Don't you just love the colors of vintage Italian, Czech and German glass beads? How I long for some of those colors to be re-visited by current glass bead manufacturers. For example, the sweet little leafy looking green beads I used as a calyx in Ostara's Emerging Blossoms necklace. I have reserved the last few I have of these precious little beauties for when I teach this in September at the Indiana Bead Society. That workshop will be on Sunday the 26th. On Friday the 24th there are 2 half-day workshops: the hand felted bangle bracelet with beaded bead that was soooo popular again this year at the Bead & Button Show in the morning and the Felted and Beaded Wire and Lampwork Bead Bracelet in the afternoon. On Saturday the 25th we'll hand felt complex cane beads and complete a necklace of them before wrapping up the day's magic. Hope to bead and felt with you there.

As I've mentioned before, the workshop/class proposals for next year's Bead & Button Show are due August 6. I have well over a dozen proposals done plus a couple new ones undergoing final tweaks. One is a hybid of techniques inspired by traditional beaded needle-point like that I've shared with you here in earlier posts showing Janet's work. While at Bella Beads in NH, owner Sue, showed us the beaded needle-point purses that her mother has made several of. The purse is brilliant, beautifully manufactured, with a removable flap so that the beader, like Sue's Mom, can select the one that matches the evening's wardrobe choice. Contact Sue if you NEED one for yourself. Another of the new workshops features vintage Swarovski stones in a beaded lariat that features new bead crochet! (I'll be calling this Lakeside Lariat, as this is where the ultimate design took form.) It is always a mystery which of the submissions will actually make it to the B&B Show class catalog. Rest-assured that I'm teaching them all widely so, if we don't get to share them at B&B we can still share them somewhere, hopefully somewhere convenient for you.

Wednesday we drove from NH to Freeport, Maine. First stop was Beadin' Path. The store is large and bright. The entire back wall boasts their vast inventory of lucite beads. Apparently they offer vintage and have taken the pains to reproduce the shapes and colors of vintage in creating new lines. The music was lively and diverse. When I mentioned to one of the lovely staff that I felt dance coming on, she confessed that she too sometimes breaks quietly into dance, of understated motion she said, but, dance none-the-less. Ya have to love the women on staff here! Pictured are Cindy and Carisa. Carisa made me feel like a celebrity, asking if she could take my picture. Cindy gave me a floral glass bead plus a snakely glass spiral to wear in my hair. Gosh, I have an entire traveler's journal of beads in my hair. Each has a story...the person that gave it to me, the artist that made it or where I was when I acquired it. And there are the beaded beads in there too. There is even an inch of spiral stitch that someone sewed into my hair! It makes my heart sing each time I'm decorated with yet another meaningful bead.

While here we were introduced to two other shoppers. One is Lilla Rogers. She becaem too shy for a photograph. Too bad. Her business card states she is a an artist, agent and mentor, representing artists internationally. Her website is www.lillarogers.com.

We took lunch at the Muddy Rudder. Mine was a perfectly fabulous lobster roll. I should have inquired about the "market price" before ordering. Not that I'd have changed my mind, likely, but, it would have been less alarming when the check came. This architectural feature of the restaurant fascinated me. It made me consider how it would translate into beadwork. Ahhhhhhhh, yet another bit of real world to render in beads. Sometimes it yeilds intriguing results and sometimes it is a lesson in futility.

Today's Workshop at The Bead Gallery was Ostara's Emerging Blossoms Necklace. Annette arrived wearing an amazing strand of graduated matching lampworked beads. Wow. There were 5o of these beauties in this necklace. When I asked her i she made them, she said no. Well, I speculated, and actually had the nerve to ask, if she was having an affair with a beadmaker. She explained that they were a special birthday gift from her sister, lampworker Lisa Blanchard. Special indeed. She lives in Valdez Alaska. How I would LOVE to be invited to teach in Alaska.

Here are a few of the budding blossoms on their bails. Genevieve is making a pair in hot, spicy reds for a chili pepper necklace.

We used a bezeled rivoli as the closure. Tomorrow we will bead our way through up to 18 different styles of bezeled rivolis.
Tonight's homework for me is to bezel 2 new shapes and sizes I have not worked with yet.

I'm in Michigan for 3 days of workshops with the always delightful and hugely creative beaders of the Great Lakes Beadworkers' Guild. Today I taught Ostara's Emerging Blossoms, the necklace that features a pendant composed of a pair of polygon buds joined by a bail of tubular and then flat herringbone plus a bezeled rivoli closure.

Karen, above, brought her stash of eggplant and green beads. Elaine (left) used a green soup of size 11 similar to the kit but, chose purple beads for her buds.I hope that every beader who signed up tomorrow's workshop gets a good night's rest tonight. I'll put them through their paces beading Advanced Elements of Beadwork, a necklace of samplers of 6 beading techniques.

