Opening a Design Door

So, the piece I was struggling with a couple of months ago when my brain was not cooperating is finally finished.  Well...the prototype is, this will need some tweaking but I'm happy with how it turned out overall.

I love lace, love wearing it, love making it....and I've really wanted to capture the beauty of crocheted lace in beads ever since I discovered bead weaving.

So this is my first piece....a bead lace version of my crocheted lace Cufflette.

Here are the two cufflettes together

It was an interesting project one where I realised my brain needed to be in bead mode for the cuff part and crochet mode for the lace part.

I get it now :)

And it opens the door to so many possibilities my muse is jumping up and down screaming in excitement with "what if"s.  Which actually can be quite annoying when you already have a full schedule.

I have started day 1 of seriously packing up the house, a slow start but I plan on getting a lot done before Monday.   I still have to bead because, well....there are beads and there are ideas....and I need an income.

Bead & Button contacted me a bit back asking if I would like to submit a couple of projects and the fixings for one of them have been sitting on my bead board for at least a month and I am hoping to get that one beaded this weekend.  It's a pendant.....it's reversible,  uses filigree, and one of those big rubber disc beads....and that's as much as I can say....it's also as much as I know right now :)

Happy Friday!

Back in Gear

I am finally back in gear and working like a normal me again :)

Not that I'm remotely 'normal' as my family frequently remind me and I'm not sure in a good way ;)

But normal for me is over-achieving workaholic and that can definitely be said that that's how I've started 2012....focused and nose to the grindstone.

I did start 2012 early with my release of the Industrial Chic: Corrugated Filigree Cuff in December but I've continued with the release of the matching necklace and the embellished bangle.  If you want to buy the tutorials just click on the pictures and it'll take you right to where you can buy them :) 

If you want both the Filigree Cuff and Necklace and want to save some $$$ they are available as a package :)

As we really need to get the house ready for sale ASAP I'm cutting my work week down to four days...which means four days of pattern writing or at least one pattern a week though I'll be beading every evening.  The goal is to have sold the house and be in Fresno by the Spring...I'd love to be there for the beginning of March in time for the Rogue Festival....but we'll see.

I have a bunch of things that need patterning, I'm presently working on finishing my Sand Dollar tutorial which has been waiting for it's center to be written and I've had the request (many) to write a tutorial for my Finger Armor so it is on my schedule for next week.

These are some of the ones I've made in the past.

Well....lots of eye candy this morning....hope you enjoy them :)

A Sparkling Brand New Year!

So....it's here, it's finally here. I've been waiting for 2012 for over 30 years ever since learning about the Mayans and their incredible predictions.

I guess how you feel about the prediction says what kind of person you are....optimistic or pessimistic, whether you have any hope left.

I definitely fall into the optimistic group because I feel December 21st, 2012 will bring about a positive change. I'd like to think it would be a great big dose of common sense, compassion and understanding released into the world-wide water system.  My money (hope) is on solar flares taking out all wireless communication....lol!  It would totally mess things up, satellite TV ...gone, cell phones....gone (who you gonna text?), and a myriad of things we have become  so used to using. We'd actually have to speak to each other again....the new neurosis of face to face contact would keep the shrinks busy :)

I doubt it would last too long....maybe a year? But it might give people time to think and reevaluate.  

I'm reading a book right now called "Alice in Darkland" and it's very relevant, I feel. Yes, a take on Alice in Wonderland but with Alice as a gun wielding freedom fighter trying to get the truth out about politicians and the rich getting together to 'thin' the population and bring back slave camps. Yup....the 1% enslaving the 99%....this time by turning people into zombies so it's easy to understand the need for the genocide and make the remaining humans 'pliable'.  Of course if you're rich enough, or connected enough there's a vaccination.

The Queen in this is one of the biologists who helped create the vaccine but took it after she had been bitten by a zombie so is half human/half zombie....which I can't help picturing our English Queen in the role as she shows no emotion and has dead eyes :)  The White Rabbit and Mad Hatter are zombies of course.

I'm about half way through the book and it's the perfect thing to read as we enter the year of Armageddon...lol! Of course, only if your dark side is out of the closet :)

My advice for the year.....have a cable connection, a landline, get out and talk to people face to face and load up your Kindle to capacity now  :)  And I'm only half joking!

