Size Matters

I've been getting a lot of "Wow, that's a BIG bead!" and "Whoa, that is HUGE!", and "Holy Moley, Girl, how much glass is in this thing?" and not enough, "Oh, how beautiful!" lately. I think I've been handed a sign, what do you think? I love making them big... though they have been getting bigger and bigger on me, and I realize, not everyone wants a big honkin' paperweight to wear around their neck. So, I've decided to try to work a little smaller. Sometimes. Not as a rule, but as an option.

This morning I was cleaning my new "little" beads, and Luke came up to see what I had going on.. and he was all excited: "Hey Mom! Your bead had babies!!!", And he went and got one of my big beads and brought it back to show me. He said he really liked these sizes, they were more "portable". Isn't that funny? Portable. I love his vocabulary. He also said he didn't love the rounder fat one as much as the thinner squished one. (One is made with a Zoozi press and one with a masher). I have to agree. He has good taste.

Here you can see what I'm talking about, with a quarter even for reference. How clever! Yes, they are still big, but not BIG. What do you think - are they more "portable"?

Photo Friday: Children

This week's Photo Friday is Children and for once I have the perfect shot for it. I love this, cheesy as it is. Done with one of my iphone apps.

For a Good Cause

The Historic Mayflower Park Hotel in Seattle is putting on another one of their great silent auctions and art shows to benefit the Haas Foundation. If you are in the area, you should RSVP - it's a nice night out and lots of great items to bid on.



This year I'm donating three pendant necklaces:

New Glass, New Beads

Last Friday Luke had the day off from school and we decided last minute to take a ride out to the ocean. You know we pass Frantz Glass along the way and had to make a stop there, right? Yes, of course. $300 and a box of new and old colors later, we were back on the road. Driving through the rain and hail and clouds on the way to the beach. Oh wait? You want to know what was in that box? Oh, of course you do! Sorry!

In the box... was some delicious Clio, a silver glass that is supposed to go pink, orange, milky shimmery pretty. I've been wanting to try it for awhile now. And also, some new OX, a green luster glass that I though might have some fun potential - it had just been put out on the floor that day. Some silver pink that I'd never tried, more opal yellow, not enough junky clear (need to order more of that asap), some 14K gold (color, not metal), some more Gaia, new mandrels, and I don't know what else. Oh some of the good Hades, and some Multicolor.

Ok, back to driving to the beach. In the rain and hail. We kept going even though... it didn't look promising. Who doesn't like a stormy beach, anyway? But when we got there! The sun came out and it was amazing. The best beach day ever. This year.





And then, I came home and played with my new glass. So far, I don't like the OX at all, all it's good for is getting a nice metallic luster and maybe storming if you like green storms. It would make nice accent beads... but I don't make them, do I? Not enough magic reactions for my taste, but I'll try again sometime.

But oh, the Clio! I do like the Clio. Here are a few of my beads from yesterday, all available on Etsy now.

Just listed a bunch of Tiger Beads!

All on Etsy this morning:

The Blue Tiger Bead

I'm trying this out in some other colors (though I love the traditional topaz and cream and gold!). So far, this is not quite right, I got a reaction I don't love on the blue - the part that looks a little pink? Not what I wanted. I'll try again though! And I'm going to try purple too!

Another Tiger Bead

Freshly listed on Ebay!

Hear Me Roar

I am so excited. These are the beads... THE BEADS... that have been waiting to come out of me for ever and ever. And they are finally here! My big cat beads, wild cats, beasts of the jungle, the Serengeti, the mountains, and yes, even the back yard. My Tribe of Tiger Beads.

The inspiration:




















For many years, I've been messing around, trying to create "jungle print" type beads. Several years ago, for my birthday, Frank got me a private class with Corina. (My favorite birthday ever, Friday Harbor, kayaking, melting glass with Corina - pure perfection). I remember Corina asked me, what beads did I want to learn how to do - and I answered "animal beads, jungle beads". I'm sure she was thinking, "oh no! not animal beads" but she was great, she pulled out a big encyclopedia and found a picture of a giraffe and another one of a jaguar and we made "animal beads". They were lovely beads, I still have them and will treasure them forever... but they weren't "it".

I tried doing the tiger thing, the jaguar thing, even the zebra thing (I know, that's not a cat!)... but it was never "it", not quite what I was going for, whatever that was. My Rainforest beads hinted at "it". I love those beads... but there was something... else... I was still reaching for.

