Art Jewelry Elements June Challenge

This lovely photo is our inspiration for the month of June at Art Jewelry Elements. It was taken by Jennifer Cameron on her recent trip to Florida.

As a kid, my family took a vacation every summer, and my husband and I have continue the tradition with our own family. We love picking up shells, rocks, and driftwood along the shore. Each year when summer approaches, I'm eager to plan our next trip. We travel by car so we can see the sights as we go from state to state, and by the time we are heading home, we are already planning for the next year.



The different colors here work so well together in nature, but not necessarily in a piece of jewelry. I had a difficult time finding just the right beads. Some were too pastel, some were too dark. But after several times of stringing and restringing it finally worked.



I started with an etched, patinated copper 'Athena'link from Melinda Orr. Also included is a Czech nautilus shell, red lava beads, aqua faceted glass beads, a couple pale pink lampwork beads from Jane Perla, a dark brown lampwork spacer from That Bead Girl, a little stone bead, and some little freshwater pearl dangles which helped fill the space between the beads and the etched link. The beads are set off with sterling beads and clasp.


'Pocketful of Sea Shells'

Be sure to visit the Art Jewelry Elements blog on the 18th to see what others have made.

Finally Friday

If you are looking to enter the Art Bead Love Tour giveaway please follow this link. The giveaway ends on June 17th.


Beaded Bright

I really enjoyed this Design Seeds color palette with the warm colors tempered with my favorite color-aqua. So here’s the piece I made. I can’t seem to stop making bracelets! Maybe I need an intervention, but really I love making them.


'Budapest Spice Market'

I named it ‘Budapest Spice Market’. I wish I could say the inspiration came from visiting there, but I’ve only seen blog articles on this beautiful place. The name popped into my head while creating the piece, and so there you have it.

There are a couple lampwork beads from Lyndas Lampwork, and one from Two Sister’s Designs. And I could not help adding that sweet floral polymer clay bead from Too Aquarius, it’s my last one—sniff, sniff. The gorgeous metal clasp and components are from Keirsten Giles, my recent Bead Swap partner. Oh it was difficult to let go of that sweet clasp! Keirsten does magical things with copper! Also included are a couple orange fiber beads from Gritty Bird, and a dark orange and aqua lampwork bead I believe from Quinlan Glass.

Thanks for visiting! Please check out Shannon's blog to see what she created, and to play along.

Andrew Thornton's Spring Challenge

Yes, three posts in two days. Unusual for me, I know. I was starting to think I had bit off more than I could chew by signing up for two challenges and Shannon’s weekly 'Finally Fridays' challenges. On the other hand I need this kind of push to keep me at the bead table.


From Andrew's Blog

Andrew collaborated with Lima Beads and came up with a lovely spring inspired kit for this challenge. I just clicked ‘add to cart’, and soon the kit was traveling to my mail box. The kit includes the sweetest bunny toggle from Green Girls, a tiny pewter bunny charm from Tierra Cast, a darling ceramic bird charm from Earthenwood Studio, a little tagua nut large hole bead, a pair of Lucite leaf charms, a hammered chain, two tubes of seed beads, and a variety of Czech beads.

I like to get some mileage out of kits like this and spread the goodness around to several pieces. The first piece I made was this bracelet made with four of the faceted fire polished Czech beads from the kit, some vintage green beads, wasabi deep cut Czech beads, green Druk glass beads, a dyed howlite tube bead, Vintaj chain and components, and some sweet lampwork spacer beads.


'Lime-A-Rita'

The second piece, another bracelet (which I’ve been making a lot of lately) includes the apple green Czech beads, a large turquoise dyed howlite bead, lampwork beads from Twinstar and Lynda’s Bead Dreams, a polymer bead from Heather Powers, a Bali bead and sterling silver spacers and clasp.


'A Gentle Breeze'

These earrings include the Lucite leaves and a couple of the Czech beads from the kit, plus triangle wood beads and a variety of Vintaj chain.


'Jungle Fever'

The inspiration for this last piece came when I saw a little bird on our porch with a wad of fiber in her beak ready to use it to build her nest. This necklace is made with the sweet ceramic bird, a peach colored ‘sugared’ lampwork bead from Fire & Fibers, Vintaj components, and a silk dangle from a destash over at Objects and Elements. I’m thinking I need something more on the chain, so I might take it apart and redo just the chain part. Also, I don’t have a name for this one. Any ideas?



I didn’t get a chance to use the chain, the bunny charm, tagua nut bead, the tiny green glass beads, the seed beads or the bunny clasp. But I hope to make something with these soon. Thanks for stopping by. Please visit Andrew’s blog for the list of participants.

Finally Friday

If you are coming here to see the reveal for Erin's Challenge of Literature you can find it by clicking on this link.




The Design Seeds inspiration for this week is ‘Urchin Tones’. I was very excited as I had been holding onto a polymer sea urchin connector waiting for just the right time to use it. So I lined up all the beads on my bead mat and they looked amazing. Unfortunately when I started putting the piece together, the polymer connector broke at the hole. I was heartbroken, as this was THE perfect piece for this project. Also, this was the second polymer piece in two weeks that has broken at the hole. Maybe I was too rough on them. But I noticed the urchin was very soft, even though I’ve had it for several months. I don’t know much about polymer clay, but I’m thinking I will stick to only round polymer beads in the future. Here's what it looked like all lined up.



So I switched out the polymer connector with a Vintaj Brass Sand Dollar. I wasn't sure if it would work since I already connected the beads with silver wire. It looks OK as it picks up the browns in the beads beside the Sand Dollar.



Below is the broken connector and the tiny pieces that broke off. I did try and salvage the connector by sanding and gluing those tiny pieces together, but you can see the cracks just a bit. Next I’ll glue the urchin to a piece of metal and see if it can be salvaged. Crossing my fingers…..



This piece includes lampwork beads by Twinstar, a drilled river rock I snatched from the Sisterhood of the Traveling Bead Box, a Vintaj Brass Sand Dollar, sterling clasp, and silver filled wire.





Yes, I do know it's not Friday, but tomorrow is the reveal date for the Andrew's Spring Challenge so I'm doing this one early. Thanks so much for stopping by. Please visit Shannon’s blog tomorrow to see what she made, and to play along next week.