Sue Beads

Cathy Mendola chose Birds of Prey for the theme this month, and it's a pretty awesome theme. You are going to see some amazing work by my team members and the guests who have participated this month! I had plans of doing more than I did, as indicated by the purchases I made for the projects I had in my head. However, I have been doing some work in my house, so whenever time permitted, meaning after work and weekend hours, we were pretty much doing the room renovations. One of them is going to be my study/studio, and I seem to be foiled at every move by trying to get some work tables. So I have only one small project to show you this month.  But first, the purchases!

This first Bali carved owl totem I got from fifirosedesigns on etsy - I wanted to make a mold and make my own cabochon to use in a necklace. However, I really did get around to doing that. So, I purchased the owl heads below.

These owl head cabochons are from ArtisticVariations84 on etsy - they are just fantastic, but …

Time for another Component of the Month - this time Lesley sent us these awesome shell cabs/pendants.  I chose a cabochon, I just can't get enough of them!



The cabochon is somewhat shallow, so I didn't bead bezel it, I glued it down really well and started beading around it. I wanted to invoke the feeling of the ocean, but underneath where there's movement but it's gentle and flowing!

I used colors that were found in the colors of the cabochon, and then added "tentacles" of size 15 seed beads and then size 11 seed beads - kind of an anemone look.

I used some awesome O-beads that I had picked up in Texas last year - they are sparkly and AB/mirror like - perfect for under water!

Right now I'm not sure what it wants to be so I'm going to leave it like this for a while.  I was thinking either necklace or pin - but maybe it wants to be part of some kind of sea piece wall art? Not sure yet.

Please check out what everyone else made, and thanks to Lesley for …

It's time for the January Component of the Month and this time, Lindsay Starr send us leather cabochons!  As usual I did not take a photo of mine before I started working, but this photo is from her post over at Art Elements!

In her post, she explains the elaborate process she went through to make these cabochons.  I chose one that, to me, evoked the sea and jellyfish!  Here's my finished project.

Lindsay had sent along some extra coordinating components, and one of them was this tassle.  While I was originally going to make the jellyfish tentacles with beads, I decided that this tassle was actually a really good choice!

 I stitched the bezel using a really pretty delica bead that picked up the colors of the cabochon, and used the small size 15 beads to pick up the most subtle shade on the cab.

I was going to add some beads to the tassle, but didn't do that yet.  I'm going to ponder it a bit first.  As for now, this is going to make a great ornament!  Check out what ev…