Pinks

 I finished making this necklace about 2 months ago. Maybe 3? It's another 2-needle right angle weave project.

This one is made with 4mm pink glass pearls, 4mm white glass pearls, 4mm Swarovski bicone crystals in the color Padparadscha, and some size 11 silver seed beads. I bought the Padparadscha crystals quite some years ago. I don't have any left to make a matching bracelet or earrings.

So I found someone on Etsy that had them in stock and ordered more. The color has changed dramatically in the years that have gone by since the first purchase. They don't match at all. So that's the end of that.

I had this clasp in the stash too. If I remember correctly, I got it from Fire Mountain Gems. It's a box clasp. You push the pointy thing into the hole in the box. To release it, you squeeze the clasp and the pointy thing slides right out. 

I was going to link to it on Fire Mountain, but I couldn't find it, so here's one from Amazon, which looks different, but works the same. Box Clasp.

This necklace is about 19 inches long. I've worn it a couple times, but I have a problem with it that I need to solve. It won't lay flat. It keeps trying to twist. I'll figure something out.

Live long and prosper. \\//

Glass Pearls

 I've finished another necklace! This one is just strung beads. No weaving. I used some beading wire, Accuflex, so it would last longer.

This is the tutorial video here: Pearl Necklace. Remember you have to have a Facebook account to have access to it.

I used 3 sizes of glass pearl drop beads,  vertically drilled, for the focal point, as well as some tiny sterling silver 2mm beads that I found on Amazon, and some small silver spacer beads from the stash.

The rest was done with the 2mm sterling silver beads, 3mm round glass pearls, and 7mm by 5mm glass pearl teardrops. I am quite surprised at the quality of both. I figured they'd be cheap looking and feeling but they are quite well made. I haven't done much with glass pearls before. I usually get real pearls but I didn't want to spend the money that would require.

I added a 3 inch chain so I can vary the length of the necklace when wearing it.

I used a plain silver lobster clasp. It came with the chain which I did not expect so it was a nice surprise. I attached the clasp with silver crimp beads.

I am super pleased with it.

Last Friday was our 44th wedding anniversary. I planned to wear the necklace when we went out to dinner. I decided to make a matching bracelet too. It has a silver fold over clasp because it's super difficult for me to do a spring clasp on my wrist.

Speaking of our anniversary, my husband got me red roses! they are so beautiful.

I got something new to help with photographing small things, like the jewelry I make. It's a small collection (7) of very nice cardboard backgrounds and a stand to clip them on to, a small backdrop set. Each cardboard has 2 backgrounds. This is front of the page I used for the above necklace.

This is the back so you can see the stand to clip the background to. You'll notice the blue marble background on the back too. It came with the clips and a small roll of tape to help keep the background in place on the table. It's pretty cool and very handy.

One of my Phalaeonopsis orchids is blooming!

It's so pretty. 

It also helps to make winter a little more bearable.

We got a bit of snow a few days ago. It was about an inch. It's already all gone and temps are going up into the 40's next week. Meanwhile my daughter that lives in Rhode Island sent me a picture of the snow she has. It's pretty deep, well over 2 feet for sure. Winter is so weird this year.

Live Long and Prosper \\//

Necklace Finished

 Got it finished. Facebook video tutorial is here:  Necklace

Here's a close up of the focal point. I've used 3mm and 6mm glass pearls, and 6mm purple glass beads. I can't remember where I got the purple ones, or even what they're called. I'm pretty sure they're Czech made. Any 6mm roundish beads will work.

I'm looking forward to wearing it. Haven't gone anywhere this week yet.

Now I'm working on a pearl necklace. Glass pearls of course. Can't afford the real thing.

I worked on it last night. This morning I looked at it and I'm not quite happy with it, so I'm gonna take it apart and do it over.

Still warmer than normal. There was an attempt to snow on us last night, but it was more half snow half rain so not much was around when I got up this morning. Hopefully, it piled up in the mountains.

Live long and prosper. \\//

Su's Project

I have been beading. In fact, I spent the whole of Saturday beading. I have a project I wanted to get done before the fair.

I have a friend named Su. Every once in awhile she will bring me some jewelry she owns and ask me to 'fix it'. The jewelry is not actually broken. She just doesn't like it for one reason or another. So I take it home and turn it into something she'll like. She insists on paying me for doing this for her. But I'd do it for free just cuz the challenge is fun.

About a month or so ago she handed me a pair of earrings, which I'm not going to talk about now cuz they aren't done, and two identical necklaces made with some kind of blue stone. They were very simple. Round beads with small silver seed beads between. She said she didn't like them. Could I make a bracelet out of them for her? I can do whatever I want. No hurry.

