Boring beads

Finally, I am getting some time in my studio.  A few weeks ago I did a local show and realized how low my supply of jewelry has become, and I need to make beads before I can make jewelry.  I am mostly missing the "bread and butter" items like small earrings, so I have spent a few days this week making small matching sets of beads.  At least I start out that way.  After a while, I get bored and move on to something more interesting, but the pile of bead sets is growing.  Now I just need some time to turn them into earrings.  Even though I get bored making them, it is still better than almost any other "job" I can think of.

Electroforming finally

I finally got my electroforming equipment set up.  I learned the process from Kate Fowle Meleeney late last year, and I finally had some time to try it out, although I had to clean off a flat space first.  I tried it on a few beads that I didn't particularly like.  They didn't come out quite how I expected, but I think I know what I did wrong.  The Berks Bead Bazaar is this coming weekend, and I had hoped to have some electroformed beads to show, but I ran out of time.   The beads on toothpicks have been painted and are ready for the process.  Just the paint is stunning!  There are also a few of Yvonne Irvins My Elements components to be done yet.
After the paint is dry, the bead is hung in the acid solution between two copper strips and the wires connected for current to flow, and copper is deposited onto the conductive paint.  If the solution is new, the process takes 8 hours or so, and as it gets older, it takes much longer.  Only one bead at a time can be electroformed, so I doubt if I will ever have too many beads.

This is a bead out of the solution, all bright and shiny.  I can leave it this way, or I can patina the copper.  So many possibilities to try!

Thanks for sharing your knowledge, Kate!

Panic time

June 1st!  Well, actually it is June 2, but close enough.  This starts my yearly panic, making beads and jewelry for the Kutztown Folk Festival.  It is a 9 day festival so I need to have lots and lots of beads and jewelry!  My work table is a mess, which means I have been working.   I really do need to finish some of those projects so I can see what I have done, and what I need to work on.

I worked hard in May to cross items off my to-do list so I could concentrate on studio work this month, but fate is playing with me.  Among lots of other things that keep popping up, I have jury duty on June 25.  I will try to get excused from that.  I am all for civic duty, but not 3 days before I set up for my biggest show of the year. 

My pile of beads is growing and the boxes of my jewelry is filling.  While I am torching, I am listening to Water for Elephants and really enjoying it.  Now if I can just keep going until the end of the month!

Jenna's beads

Jenna demonstrated for 4 days at the Kutztown Folk Festival.  She has done this for me for around 6 years, and it is the only time she gets to work on a torch.  These are the beads she made on the last day.  They were still in the kiln at the end of the day when she left.  By the time I was packed, the kiln was cool enough to put in my car, and then this week I took them off the mandrels and mailed them to her.  Jenna has done some sculptural beads before, so this year I loaned her my book about Sharon Peters.  As you can see, she got lots of ideas!  The lizard is on a big hole bead, ring sized.  The lion and pig are amazing, and the ladybugs are probably destined to be earrings.  She certainly has the knack of working with hot glass!  I tell her I want credit when she is famous!

Open torch!

I am lucky enough to have a glass tribe.  Years ago we met mostly in workshops, became friends and started getting together to torch, fuse, cast and any other glass activity we could think of.  A while ago we lost the location we used, and we really missed it.  Recently a friend moved into a house with a large garage, and she set up the garage as a glass studio.  Last weekend, we converged on her garage and spent the weekend working together again, at long last.  We had 6 torches and 3 bead kilns set up, along with space for fusing and casting, and a kiln or two for that too.  It was so much fun spending two days working and talking glass with friends who are as fascinated by it as I am!

Because I am getting ready for a huge show (Kutztown Folk Festival), I spent the time making beads, experimenting  with new colors.  I learned some new combinations that work, and some that don't!  It is all good!