Progress -- (our most important product?)

The bezels are all complete!

Pay no attention to the black marker lines on the backing -- what really counts are the pencil lines you can barely see on the picture

Never mind, this will all become much clearer soon as I do the background fill

Usually I have used all size 11 beads to do the bezels, but this time the first row (the one stitched to the cloth first) is size 11 beads and the next two rows are size 15 beads. They snug up better, and they cover less of the stone, which is a good thing I think.


On Friday I spent a couple of hours tidying up in the studio.

Usually when I finish a project I just put all the tubes of beads into a plastic tub to be sorted out later. This means that after a while I have to dump out the tub and sort it out and put things back into the places they really belong.

So, after I finished that project, I went through all the pieces I had pulled out for rework when I did the inventory.

This was one of them

While I like the general concept, I'm not wild about the way it hangs from the chain, and I think it needs better fringe.

While I was sorting all the tubes of beads back into their boxes, I puled out the ones I had used for this piece so I can rework it.

Right now the chain is natural stones and glass beads strung on a wire with a toggle clasp. I'm not sure if that is what will remain the chain. When I finish reworking the "bail" and the fringe, I may decide something else will look better. We'll see.

More goodies in the mail box!

This entire issue is full of beading projects that involve flowers.

A couple of weeks ago when I went to my beading club meeting we decided that our theme for the State Fair this year will be "In the Garden"

How interesting is that! I'll be spending some time learning the techniques in the magazine so I can create a piece (or two) for the club competition -- the deadline is July, so I have some time to do this in.

Meantime there are already little "drool" marks on some of the pages (hehe)



The crackle medium has been applied and the top coat put on

I love this look -- like the piece has been in the sun for years

Now I need to decide if I'm also going to rub this one with the antiquing gel which basically makes it look like it's been out in the weather too

Not sure about that yet

One of the accents that will be going with this is a string of heart shaped mardi gras beads that I got at my bead club meeting --- it just seems to go with it


Some of them are now stitched!

I have to say that they look even better than I thought they would

Got to love those knees!!

Hopefully today I'll get the other leg and the body stitched and turned, then it's on to the stuffing and attaching




Finished the chart to knit the back legs of the giraffe from.

I also started on the chart for the body

So far so good!





time to get movin'