New Work!

When you read this post, I will have just gotten back from a week long trip to St. Maarten with my boyfriend, celebrating our 50th birthdays - his was just after Christmas, mine is in May!  Since I won't have time to show you what my new beady inspiration will be from photos of that trip, I thought I'd just show you what I've been working on lately!

 First, I've been working on some round beads, and playing with frit reactions with silver foil! 

 Some sold immediately on FaceBook, which was really nice. Others are now listed in my etsy store.

I'll be working on more of these when I get back from my trip!

I've also been working on perfecting my beads using the bicone bead roller.  I love this shape!

I did some in the same colorways as the round beads, and then some with color wrapped around the middle.

I think my favorites, though, are the last two on this mandrel - the tribal looking ones and the softened bicones on the bottom.  There are many possibilities I'll also be revisiting!

I've also been doing a lot of work on my house, so I've been relaxing doing some bead weaving.  It's a new obsession, I think.  I made this one for me, with one of my favorite beads of all time!

It's hard to see, but these seed beads (Jonquil Rainbow Jet Lined size 11 from Toho) have the most amazing rainbow look and go perfectly with this black metallic heart I made.

I knew I wanted to use the bronze Saki Silver clasp, it goes perfectly with the imprinted swirl design on the heart.  But I had a hard time visualizing how I wanted to connect the heart to the necklace.  I thought about many things, but finally decided on this bronze bail.

I'm really happy with how it came out.

I made this necklace for my mom, with a ceramic flower pendant from White Clover Kiln.  It took me a really long time to decide one, find and finally receive the seed beads, but I'm happy I waited.

I made a spiral rope with size 11s as the base rose, and then the loops are size 15s and size 8s.  The contrast gives the spiral rope some nice texture.

I had the perfect clasp in my stash - a Swarovski box clasp I purchased from A Grain of Sand a very long time ago!

My mom loved her necklace!

Currently, I'm working on finishing this beaded bezel ammonite cab I made - I was in the mood for some color and I'm excited to finish this - maybe while I'm on my trip.

And I'm already planning my next project - deciding which pendant to use to make a spiral rope for myself; I love these colors, and this will most definitely be with my on my trip - if I have enough time in between laying on the beach, drinking fruity drinks and eating, I may just get to it!

When your schedule gets tight, what do you work on?  Have you tried anything new lately?

Susan Kennedy
SueBeads Etsy
SueBeads Web Site
SueBeads Blog

Embracing the Failure...

I just realized this is my last post here at AJE for 2014!  Looking forward to a new year of designing, making, experimentation, and yes, failing!  It seems that 2014 has actually been full of those last 2 for me!  I jumped in and tried some new things...polymer clay, kiln enameling, metal clay are the stand outs in my mind.  I am excited to say, I had lots of success.  All those mediums have learning curves.

There were failures, though...remember these?

Ugh...I haven't tried kiln enameling since, but it is definitely on my list to play with again soon!

Sometimes, failures just happen.  They are a surprise and we have to go back and think of what we could have done to prevent it.  The above enameling debacle was really no surprise, it was just my novice approach after my torch-firing successes.

This one came as a total surprise to me.  I made 2, one came out perfectly, but this one had a big old crack. :(  What did I do differently with it?  Hindsight made me remember there was a tiny scratch as my file slipped while cleaning it up.  Had that weakened the piece?  Possibly.

Some of you remember this from my FB page...

I was so bummed!  I felt really stoked about carving the cross stamp and was so happy with it.  As it dried, something bumped it, or knocked it, and it just snapped.  I almost cried.  I set out to repair it, though and several layers of slip, drying & sanding later I was satisfied that I was going to succeed.

The back side of repaired piece...just one more bit of cleanup!

Fast forward to after firing.  I took it out of the kiln and inspected it.  It looked good, albeit a  bit curved.  No problem, after clean up, I will flatten with my rubber mallet and steel block.   Which I did!

Hmm, yeah.  Well, obviously, all that tender love and repair care had not worked.  I had smoothed the outside over cosmetically, but the fatal flaw was not fixed.  Lesson learned.

Not to be defeated, I am already trying to come up with a mixed-media design to incorporate the pieces...maybe riveted to copper with beaded wire around the break? Maybe a bezel with resin?

A little E-6000 will hold it together long enough for me to trace a backplate and decide what to do next!

So from me, Happy New Year.  I hope 2015 brings lots of joy, happiness and peace....and just enough failure to keep you striving to do better ;)!