Can you resist The Green River?

I've got a new organic choker for My Etsy Shop tomorrow morning in shades of green, ivory, gray and purple!

No, this bead isn't named after the infamous crimes in Washington State, but for the bright green band that flows diagonally across the front side of the bead as you can see in this picture.

The back of the bead has a much more mixed color palette with more of the purples visible than on this side, but you'll have to check out my new listing tomorrow to see all of the pictures of this bead.

The black caps on the end really add an elegant flair to the bead and set off the colors in the body of the bead.

As with all of my chokers, this one is strung on a steel cable with a very secure magnetic clasp for ease of putting the choker on and taking it off.

Be sure to stop by My Shop tomorrow and see all of the pictures of this unique piece of jewelry.

Have a great night!

Attention All Bears!

Hey Bears, I've got a new listing coming to my Etsy Shop tomorrow that you might just be interested in. I'm entitling the series "Bear Wear" and have a number of fun ideas.

The choker, strung on nylon coated steel cable with a magnet clasp, is called "Ivory Bear Paw".

This is the first of several new pieces with a Bear Theme coming to my shop. A dark black paw print is on the front of the bead in this choker, but there's a surprise on the back of the bead that you won't see until tomorrow.

Silver and ivory glass create a marble -like background for the dark black bear paw and the design on the back of the bead.

The lines visible in the black paw print are actually reflections in the glass of me taking the picture. The paw is solid black like onyx.

To see the entire design (along with the surprise), be sure to check out my new listing tomorrow in My Shop.

Have a great night!

Let's meet under the Rain Tree!

Tonight has been very busy and very productive. I've completed a picture reorganization on my computer, pushed the new pictures up to the website AND I've got a new item for Etsy tomorrow.

Website Updates

After a few weeks of being gun-shy about updating my web site with new pictures since the MobileMe upgrade that gave me so many problems in July, I've updated my web site with LOTS of new pictures--many of items that have never been in Etsy or shown here!

Be sure to check out the new stuff on the site. Click HERE for the blog post about the new items!

Rain Tree Choker

Do you remember the Rain Tree commercials from the late 70's/early 80's? Apparently, I do since the tree on this bead reminded me of it so much that I named it, you guessed it, "Rain Tree".

The product was for a facial moisturizing creme, if I remember correctly. However, I think this choker will be much more memorable than that old commercial, don't you?

I've been playing a lot with the mottling of ivory glass to look like natural stone this week, and I really like how all of the choker focals have this really interesting and warm background.

My first successful tree bead, which I kept for myself, has this type of warm ivory background (without the marbling design) and I never wear it without someone--guys and girls--stoping me to ask about it or comment on it. So, I guess it was time to make a few more in a similar design, and that is how the trees this week came about.

The branches and trunk of the tree have lots deep, warm colors which adds more variation to the piece.

I'll be adding this choker to my Etsy Shop in the morning, so please be sure to stop by when you get a chance.

Have a great night and take care!

We Didn't Start The Fire

But you can certainly wear it!

I've got a new choker coming to my Etsy Shop later today, and it features the "Standing Against The Fire" tree focal that I created before going up to Door County.

The focal of this wonderful piece of jewelry is a lone tree growing on a patch of sandy ground a fire rages in the background, thanks to the bright organic design of the base bead.

In spite of this adversity, the tree just keeps on growing.

The choker is a high-quality steel cable with a very secure magnetic clasp that is quite easy to close and re-open as necessary. The cable is coated in transparent nylon which makes it quite comfortable, and since the cable is small, the choker is very light to wear.

I'll be posting this piece into My Shop later this afternoon with many more pictures. Won't you come take a look?

Have a great day!

Standing Against The Fire

That's the name of this new tree focal bead I created this weekend.

A lone tree grows on a patch of ground while a roiling fire rages in the distance, and the tree does what it can only do--stand there and live life to its fullest. No matter how much time it has, it will enjoy every minute of it.

I can only hope to be as brave and resolute as this tree in my life, and I think we can all use this focal as an object lesson for life from time to time.

The back of this bead shows the rich colors and swirling "flames" of the background, and I suppose the bead could be worn with either side facing forward, depending upon your mood.

This is one of the beads that will be going with me to Door County in our search for a gift shop outlet.

Have a great night and don't forget to stop by my Etsy Shop if you have a chance!