I've been letting this project ferment in my brain every since. Hmmm....what will I do? I decided this last week and got to work.

I made this first.

I just shortened one of the necklaces. Voila! Bracelet.

There were a lot of left over beads. So I dug in my stash for some 4mm Swarovski Crystals and glass pearls. I also used some pale blue transparent size 11 seed beads. I made the bracelet on the left.

It's a variation on the X's and O's pattern, also known as the Hugs and Kisses bracelet.

This used to be a free pattern on the internet but that web site is no longer available, so I've linked to a paid version of the pattern. It was published in Bead and Button Magazine some years ago. They have it on their site.

The clasp here is just a simple lobster claw.

Here's a close up. I've made this bracelet several times. Still, I only own two. It's one of those bracelets that a friend admires, so I take it off my wrist and hand it to them. I think to myself "I can make another." I need to make some more.

After finishing the bracelet I still had a whole lot of those blue beads left. I decided to make a matching necklace.

The pendant is just the X'x and O's pattern severely shortened.

Now Su has a set.

She doesn't get it, though, until after the fair.

It was hot today. In the 90's. Later in the afternoon the air got very smokey. Fire season has begun. Smoke is blowing in from areas north and west of us. The heat of today aggravated the nearby fires. This was the view of the sun from my driveway this afternoon.

I guess I'll be spending the rest of the summer indoors. This is when having asthma makes me anxious.

Live long and prosper. \\//

Spring Blooms

Oh goodness! We're 2/3rds of the way through June already. The spring just zipped by! My yard was extra pretty this year. Everything bloomed spectacularly. I took a few pictures, and that's what's being posted today.

First of all, my baby flowering Crabapple out did herself. She likes being in a fenced yard where the moose can't chew her to bits. She was thick with flowers.

It's been awhile since she's bloomed, and the last time she did I could swear the flowers were white. So it was a surprise to find pale pink with dark edges on the petals.

When I bought the tree, it was mislabeled so I thought I was buying a regular dark pink Crabapple, making the color a surprise regardless. I didn't know Crabapples came in any other colors. Suddenly, I'm noticing all the white and pale pink Crabapple trees all over the place. The county is littered with them. They smelled wonderful.

My Honeycrisp Apple tree bloomed too, but it was only about 20 or so flowers toward the center of the tree. They were fairly large and pure white. I didn't take pics. Some of those flowers are now tiny little apples. We are actually going to have apples on that tree! I am SO EXCITED!

The flowering Cherry had a few blooms too. It hasn't recovered completely from the moose abuse, even though it's been 3 years. Poor thing. It's loaded with leaves though, and growing like crazy.

My French Lilac was gorgeous! Loaded with blooms this year. It's growing like crazy too.

There's a young Ponderosa Pine behind it that is sort of crowding it above so I'm going to be pruning some branches to give it more room to grow upward.

If you've never seen these in real life, the flowers are much larger than the standard lilacs, and it smells heavenly. We had a whole week of lilac perfume in the house while it bloomed.

My regular lilac bloomed as well. Last year we got a frost at the wrong time that killed its buds, so it was nice so see them this year. The bush itself needs some work. The snow sliding off the roof has done some damage. (Please ignore the weeds)

It's the more traditional lilac color.

Smells wonderful too.

I have future flowers coming. All my Peonies have big fat buds on them.

We have had wonderful weather since I last wrote. Many perfect sunshine days for sitting out on my deck and knitting. Some rain too, keeping things nice and fire resistant. Temps have ranged mostly in the upper 60's, low 70's, except last week which got up close to 90F. This week it's cooled off and we're getting 5 minute weather days. We had a rainbow yesterday afternoon.

We went camping last weekend at Heyburn which is on the south end of Lake Coeur d'Alene, and it was perfect weather. I enjoyed the whole weekend immensely. Forgot my camera though, which made me very angry with myself because there are lots of wild flowers there of which I wanted to take pictures.

Sweet hubby, Dan, and Sue went on a bike ride while there, so me and Ruth went into Plummer and visited the Warpath Smokeshop and Trading Post.

Plummer is about 5 miles from where we were camping on the Coeur d'Alene Indian tribes reservation.

The shop carries beads. The last time I was there (which we figured out had been 12 years) it did, anyway. Just a small selection of Czech opaque seed beads. Well, things have changed. They built a HUGE addition onto the back and it's chock full of beads.

