The Bead Hoarders Party Revel!!!!

Yippee!  The day has arrived to revel what we created from our partner in the Beader Hoader's Blog Hop.  My wonderful partner, Elizabeth Bunn has already posted her revel so I am behind a little bit.  Elizabeth is a fantastic lamp work artist from Texas and I was over-joyed to receive one of her focal beads and several glass donuts that she had made.

She also gifted me with crystals, stone donuts, seed beads , 8 mm red quartz beads, and an awesome snowman tin (which Mom tried to sneak away from me.)  I just loved everything in the soup!
After much trial and reworking of ideas, this is the necklace and earrings I designed----

The focal bead is so beautiful I thought you needed to see a closeup of it.

While we were waiting for the revel date, I attended the Delmarva Wool and Fiber Show in Ocean City, MD.  I found this wonderful yarn that screamed at me to go with the glass roundels Liz sent.

This is the first time I have used fiber in a pair of earrings. I think I really like how they turned out.

Thank you Liz for the wonderful bead soup.  I still have lots of the soup left so who know what you all will see next.

Now it is time for a confession and an apology.  For the first time since I have been doing the Hops under Lori's direction, I did not follow her wonderful advice.  She told us to get our soup together before we found out who our partner was going to be, which I did.  Then she told us not to check out their website or blog until after we mailed off the soup --which I did not do.  I was so overwhelmed by the beauty that Liz creates that I second guessed the soup I was going to send her and  I pulled together a hoarded soup that was nice but not what I really wanted my partner to have and mailed it off.  I then stewed on the idea that it wasn't what I really wanted to send for a week then sent the original soup to Liz. Once I mailed it off, I felt joyous and happy about everything involving the party.   Next time, I will listen to Lori and follow her wonderful directions.  Lori takes so much time and effort in everything she does and writes for  her events that I was rather foolish not to pay attention.  for that I do apologies to you Lori McDaniel Anderson.  My confession is over and I am going to go visit everyone else's blogs.  Check out Lori's blog for a list of everyone in the party  and I look forward to seeing everyone's comments.  

 DON'T forget to check out the Bead Soup Party Pinterest Board

Hello World

  Time to dust off my blog and get myself back into shape.  I have been such a procrastinator lately that I am beginning to wonder if I am getting either depressed or just plan overwhelmed!  Since I haven't written since 2014, I am going to say that it has been both.  Mom went through a really bad time with her heart, then pneumonia, then a  C-Diff infection all within one year.  I wasn't sure if she was going to get stronger and completely pull out of it or not.  Fortunately, she did and she continues to get stronger each day, but it has taken her about two years to feel a marked improvement.  During this time, my fibromyalgia kick in and I got diagnosed with osteoarthritis mainly in my hands.  Well, up until the last two weeks, I could deal with it all and although it has been frustrating and a pain in the you know what, life has been good.  I know that there are people who are a lot worst than I am and they are dealing with more severe problems that I am so I haven't complained or said much about what is going on.  Two weeks ago, it seemed like everything just exploded on me and the inflammation seemed unbearable.  I went to the rheumatologist who wanted to put me on a different drug.  She was very honest and told me that one of the side effects to the medicine could be the loss of my peripheral vision. Since I already have vision problems that was not a option I wanted to chance, so I told her that we need to find something else to reduce the inflammation.  We are working on that solution.  Any suggestions would be helpful!

Now that I have gotten that off my chest, I am going to close this posting and tomorrow I will start a new page in my blogging and post happier information.  Take care everyone and enjoy your life everyday.

The 8th Bead Soup Blog Hop Revel!!!!!!

The 8th Bead Soup Blog Hop Revel began on Saturday, May 10th.  I have been out of town this week and left my adapter for my camera at home.  Darn, this year I didn't even have to struggle about finishing my pieces the night before or my blog, I just couldn't upload my pictures.  So done with the excuses and on to the Revel!

My partner is the amazing Andrea Beth Trank.  Andrea is one of these extremely busy ladies.  A Professor of Education who has just finished the dreaded finals and college graduation ceremonies (I don't know if the ceremonies are harder on the graduates or the professors), has two wonderful sons (one who is a new driver here comes the grey hair), a designer for ZNet Shows and artist extraordinaire.  Andrea living in Florida and is now in  her busy season with shows and she is working at a friend's gift shop on Sanibel Island.  I still haven't figured out when she does normal stuff like eat and sleep.

Pleased visit her blog spot-- there was a mix-up in Lori's posting about Andrea's address.  It is www.heavenlanecreations.com  This is just a sample of what I sent her:

What she created is fantastic!!! Be sure to check it out.

Now to show off what Andrea sent me.  YUMMY!!

I was so excited I started with the bronzite bead then remembered that I needed to take a picture so the leather strip is something I added.  I was going to make a cuff using the focal but it didn't want to go in that direction.  Instead I have created (I think)  the most elegant bead embroidery necklace in my collection.

 I paired the focal with bronze 11 and 15 seed beads, 3mm bronze pearls, 4mm bronzite  rounds, and bronzite ovals.
The second necklace I made was a complete switch for me.  I don't make metal components but the beads, clasp, and chips she sent just screamed at me to add some copper wire.  So I started bending and twisting, cutting and hammering, and this is what I made.

I added the copper wire, some bumble bees and three lampwork beads I found in a shop about three years ago (yes, I am trying to use some of my hoarder stash! )

I still have lots of beads left so who knows what will show up on my blog page next.

Please take the time to visit all the extraordinary artists in this years Bead Soup Blog Hop.  With 500 artists in the hop the talent is fantastic.  Bead Soup Blog click on the link and it will take you to a posting with everyone listed.