New Tools Arrived--Bead & Button Weekend!

My new tools arrived today from Scott over at BearFootArt after several weeks of waiting for them to be made. I can't wait to try them out, but it just so happens that this is Bead & Button weekend!

I saw them demoed last year at the Bead & Button Show and I've watched the movies of them in action. There's a number of new techniques that I want to try once I get used the new tools. Keep an eye on my Etsy Shop for some new designs!

Bead & Button Show

I'll be heading up to Milwaukee on Saturday to spend the day looking at all the new toys and glass at the market. If you're in the area, I would really recommend it.

The market is huge and you can see glass beads from artists around the world, new glass vendors for both Boro and soft glass, new tools, suppliers and just about anything else you can imagine in the bead and jewelry market.

Last year I was fortunate to take a class there and spend several days, but that just didn't work out this year. Maybe next year, but I'm not missing the market!

Watch Out For The Breaking Wave

My latest focal bead that I will be adding to Etsy tomorrow is entitled "The Breaking Wave" since the design on the bead at the top looks a lot like a wave on a very deep ocean. Ivory foam of the the wave pours over the side along the surface in a very cool design.

The deep ocean currents are a variety of the deep rich colors in greens and grays, while the upper portion of the bead is dominated with light purples and ivory colors.

This bicone is accented with rich black ends that make the colors really stand out.

Don't forget to stop by My Shop tomorrow and see the new bead. This one will be posted in the mid-morning time.

Sleep Tight!

Time For A Little Creme Soda

While I like rootbeer, there's always been a special place in my heart for Creme Soda--usually A&W Creme soda. No diet stuff. The actual stuff.

So imagine my pleasure when this bead came out of the kiln and my first thought was "It looks just like a frothy creme soda." So that is the name I've given this long barrel bead.

There's a lot depth to this bead and the swirls have been reworked by gravity to give it a wonderful wave effect. The golden shades of light and dark amber, light brown and two shades of ivory really worked out for a classic color combination with lots of possibilities for your designs.

I'll be posting this focal into my Etsy Shop sometime tomorrow, so please check by often. It will probably be a late afternoon, early evening listing.

Hope you have a great night!

A Painted Tear - Coming To Etsy Soon!

No, this tear is not for Hillary Clinton...unless of course she buys it!

This tear is a new organic focal bead that I made on Sunday with a tear-shape that is awash in colors and patterns.

Rich pinks and bright reds collide and the various other glass colors react to create a subdued palette with brilliant punches of color in this cone focal. A cap of black glass sits atop the bead as the colors spiral around the ever-widening base.

There is a lot to see of this bead, and I hop you can stop in and take a look at it in my Etsy Shop tomorrow morning. There'll be plenty of pictures so you can see this bead from all angles.

Have a great night, and thanks for stopping by!

Wear-thering The Storm

As I am writing this, my office is well over 80 degrees and the rest of the house is barely any cooler. Summer has hit today and I am feeling the heat. I cannot wait to go sit in a cool bath and relax a bit before bedtime.

We could sure your a nice cool storm to come through and make everything comfortable again. Perhaps this bead will help. It's called "Triton's Storm", and it is an organic focal in cool shades of turquoise and transparent blues. White foam and storm clouds encircle this bead, while patches of blue ocean do peek through the tempest.

It's a great little focal and will be added to my Etsy Shop in the morning. There are more pictures that will be posted there, and you can see all of the secrets this bead has to offer!

Wouldn't you love to wear this storm around your neck?

Until tomorrow, have a great night!

It's Not Joan's Sister, But...

You might think that they are related by looking at the name, Ruby Rivers.

They're not even related, but this bead is certainly a star with its bright pink highlights against a charcoal gray background that ebbs with lighter shades of blues and ivories.

The pink worked out so nicely with the darker colors in this bead, I'm so glad I gave it a try. Pink, especially transparent pink, can be a tricky color to get to come out in the appropriate shades. Fortunately this bead, which was going to be a black and white only bead initially, all came together as it should.

There is a lot if depth and organic patterns in this bead that will make for a very intersting piece of jewelry.

Come and visit my Etsy Shop in the morning and see the rest of the pictures for yourself.

Have a great night, Everyone!

What's In A Name?

The focal for tomorrow's new listing in my Etsy Shop was almost given a completely different name. Would it have mattered?

