who visit Eclectics Gallery, where these will be for sale.

We are back home in Missouri, and it's going to be 95º plus all week. Our first day back was the hottest day of the summer and I spent it helping Laura (lovely daughter) and Aaron (super son-in-law) move across town. Schlepping boxes is a crazy job in this heat and humidity, but hey - she's my daughter. Try to Keep cool.