I've never seen so many beads in just one place! It was awesome! I actually had a huge rush when I stepped in the door and first laid eyes on them. There must be every color of Czech 11 seed beads there. Thousands of hanks hanging in rainbow order on the walls! They had 6, 8, 9, 10, 12, 13, 14, 15, and 20's too in round and charlottes. Tons of Toho seed beads in tubes lined one aisle. They had a wall full of fire polish crystals, and all kinds of things for making Native American regalia (They have stuff for making moccasins!!!). I had the biggest blast looking at everything. I spent money. Way too much. They have Native American themed fabric and I bought some cotton for a blouse. That store was the highlight of the trip for me.

I am still diligently working on Margaret Tudor. I've got all the body pieces done. I finished them last week. HURRAY!

I also knit the two sleeve rose panels already. While camping, I worked on the first side sleeve panel (there are 4). It's not been going so well because I keep goofing it up. It's pretty complicated. I've cast on 4 times for it now. I think I've finally got it figured out. Geez, I sure hope so. I do not want to start it a 5th time.

Well, that's my news for now. I haven't given up on the blog yet. Just been really busy, Here's a picture of Zoey, who is doing lots of running in the back yard and enjoying it.

Live long and Prosper. \\//

Chantal's Green

Well, we're at that time of year when time speeds up to an unreasonable pace and I find myself in panic mode trying to get ready for the holidays. Joy joy. I think there might be less panic, though, because I started earlier than usual with the hand made presents. I got the socks done weeks ago, and I have finished the first beaded gift. Here it is.

The beading technique is Peyote With a Twist. I used the pattern Green by Chantal  Martens which is a free pattern available to the members of the Facebook group Peyote With A Twist - Not Crochet. Obviously, I used different colors since mine isn't green. I used colors I know the recipient of this necklace likes.

The necklace is 19 inches long. It was only 15 inches long when I finished the pattern chart, which is four inches shorter than I wanted, so I started the chart over again and did two inches. Then I added beads on the ends before the clasp to make it a full 19 inches long. I did beaded caps for the ends of the rope, and I'm not happy with them.

I think I could do better, but I've reached my limit on this project. I've put enough hours into it.

It's 18 beads around so I put a cotton cord inside the tube so it can't flatten. It lays nicely when around the neck. All in all, I'm pleased with the results. Pictures don't do it justice.

 On the weekend my daughter who lives in Rhode Island called to tell me she's bought us plane tickets to fly out and stay with her and the son-in-law for Christmas. I think that's pretty exciting. I will have to find someone to take care of the fur kids though. I don't want to kennel Zoey because it's so expensive, and at this time of year almost impossible to find a kennel with an opening. You need to make reservations at least 6 months in advance for Christmas time. And then there's our two cats. Someone will at least need to empty the litter box every so often. I decided to try family members first. My sister-in-law has consented to do it. She'll stay at our house while we're gone. That will be perfect.

We've had cold, but clear weather lately. Sunshine, blue skies, and, at night, stars and temps in the teens F. The ground is solidly frozen.

Birds have started visiting the Parkarosa Bird Buffet again. Just a few. It will get more popular when the snow comes.

Live long and prosper. \\//

Learning A New Beading Technique

Earlier this month I found a group on Facebook called Peyote With a Twist - Not Crochet (Peytwist for short). I was curious, so I joined it and this is how I learned there is a new beading technique. It bears the name of the group. The technique makes peyote stitched tubes that look just like slip stitch bead crochet rope. I love bead crochet rope necklaces. I've made a few, but haven't in several years because the eyes don't want to see the tiny thread I need to crochet with to accomplish the task. So I kind of got excited about this new peyote technique and have set about learning how to do it. It is actually fairly easy once you know how to start it.

The July 2018 issue of Bead and Button featured this technique, which was invented by Gerlinde Lenz. I didn't get that issue. My subscription ran out in June and I decided not to renew it. Anyway, Gerlinda and the other members of the PWAT group were very helpful in directing me to resources that helped me learn it, including this video:

Peyote With a Twist - Not Crochet

So, here is my very first Peytwist rope necklace.

I learned the technique from the above video. I love it. It's fun to do and the finished rope turned out gorgeous. It lays very nicely on a neck.

I used a very simple pattern to start. The beads are size 11 Japanese Miyuki seed beads in a matte light gold and shiny opaque deep purple.

One of the things I learned in the group is how to make beaded end caps to finish the rope. There are instructions in the groups file section for this.

 I love the look. It goes perfect with the rope.

The rope itself is very flexible as peyote stitch goes.

More so than a regular peyote stitched tube, but not quite as flexible as bead crochet rope. I can live with that.

I am so excited about learning Peytwist. I can hardly wait to start my next rope.

Live long and prosper. \\//