Happy Armageddon!

Last One Off the Bead Board

So...if you've been following you know I've been trying to clear a few of 2011's UFOs and last night I finished the last one I planned to complete before the year fades out.

So the second version of the Embellished Corrugated Peyote Bangle is done. This one uses bugles and the new Twin beads....which as luck would have it were released just as I was thinking "gee, I could use a two hole bead for this bangle" . Sometimes things just work out right :)

I managed to get four pages of illustrated tutorial done yesterday, then I was feeling so proud of myself I had a glass of wine with dinner, not thinking it would make sitting at the computor and doing the last two illustrations impossible. But it did so I didn't finish.   I should get it completed and published today though and that's before the end of the year so it's good :)

I had hope to pattern up the bangle too before we turned all 2012 but as I was doing the second version I realised it was going to be a bit more involved than I thought....gee, really Mikki....two designs in one pattern is more work? I bite off more than I can chew at times....the problems of an over-achiever!

Clearing the Bead Board

Making progress on clearing the bead board before the ball drops at the end of the year.   Completed last night my herringbone Deco Medallion bracelet.

As you can see I used two different medallions for this one but I think a bracelet of either one of the medallions would be pretty too.  When I get to writing the pattern I think I'll put all three styles in because it would just be the joinings that would be different.   Of course I'll have to make two more bracelets :)

This was the first time I've used Delica 15/0s for more than just the small beads in a bezel but I felt these designs called for something delicate.

I'll probably try working them up in other beads too...maybe I'll be surprised :)

Anyway...that's one more UFO off the bead board and leave just one to go....not that I don't have a bunch more UFOs but there's only one left of the group I planned to be finished before the end of the year.

I'm hoping to finish the tutorial for the Corrugated Filigree Necklace today...six pages but I think I can do it.  That would leave tomorrow free for one last tutorial....an easy one, the Embellished Corrugated Bangle which is also the last and current piece on my bead board...the second version, embellished with the new Twin beads.

And yes...."My name is Mikki and I'm a workaholic"

The Conveyor Belt on my Conveyor Belt

This week has been a return to my productive little self and my bead board has resembled a conveyor belt as unfinished pieces rolled across it to be completed.

The latest is a piece I think of as "The Conveyor Belt" necklace as it reminds me of the conveyor belts that used to move freshly baked sponge cakes along the factory line to find their boxes at my summer job when I was at college.  Funny where inspiration comes from.

The large Steampunk button seemed the perfect pendant to go with this industrial piece. I love the way the corrugations undulate and I'm sure I'll be playing with more versions of the undulations as designs pop into my head...as they are doing right now :)

The Beadsmith Project......DONE!

 Finally finished the two projects for Beadsmith, I ended up with two necklaces purely because I couldn't find a matching delica for the silver clasp that I was happy with.  After seeing some of the other amazing pieces people made I think mine are a little on the simple side.....maybe I approached the challenge differently?  My thought was to make something that showed the clasp off and was simple enough to make people think "I could do that"....so they'd run out and buy the clasp.  The black piece in particular....because I figured even if you are a stringer you could work something up similar.

And my sprint to the end of this year

I'm now working on what I call a Steampunk piece though it's not like any I've seen.....the idea for it was a cog on a conveyor belt or gear on a bike chain. It's sort of got an Egyptian feel to it...don't ask how THAT happened....lol!

Sometimes I think my muse and I think very differently.   Anyway....I have a couple of inches and a clasp to go on that one....so pictures should be up tomorrow.

Today I'm back at the drawing board...the computerized version, of course.

I completed three pages of the Corrugated Filigree Necklace tutorial yesterday,  I can use ten pages for the two components that are the same as the bracelet tutorial....so I figure I have another ten or twelve to write and illustrate.  Five new components in the necklace.

The goal is to finish the tutorial and write another (simpler) one.

To finish the Steampunk necklace, make the final link for my Deco bracelet, and finish an alternate using Twin beads of my embellished corrugated bangle.

All by the end of the year...I can see me being up at midnight on New Year's Eve....and not to see 2012 in :)

As for  what 2012 holds......

I get my life back

I start sculpting with beads

I paint again

I get on the teaching circuit

Please God!