Created in a warm color palette, I decided to experiment a bit with form and create a very different kind of bicone bead--at least for me. Using a razor blade tool, I worked in the ridges that you see in this bead once the main shaping had been completed.

The indentations give this bead a wonderful texture as well as a look that I really like. I'll probably do some more unusual shaping once my new tools arrive since I think they will make it a bit easier yet.

I've named this bead Rootbeer Barrel partially due to it's shape with the banding around it and partially due to the rich colors of the bead and the chocolate capped ends. The ivory accents look like rootbeer foam and this one is good enough to eat.

I do hope you will enjoy this one. I'm adding to the my Etsy Shop in the morning.

What was the other name that I almost gave it, you ask? Why, Ribbed For Your Pleasure, of course!

What's Behind The Waterfall?

This stunning bead has a secret, and it's hiding behind the waterfall.

When I took this bead from the kiln, I was surprised to see what appeared to be a cave recessed into the depths of this bead behind a formation that I think looks like a waterfall pattern on the surface of the bead.

While I've made these types of organic beads before, I've never had one with a transparent window into the interior of the bead like this one.

Multiple shades of pastel and transparent green glass give a mossy, forest-like feel to the bead. The ends have been capped in black for a contrast that makes the colors come alive.

This bicone focal is titled "The Secret Cave" and will be available in my in my Etsy Shop in the morning. There will be many more pictures, so I hope you can stop by and take a look!

Thanks for stopping by!

I'm A Featured Blog!

Good evening All.

Today the monthly newsletter for the Creative Glass Guild of Etsy (CGGE) e-mailed their monthly newsletter to all members. In the newsletter, this blog has been selected as the featured blog of the month!

Thank you so much CGGE and welcome new readers! I hope you like what you see, and stop by often!

I try to keep the blog interesting, on topic, for the most part, and fun to check out. I also regulary preview new items coming to shop here before they get listed. Like this one...

Just Cloning Around

Tomorrow morning, I will be adding this VERY BRIGHT organic focal to my Etsy shop. This bead is entitled "Clones Of Jupiter".

As with Navajo Blanket, I've used a few of the new colors in this bead to see how they would turn out in the organic design. New colors used in this bead are both by CIM--Lipstick and Sangre.

I love how well they mixed in with some Electric Yellow and Dark Ivory in this bead. It colors just flow and swirl around this bead like a gaseous atmosphere of a large planet--can you think of which one?

Anyway, I hope you like it and will stop by tomorrow and see all of the pictures!

Remember Multimedia?

Back in December, as some of you may know, I bought a new Mac computer to enable me to speed up photo and web site editing and include some new multi-media features like podcasts, tutorial movies, etc.

Well, so far you've probably been wondering "Where the hell is the multimedia?"

I can now tell you that my first podcast is coming very soon. I'm learning GarageBand, which came with my Mac, and planning out the first episode.

Keep your eyes and ears open...

Anyone Looking For A Navajo Blanket?

Navajo Blanket is the title of this new focal bead that I made yesterday. It's got a rich, organic palette in shades of purple and blue with some ivories and tans thrown into the mix.

Capped with black ends to really accentuate the colors, this large bicone focal is a real winner and should be quite stunning in any creation you can imagine.

This bead has so much detail and depth to it that it really must be seen and inspected in person to really see the colors play with each other.

Why is it named Navajo Blanket, you ask? Well, it's what I thought of when I looked at the bead. The black ends make the bead look like it has been wrapped up in something. The soft color palettes reminded me of an almost southwestern design. Bring the two concepts together and that how I named it.

You can call it whatever you want when it's yours, however. I will be adding this beauty to my Etsy Shop first thing in the morning with many more pictures. I hope you will stop by!

Have a great night.

Welcome To Byzantium!

Today I took two new necklace designs to work to see what they thought of the new chain mail design that I learned at my class a couple weeks back.  I wasn't sure what they would think or how they would react, but I wanted to see if they thought the designs was worth pursuing since they're pretty good at predicting what others will buy.

To say that the necklaces were well received, would be an understatement.  The loved the necklaces! One of my coworkers, who had seen the rings that I made the chain from, said that she had no idea that this was what I was planning on making with the rings.  

This is the first of the two necklaces (the only that is complete at the moment), for your review.  I've entitled this one "Byzantium Twilight" since the chain design is a Byzantine weave.

