Tuesday, February 28, 2012

4 Days til Bead Soup Reveal!

 
 
A sneak peek of one of my soup recipes
 
for "Spring"! 


Sorry, I couldn't resist...(wup, I did it again)...
I really should restrain myself, but you know how easy it is to get wrapped up in the excitement!

I'm just wound up from all the tension of anticipating...

THE REVEAL!
Saturday, March 3rd, 
when the camera lens zooms out for the 
Bead Soup Blog Party.

Come Back!
There will be easy photo links here 
for the blogs/reveals of other participants.

Monday, February 20, 2012

Glass Experiments

If you're under age 30, you may not know what this is or the purpose it served. 
Thirty-five years ago, I used several of them for decor in my hip pad...they were groovy, man!

As you can see, they were made in a variety of shapes and colors.

And here is a clue to their purpose... 
Glass Insulators between wires and wood on telephone poles. 

Too bad the industry has switched for using these boring ones now:
(So what's your point?)

A fellow glass bead artist sent me some broken chunks of a blue-green insulator to test drive.  I warmed the chunks in the kiln, melted them in the torch, and pulled them into rods. 

Robin was very generous in that he also sent some rods that he had pulled from chunks.  I used the rods to make these beads:


Interestingly, I got 3 shades of color from the same rod.  And notice how when I added frit to the bead, the color changed the entire bead.

While I was in experimental mode, I decided to finally test the wine bottle I'd been saving:
Such a gorgeous cobalt blue, and the contents were equally delightful!
I held the entire bottle (with label still intact), and heated the mouth to glowing, wrapped the molten glass around a mandrel, which resulted in:
I expected the viscosity of the molten glass to be akin to Borosilicate (COE 33), but instead it was much like that of Bullseye glass (COE 90).

Think I'll test drive a few more ideas at the torch!

Monday, February 6, 2012

Bead Soup Sent

A couple of weeks ago, I posted a teaser of what I sent to my soup partner.  Since she has received it,

I can now bring it into focus for you.  My favorite style of bead to make!

I knew Jean was not a fan of blue, but this isn't really blue, is it? 

 Besides, she said she does like this shade.

 Sterling toggle clasp.

I can't wait to see what she comes up with; she's great at design!

Visit our host's blog, Lori, to see a list of participants & links to their blogs:

Thursday, February 2, 2012

That Short Girl's Blog

The title might lead you to think it's descriptive of me (and it could well be), but my friend Eliza is even shorter, lol!  She is an artist in her own right, from jewelry design to sewing, and some time back, she interviewed me.  It's an honor that today Eliza has featured my story on her blog.   Stop in for a spell at: