New Video for Beadwork Magazine

Crazy for Copper

This necklace appeared over on the Beadalon Blog last week and I thought I'd go ahead and share it here, too. It's one of my recent faves. I’ve always been partial to silver, but copper has taken hold of me lately and won’t let go. I love the warm tones, especially in combination with crystals.

To create this necklace, I combined copper shaping wire with Crystallized™ - Swarovski Elements and Limabeads.com filigree components in linked units. I used thin gauge wire to attach crystals to the upper and lower edges of the big copper filigree tube in the center of the necklace.

Hello, Spring!

It finally looks like spring is on its way and a pretty mixture of shell pearls arrived in the mail, so I made this necklace to celebrate.

The beads are linked together with eye pins. The only tricky part was figuring out how to do the spacing for the multiple strands. It helped to put the necklace on the bust as shown so I could play with the arrangement. There's a multi-strand connector in the back to join the triple chain strands to the clasp.

Openwork flower and chain provided by Ornamentea; shell pearl mix/Czech glass beads provided by Rings 'n Things.

Dear Diary & Beady Links

Dear Diary,
Over the weekend, I learned how to re-upholster a dining room chair. I would rather make jewelry, but the house needs some attention. I found some pretty paisley fabric in brown, green and blue and my mom showed me how to cover the seats. No way those off-white covers are going to last through another toddler! In the meantime, I'll be planning beading projects in my mind...

A Bead A Day Want to stand out from across a crowded room? These Electric Sparkly Beads ought to do the trick!

About.com Jewelry Making Turn a little hand-dyed ribbon and shell pendant into a trendy jewelry piece you'll wear with almost everything in your closet.

Art Bead Scene Got cabin fever? ABS has some beady suggestions so you can get out of the house.

Barbe Saint John - New Jewelry from Forgotten Artifacts Barbe is avoiding work by showing some pics of recently made creations.

Carmi's Art/Life World A new spring challenge from Artbeads.com means Carmi has a new brooch!

Beading Arts Cyndi is running a contest on Beading Arts, and the prize is an absolutely free advertisement!

Cindy Gimbrone aka The Lampwork Diva Squee! Rings N Things sends shell pearls which Cindy mixes with her single color lampwork beads.

Earthenwood Studio Chronicles Ferris wheels, carnivals, and comedians inspire a new Song Lore Saturday post for Melanie.

Lorelei's Blog: Inside the Studio The answers still hold true in this interview that Lorelei had with herself back in 2008.

Snap out of it, Jean! There's beading to be done! Jean made a necklace for a relative. Of course, it had to be perfect. Therefore she turned to Kazuri Beads!

Making Your Own Chain

I like the look of handmade chain, especially when it's colorful and mixed with findings in traditional metallic colors like gold, silver or copper. For this necklace, I twisted wire together and then used it to make my own jump rings.

Here's a video about making chain with twisted jump rings.

Books of Note: Metalworking 101 for Beaders

Metalworking has been on my list of things to learn for a while now, so I am drooling over the projects in my pal Candie Cooper's new book, Metalworking 101 for Beaders.

The book starts out with a lot of accessible information about tools and techniques for metalworking. There's a section on texturing that made my wheels start turning, and I'm looking at my hammers in a whole different way now.

I think I could even handle starting with one of my favorite projects, the Cut Copper Tubing Necklace that's shown in the lower right corner of the cover. I love bead frames and this project features a clever technique for making your own.