Next week I will teach two sessions of Hand Felted Bangle with Beaded Bead at the Bead & Button Show in Milwaukee. Kits for this project will be available at Meet The Teachers Event on Wednesday June 9th and any time from my studio. The kit contains a Turbo Felting Board (a sharply corrugated surface that hastens the felting process allowing some to complete it in a 3 hour workshop WITH the beaded bead!), fine merino wool roving in choice of 2 color blends: to make the top bangle in the picture (classic gold) or other bangle in greens and purple/raspberry (botanical), beads, needle, thread and recipe to make the beaded bead plus a video lesson.
This is my first experience of making and providing a lesson on video. Now I can offer a would-be felter my handfelted jewelry workshops without their having to leave the house. As an author of technique books, I'd like to think that everyone can learn from books. In reality, I've had a few people tell me they need to SEE it to learn. Well, now I can provide this too. I'm excited. Haven't successfully recorded it to dvd but, wish me luck. I'm trying not to make my usual lament that "It isn't enough to be really good at what you do. You have to know how to do it in French, underwater." This decade-long struggle to embrace technology is starting to grow on me. The joy of reaching more people and sharing more things drives me ever forward. Jay calls me his little geek.

Jill (aka Jilly Beads) is wearing her freshly beaded bud bead earrings. These are sweet little lampworked beads by Lea Zinke that are beaded with size 15 and 11 seed beads using, believe it or not, 5 different stitches. They are fun to make if you like working with tiny beads. Kits are available from my website and Bead Gallery Inc.

Here are some that were made at Bead Gallery Inc when I taught the Beaded Bud Bead Earring workshop there. When store owner, Genevieve Martineau, kitted this project for those who missed my workshop, it led to us collaborating on more kits. This line of kits combine my step by step instructions/recipes with her stash of Swarovski stones, including some rare and precious ones. Her kitting progress stalled while renovating her beautiful store but, she is expected to join me at the Meet the Teachers event at B&B, with completed kits in tow. At $15 or less, we hope beaders will want at least one. Check into my website in a few weeks for newer additions to the line as she gets to finishing them.

Just like those in the kits, these two differently sized rivolis are bezeled using a version of a little known South African stitch. Lovely from every angle, they are shown to their best advantage on the ends of a firepolish bead lariat. The stick pearl slide can be worn on either end, or in the middle. Looks like this project will be one of the classes I'll teach in Germany in March.

While designing this array of bezels for the various shapes and sizes of Swarovski stones, I have been inspired to design projects that flaunt the bezeled stones from every angle. Oh great, just what I need. More inspiration! and too little time! Hmmmmmm. My mantra, time will expand to accomodate my beads...

Sunday's workshop at Bead Gallery, Inc was the Fantasy Flower Lariat in 5 Stitches. This is the one of the series of botanically inspired necklaces, that features pearls that look like cornflakes, as the petals.

Here I captured Stacey snapping of photo of Dionne's, so you get to see both!

Looking at Nancy's, you can see how much material was covered in the 6 hours (with a lunch break squoze in). We began by beading a mandala of circular peyote. Once lavishly beaded with fringe, it became the flower's center and the base of the calyx. We transitioned to beading the Ndebele herringbone calyx, tapering through strategically placed decreases to peyote and then the long stem of netting. Before adding the pearl petals, we beaded sepals along the top to support and lift them.

Rita's is the same composition though using a different color palette. Each beader had the freedom to express color preferences, with the selection of pearls at hand.

This is the store owner, and jewelry instructor Genevieve Martineau. She was able to sit in with us for the day. What a treat. You may recognize her from public t.v. appearances on Pam Healy's Jewelry Junkie show.

You may recall my writing about her collection of vintage, rare and custom Swarovski stones and rivolis, because together we are offering kits that pair my recipes for beautiful, fast and fun polygon bezels with her stones. They are priced around $15 each, so they can be purchased several at a time. Production stalled while she renovated the store but we expect to have a selection of these irresistable kits at Meet the Teachers in Milwaukee at the Bead & Button Show in June. THey can also be purchased from my website and Genevieve's store.