Beads of Clay Design Challenge!

Beads of Clay invited 10 wonderful Jewelry Designers into our Team in order to show you how you can use our Ceramic Beads and Pendants in your Jewelry Designs. This is the first of many Design Challenges for them.

Here are The Components:

This is an Eclectic Grouping of Components. They wanted to give the Designers a REAL challenge! Do you think they did? I do! It was a real challenge for me! First we received the black and white photo and didn't know the colors of the beads. Then we received the beads!

And The Folks that Donated Components:

Raku Rectangles - Duane Collins-Elements Pottery
Beads - Marsha Neal Minutella- Marsha Neal Studio
Beads - Golem Studio
Pendant - Shaterra Clay Studio
Vintaj Chain and Bead Caps - Marla James

Here's what I made; the initial challenge was a necklace, but I also used some components to create two bracelets. Between getting ready for Bead Fest Philly, my vacation and my nasty monster migraine that I am still not over yet, while I was happy with the ideas in my head, the execution has left me wanting! I hope to be able to make some changes in the next few weeks to make my ideas better, I'll let you know!

Necklace I made - I opened up the filigree bead caps to make connectors.

The first bracelet - macrame using greek leather as the base, chinese knotting cord, and Marsha Neal's beautiful beads! Plus two little robin's egg spacers of my own!

The second bracelet - this was to be a triple wrap using Duane's amazing raku beads! There were two included. I made this one and decided I also need to do some work to my idea! The components (leather and large clasp) were from Melinda Orr.

Please Hop on down the road to our Designers blogs to view all the finished Pieces that they have created.
And then stop back at Beads of Clay and let us know what you think, cause you never know WHAT we have up our sleeves!

Linda Landig Blog: www.LindasBeadBlog.com
Lesley Watt Blog www.thegossipinggoddess.blogspot.com
Katie Nelson FB https://www.facebook.com/katiebead
Susan Kennedy Blog www.suebeads.blogspot.com
Staci Smith Blog www.stacilouise.blogspot.com

Bead Soup Blog Party!

Welcome to the 3rd Bead Soup Blog Party! What is a Bead Soup Blog Party? Each beader was paired up with another jewelry designer and tasked with sending the following: ~ A focal ~ A special clasp (not just a lobster claw) ~ Some coordinating spacers or beads Using the focal and the clasp was mandatory, but we could use anything from our own stash to round out the rest, and choose to use the coordinating beads or not. You may recall my partner was Margot Potter ; click this link to see the blog post I wrote of what she sent me! Here's what I made! Dangly earrings! Come see what the rest of us made! 1. Lori Anderson, Pretty Things 2. Kitty Durmaj, Perles and Life 3. Michelle Heim, Life In the Bead Lane 4. Lisa Petrillo, Lucid Moon Studio 5. Anitra Gordy, Leelu Creations 6. Paige Maxim, Paige Maxim Designs 7. Marianna Boylan, Pretty Shiny Things 8. Cheryl Roe, BeadRoe 9. Heidi Post, Ex Post Facto 10. Cindy Wimmer, Sweet Bead Studio 11. Terri Gauthier, Blooming Ideas 12. ...

AE Component of the Month - July - Scarabs by Me!

I provided the scarab beads for the Component of the Month Challenge over at Art Elements for July! And as usual, didn't take a photo of my own bead before I started working with it. But here is the one I used - unfortunately, you can't see the lustrous oil slick colors of this black metallic glass because once again we have cloudy days here in Pittsburgh. I made a choker length necklace using spiral stitch and these awesome seed beads that go so well with this black metallic glass! I used hematite swarovski crystals to divide the bead stitching and the scarab focal bead; I actually ordered a pile of pairs of various black swarovski colors and decided that these match the best! I finished off the necklace with the ball socket clasp - it's a nice way to finish a spiral stitch - the size is just right and it's fairly easy to sew into the design. Please check out what our guests and team members made with their scarabs! And thanks to everyone who took par...

This is Big!

Join me and several other artists for a huge early bird sale event from October 26-28! Use coupon code EARLYBIRD15 in my SueBeads etsy store for 15% off your entire order! Plus anyone who orders an "earring pair" will receive as a bonus a pair of brass or copper ear wires made by me on the days of the discount! Please see Melinda Orr's blog - she's the wonderful host of this event - to see everyone who is participating. Above you can see what I will be giving away - beads worth $70!!!! Leave a comment on this post for your chance to win. Leave me another comment if you blog, facebook or tweet about the event for another chance to win (please link to this post - one entry per action)! Also if you purchase something from my store from now until the event, you will receive an entry to win! You have many many chances to win great prizes from some fabulous artists!

Sue Beads

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