Black and White

Like most everyone, I love color. And normally my beadwork reflects my color personality....my bead stash certainly does! I buy seed beads primary because the colors attract me - only rarely for a specific pattern. As a result, my library of seed bead sizes and colors is dominated by jewel tones, AB finishes, charlottes, greens, blues and bronzes. Sure, there is the occasional matte finish or opaque red or transparent yellow, but you will look long and hard to find many pastel beads, or lavender or orange.

But, I do have various black and white beads....so when I decided to experiment with my published peyote bracelet pattern by working a stripe into the design, I chose black and white beads.

Actually the first striped version was an attempt at an all-black bracelet for a friend and golly! It was very hard to see where I was. See what I mean???

The striped weave is mostly size 15/0 hex and 15/0 rounds. It looks great, sparkles nicely. Can you believe it wasn't what my friend had in mind, so she sent it back? But took so long to make I cannot bear to sell it and it now lives in my private collection.

So this time I used black and white beads...and I love the way it turned out! And it WAS a lot easier to see the pattern.

 Since the stripe pattern is so angular, I opted not to use my usual beaded toggle, but added a slide tube clasp, attaching with the same 15/0s used in the bracelet.

Now I think it's time to do more experimenting with black and white beads. Just ordered more from my favorite bead suppliers -- Bello Modo (free shipping!) and Charlenes Beads (hard to find colors, half kilo and kilo packages).

Four Generations Photo

Great Grandma Baumgarten with daughter, grandson and great-grandchildren on the Fisk side.
Pastor Jonathan Fisk, Grandma Lynette Fisk, Great Grandma Ruth Baumgarten (front) with Fisk grandkids (l-r) Trinity Promise, Anastasia Aviella, Chloe Elkanah and Fides Athanasius. Photo taken November 2011 in Naperville, Illinois.

Jonathan's Recent Installation

Bethany Lutheran Church in Naperville, Illinois, installed Jonathan Fisk as their third pastor in November, 2011. Check out the podcast.

Pastoral Staff with their wives and family.

It was a great week, which included celebrating Thanksgiving. Great-grandma Baumgarten was there and got to spend time with her Fisk great-grandkids.

Jonathan and first son, Fides, enjoyed a moment at the post-ceremony congregational dinner. (no, he wasn't really choking, but trying to get his fist into his mouth, like any normal 6 month old.)

Jonathan and his family had just moved into a house in Naperville a week before installation day and house-guests.

Beaded Christmas Trees

At Eclectics Gallery's Ho Ho Ho Show last Sunday, people commented on my beaded Christmas tree earrings.

While I like these, I think they are a bit too "conventional" so I've been working on some others which I like more, though they take just as long to make...but I like that fact they are not the same and not "perfect" trees.

I really like my Charlie Brown trees best...

Vintage Brooch Re-purposed

This vintage brooch with its unusual color combination of brown, green and pink, was in a stash of a customer's mother's jewelry, entrusted to me to make into something wearable...

 It just didn't fit with the other brooches, which mostly went into one large, "statement" piece...

So this week I took beads from another piece from the same customer - a set of various glass beads knotted onto gold-toned cording - and use the best ones to make the square brooch into a wearable necklace.

Not all the beads here were created equal - some were made of colored glass, others were clear with a color coating, which was coming off. But there were plenty in the brown and green shades needed.

In my own stash, I found a near perfect matching earring - just had to replace one bright green rhinestone with a deep pink and I had a perfect match.

The strung beads on the necklace were augmented with a large Swarovski crystal and a few other vintage beads.

The clasp was custom made from shiny brass wire to fit the scale of the piece. Sure hope Marjorie enjoys wearing her mother's unusual brooch.