Creating your own bustform challenge @ beadfx!

I'm sharing a post I made on the beadFX blog this morning. What started out as a fairly simple link to a tutorial, turned into a challenge of sorts. I hope you'll come along for the ride - should be lots of fun!

Yesterday's post turned into quite the discussion on facebook. It seems I'm certainly not the only one who has been hoping to find/make a cool bustform for jewelry display! We've started a little challenge, with a few of us vowing to either make or alter an existing form somehow by the end of February. We'd love to have more of you join in, as always the more the merrier! Feel free to reblog this, or share with your friends. The beading/jewelry community is highly creative!

The deadline for submission is February 29th. Send me pics, and a little information about you, and of course your process/artistic vision in creating your bust forms.  I've copied yesterday's post below for ease of sharing!  And I think this time, a prize will be in order. Hmmm, to be determined - but will most likely involve some handmade beads, and a bit of destash!

Prize will be drawn randomly based on the number of participants. We're not going to judge your artwork!

Send your submissions to jennifer@beadfx.com by February 29th. The reveal post will be very early March - depending on how many submissions we have.

You have almost 2 months - time to get busy!


Here is a copy of yesterdays post - Sorry for the duplicate!

For a while now, I've been occasionally hunting kijiji for a cheap dressmakers judy to use for photographing necklaces. I have some necklace display forms, but really wanted something close to lifesize for photography - or at least bigger than your standard display forms. I came across a tutorial online that I wanted to share with you all.  The Polka Dot Closet shows how she altered some inexpensive larger jewelry displays. Maybe we can get Marg to order some of these larger displays - We'll have space once we move!

If you would prefer to go full on out DIY, you can create your own completely from scratch with this tutorial from Linda's Art Quilts.

Here are some decorating ideas no matter which method you choose:

                                                                             Source: itsy-bits-and-pieces.blogspot.com via Rachelle on Pinterest

                                                                               Source: vintiquitiesworkshop.blogspot.com via Teresa on Pinterest

                                                                                         Source: crochet.tumblr.com via Krislyn on Pinterest

While these may not have a subtle enough background to actually make your jewelry stand out, they're too awesome not to share.

                                                                                               Source: stampington.com via ms on Pinterest

                                                                               Source: balzerdesigns.typepad.com via Wendy on Pinterest

Happy New Year!

My New Years resolutions are simply to have none this year. Every year, I make all of these crazy resolutions (lose weight, renovate my studio, make a gazzilion beads per day, etc), only to completely set myself up for failure. My friend Lyndsey mentioned on facebook that rather than set yourself up for complete failure with a resolution, she sets goals. Goals are easily broken down into small attainable steps.

So, with that in mind my first goals of the year are to lose 5 lbs, and work towards managing my time better. I would love to spend more time making beads and jewelry - unfortunately, with my other commitments I find I have nowhere near enough time. I do however spend far too much time on the computer, and a good chunk of it is not hugely productive ;-) This I can most certainly manage!

One of the more productive tasks I've taken care of over the last week, is to separate my jewelry listings from my bead listings on etsy. I've set up a separate shop for my jewelry here. I'm hoping this will make my bead and component etsy site far less cluttered and more cohesive.  There's not that much there yet - but that's another goal for the new year ;-)

Recovering

                                             Christmas Eve, and no, they're not all mine!

...From far too much food. Sigh, I feel like a stuffed sausage ;-) The girls are having an awesome time playing with their gifts, we've been swimming at the Y pretty much every day so far this week - but today, it's just far too cold to even consider heading out of doors. 
This is why - Last night, the first snow of the season fell....Then it froze. It's -8 with a windchill of -17, that lovely snowy scene is now a big pile of solid ice.

I think I may just entrust the kids to hubby's care, and have a little playday in my studio. We'll see, i'm not entirely motivated yet to do much more than drink some coffee. 

Pre Holiday Blowout Sale!

                                                                                      Source: 4.bp.blogspot.com via Chandra on Pinterest

Hey folks, it's time for the super fantastic pre-holiday blowout sale. The shop will close at the end of the sale (Monday, December 12th) for the holidays, and I'll be reopening in January with all new goodies. New Year, New Beads! Save 25% off EVERYTHING including all of the lovelies in the clearance sale. Nothing will be renewed during the sale including the made to order beads. Once it's gone - it's gone!!  Thank you so much for your support over the years. I hope you have a wonderful holiday with your friends and family.

Christmas planning

I started making my shopping list for the seemingly million and one folks we need to give gifts to this year. I know, I make it sound like a terrible thing - but when that list is hitting 30 odd people, it gets more than a little scary financially! :-) Not that those wonderful folks don't deserve gifts - they do!!!

I then of course remembered that I have a good supply of soy wax in the basement from when I was making soap and candles before my health problems got in the way. Candles! Perfect gift for just about everyone. I just ordered some gorgeous glass apothecary jars from a local supplier, so I should have these by next week. I also picked up some of those new wooden wicks, and I think I'll hit the local thrift shops for some pretty teacups like these:

Source: etsy.com via Anne Marie on Pinterest

And looking at these, maybe I should have skipped the apothecary jars and just went with this idea:

Source: designsponge.com via Baylie on Pinterest

A perfect handmade Christmas!

I've become a morning person

Weird...and I'm not entirely sure I like it. The older I get, the harder it seems to be to stay awake at night. Late evening used to be my most creative time - I could do a huge multitude of things between the hours of 11pm and 3am. Now, I can't stay awake much past 11. If I am awake, at best I can get some reading in. Lately, 4:30 am comes along - a cup of coffee later, and I'm raring to go.

This morning I packed up half a large order of these beads. I just loved how they looked all together, and thought I should take at least a couple of shots of them before they go off to their new home.

 

I'm off to torch - a few more beads to go, and then I'm done!  The holiday sale is still active on my etsy site, probably until tomorrow sometime. I still have to edit all of the tags and descriptions to remove the sale notices, and I just won't have time til later tonight.  

Busy weekend ahead

My wonderful hubby has cleared his schedule so that I can spend the entire weekend in the studio. This happens ever so rarely, that I'm just brimming with excitement. Holiday shopping can wait one more week - and with luck, I'll get a few gifts made as well.

The holiday etsy sale continues as I post new items, plus a bunch of goodies that were sadly forgotten about. The kilns are full, and I'm enjoying my 3rd cup of coffee with a break to upload new goodies to etsy and here on the blog. Don't you just love these mornings when at 9am you've already manged to get 3 hours of work in? I feel so blissfully productive. :-)


These and more are in the shop, with heaps more to come!