When I turned around to see who had tapped me on the shoulder in the lobby of Beadfest, it was Ellen, wearing her Ostara's Emerging Blossoms necklace, from the workshopI taught at Beads by Blanche.
Once on the show floor, of course, I headed for Melek Karacan's booth to say hello and check out her beads. She has a line of them with holes large enough to wear on a crochet rope (and my locks!).

We missed Jane at the Bead & Button Show but caught up with her here in Beadfest. Wasn't I tickled beyond belief to see my MASTERING BEADWORK in front of her at the register and her working on Supple, Shiny and Shapely bracelet if time allowed. And just to give me goose bumps, she reported selling all but this copy today.

Hey, if you click on her website, be patient for a day or so. Someone attached malicious software to her site. Jane's staff is in the process of reconstructing the entire thing. Sounds daunting but, she is on it, and always cheerful, even so. Robin was working the booth with her and Tom, the newlywed, wasn't here this time.

Jane gave me a couple tubes of those new drop/magatama beads (LMA 250, clear with AB). Let me decribe them as: our standard magatama is to ziti as this new bead is to penne. Ya know, kind of leaning over. Like a splot of glass with the hole off center caught in a stiff wind. Got it?

York beads (my source for masses of Czech seed beads) is exhibiting here for the first time. I picked up a strand of each of several flavors of the daggers with geometric surface designs. When I head into Manhattan to buy bulk, I'll have stock numbers and samples on hand. Ah, such efficiency.

In the York booth I met Bert and Dana Freed, exhibiting their new interchangeable travel cases for beadwork (and other portable projects like knitting, wire, etc). This mother-daughter duo also sell couture beadwork under the name chicken and the egg.
More on this later when I've given it a test drive.

Friday at Beadfest concluded with Meet the Teachers. Phyllis Dintenfass, my bud and roomate for this annual event, presented kits for her projects in a vast array of color combinations. Shoppers had fun finding their special blend to create their Tri-Phyl, Tetra-Phyl or other popular designs.

Yoshie Marubashi came to Kinokuniya Bookstore to say hello during my 4th of July beading workshop/book signing event. Here with us is John Fuller, store manager. Look at the beautiful cuffs these new beaders completed in class.

We scheduled two more workshop/booksigning events, to include a trunk show of my beadwork and felt: $25 registration fee includes instruction, materials and supplies!

October 25, 2-5pm. Registered participants will learn how to sculpt using wool and a felting needle. They can expect to finish a small item such as jewelry, ornament or decorative item.

November 15, 2-5pm. Registered participants will hand felt flowers using wet-feltmaking
technique and an array of fine merino wool. These are both wearable and decorative.

On my way from Grand Central Station to Kinokuniya I stopped at 70 West 40th St for a bite of lunch at Le Pain Quotidien . The comfortable and welcoming ambiance drew me in. The delicious and healthful cuisine offered this seasoned foodie a new treat: farro . Here is it offered as a salad in combination with raw beets and carrots and garnished with nori and sesame seeds. Yum. Did I say how charming and knowledgeable the waiter was? And...I had a macha latte that was so good. This morning I was eager to try my hand at making one at home, and did, and it too was yum!

From my seat at this huge communal table in the center of the dining room I could see the pastry case, blackboard of the day's specials and even catch a glimpse of the barrista at work.

When I returned to the Poughkeepsie train station, the entire station, all the platforms, and several surrounding blocks were teeming with people and cars and kids and dogs and everyone eager to take in the fireworks. Once the display was under way I was able to make it to my car in the parking garage and head through the congested streets towards home.

Mary Tynes came to the studio this week and put the finishing touches to her Ostara's Emerging Blossoms Necklace. She had been in the workshop at Beads By Blanche a couple weeks ago.

While at Blanches, we put the Flat Polygon Bracelet on the schedule for Tuesday evening 6-9 on September 22nd. Here is the one Beatrice made last week in the studio class. When Blanche posts it on her website, I'll offer a link.

After playing catch-up with my blog to reflect some of the recent happenings, it is time to pack for this weekend's workshop at Beads by Blanche . This necklace I call Ostara's Emerging Blossoms is a vehicle for exploring a little used South African beading stitch called Polygon. Imagine the pair of pods in the focal pendant as chili peppers when rendered in greens and reds; or bananas, when rendered longer and thinner in yellow.
As beaders, we are all attracted to certain shapes such as circles, triangles, squares, and yes, pods.

This workshop also introduces the highly textured bezels for rivolis that are as lovely from behind as from the front. That they work up in under an hour is just an added delight! Blanche e mailed that there are still seats available, so give her a call and perhaps I'll see you Saturday morning in Bergenfield, NJ.