I finally found "it". Big cats. In glass. Beautiful reactive metallic sparkly shiny glass. My Tribe of Tiger beads. I love them - I hope you do too.

Mermaid

Meet CIM's "Mermaid" - this is my first try at it, and so far... I kinda think it's a lot like Moretti's Petroleum Green. Which I don't love. The frit helps it though, I think.

The Finished Auction Necklace

The School Auction Necklace is done. I'm happy with how it turned out. I hope someone wants to buy it, I'm a little nervous for some reason, maybe it's a good thing I'm not going to the auction!

New Prices on Etsy

I've gone through Etsy today and lowered prices on some of my beads that I want to move along to make room for new things - have a look! Thanks :-)

Lots of New Beads on Etsy

Lots of new beads on Etsy today, and some old ones have been renewed too. Here are some of the newest listings:













Thanks for looking!

School Auction Necklace

Luke's school has an auction every year - you might remember the projects I worked on with the kids the past couple of years - the fabric/paint collages? This year that didn't work out for various reasons I won't go into... but I wish it had, it was fun and the kids loved making them and they were pretty popular with the parents too - oh well! So, anyway.. I decided I'd make a necklace to donate instead. It's getting to be last minute, but I think it's going to be something with this stuff in it. Kind of fun, but I'm not sure where to start now! I think I have a week to figure it out...

The Nautilus Beads

I had F.U.N. yesterday with my new hotter torch! When I brought my bouquet of beads in from the studio this morning (and that is what it looked like, a bunch of big beads on mandrels held up like a bouquet of flowers!), Luke said "Holy Moly, MOM, you made ALL those?". Yes, it's a record I think, 9 beads in about 5 or 6 hours of torching. I got to play and experiment AND make some things I think would sell as well - it was great.

So, my playtime included... trying to make Nautilus Fossils. My inspiration was this:



and this:



And this is what I came up with:

I Like This Girl

Do you watch American Idol? I know, I know, it's a guilty little pleasure, isn't it? I was a total snob about it in the early days, but then Luke wanted to watch it and so we do, and it's fun. We enjoy it. I call it 'good family bonding time' and then I feel less guilty about it.

So, check this out. This girl! Siobhan Magnus from Cape Cod! Not only does she have a great voice, but she is a lampworker too! And look at that torch - now I have torch envy. Ah... I haven't been able to find any photos of what kinds of glass things she makes... but when I do, I'll post a link. I wonder if she will still melt glass once she's a famous singer?

siobahn 24 @ Yahoo! Video

Studio Improvements AKA New Toys

For several months now I've been struggling with the snail pace I'd settled into making my big focals. Most of my beads take about an hour to create. There is at least a rod and a half glass in each one and I would spend a boring half hour melting melting melting just to get the base on the mandrel before I could get to the fun part - the decorating. Then when it was all decorated, another long period of time heating it back up so I could squish it. And then more time to get the chill marks out and shape it up right. It had come down to only 30% designing fun, %70 boring melting in, waiting. I'm not good at waiting. So, I decided it was time - time to either make smaller beads, or get a new bigger torch. You know what I chose, right?

I did my research, asked around... and eventually picked out a fabulous new torch (the GTT Scorpion) and ordered it and a new oxygen concentrator to go along with it. The concentrator came first and I was so excited to try it out with my current torch (a trusty old Nortel Minor Burner). Well, let me just tell you, the EX-15 oxycon has a LOT of air! It's more than I really need, and my plan of hooking it up with my old oxycon was overkill. Eventually I got it figured out and now my flame is Super Hot, Beautiful, and Perfect... and really, it's all I need. For now. So I canceled my Scorpion order and I'm fine with that. It's like I have a new torch - I can melt a rod of glass in 5 minutes now. Exciting!!!

More good news is in the form of a tool that I finally found - I've been looking for this thing for a year, but didn't know what it was called. I got to play with it at Frantz during a workshop with Corina. Turns out Arrow Springs had it and it's called an Osibin Former - this thing is GREAT for shaping up a bead before squishing it in the lentil masher. The Medium one is good for making lentils the size of the TP Masher.



Here are a sampling of the beads I made with my new setup and Osibin Former. More coming soon - I can't wait!