This chain incorporates copper and aluminum rings in the design with an organic focal bead that I made at Bead and Button last year during class.  A copper toggle completes the chain and makes putting on and taking it off very easy (since I'm such a klutz!).

This necklace is mine, and I cannot wait to see the reaction of others when I wear it.

I'm planning on having several of these types necklaces made up when I go to shows and see what folks think.  The focals can be anything from a large grape or tree bead to a simple organic focal for a more subtle look.

I'm hoping that this particular style will be popular with men as well as women.  

What do you think?  

Are You Ready For Cosmic Drift?

My doctor's appointment this morning went just fine and the blizzard that they've been predicting to hit us tonight has apparently fizzled out, so we do not have to cancel our theater plans for tonight.  

This should be a lot of fun, and I'll be sure to let you know how "Jeeves Intervenes" turns out (not then ending, just how I liked it).

Cosmic Drift Coming To Etsy

A new set of medium Lentils is on its way to my Etsy shop in the morning.  The name of the set, "Cosmic Drift" really sums up the way this organic set of beads looks.

Using Ivory, Pink and Leaky Pen colors in the beads and working the glass with gravity for the unique patterns and swirls, this set is really timeless.  

Rich transparent blues are interspersed with clouds of pale pink and ivory, much like the nebula and nova in the cosmos.   

This set is not endorsed by the scientific community, and any resemblance to actual galactic phenomenon, past, present or future, is purely coincident.  

Great New Stuff Coming--Thanks Starbucks!

Last Sunday's torching session was really fun and I just made whatever I wanted to make, played music I wanted to listen to, and just let the glass lead me in whatever direction.

Grooves like this do not come around every time I sit down to the flame, so I really enjoy them when they come.  I came with some really cool and unusual creations that I'll be unveiling for your viewing pleasure over the next few postings.  

But first, a word from our sponsor:  CAFFEINE!

Inspiration is a very funny thing, but that's not what this is about.   

It's great to be inspired and all that jazz, but unless you have the energy, the song in your heart that just wants to be heard, the vision of the elusive future that you must conjure through your own hard work and perseverance, that iron will that will not let you get up until you have achieved your goal, all this inspiration in the world is not going to help.

That's what Starbucks and their elixirs of life do for me.  Thank you, and be sure to tune in tomorrow night when our sponsor will be ADDICTION.  Now back to our regularly scheduled program.

Tonight's picture is one of those beads from Sunday's torching session.  It's a large organic bicone in one of my favorite color palettes.  These colors never let me down when I work them together in an organic focal, and they certainly worked out nicely this time too.

The rich shades of carmel and brown contrast so nicely with the rich shades of cool, cobalt blue and light ivory highlights.  I first made a bead using these colors during my class with Kim Fields.  I wasn't supposed to use any blue, but I added some in the final step to see what would happen along with some purple.  When the beads came out, she really like it and wanted to know what I'd done to create it.   I thought that was very flattering.

This is the second bead I've made using these techniques and nearly the same colors, and while it's very different from my first, I think you'll really like it too.  

I'm only posting one picture here, but there will three pictures when it gets listed into my Etsy store.

I hope you'll check it out!

It's not Niagara, but watch out for Waterfall!

Good evening everyone!  I hope your weekend has been a great one.

Tomorrow, I've got another new focal bead going up into my Etsy shop.  This one is a captivating organic lentil that appears to have a waterfall on one side of the bead (if you use your imagination).

Organic beads make great ink blot tests, because everyone sees something different in them.  Perhaps the psychiatric community will start to use them for therapy...maybe not.  

There's a wide range of colors in this bead including blue, green, dark ivory, black and just a bit of violet to round out the palette. 

On the waterfall side, the ivory looks almost like the mist at the base of a waterfall, but I'll let you be the judge.  What do you think it looks like?

At any rate, I hope you have a great night and chat with you soon!

Burning's Back In Town!

The Funeral Service Trip

Well, I'm back from the quick trip to Ohio for the funeral.  It was a lovely service, and it was nice to see everyone again, although I wish the circumstances could have been better.  However, I'm glad to be back home since this was not a pleasure trip.  

Traveling weather on Tuesday night to get there was horrible--rain, lots of trucks and very hard to see the lanes due to Indiana not having reliable reflectors on all parts of the their turnpike.  Fortunately, we made it just fine.  

Coming back the roads were dry and we left while we still had some daylight, although it was dark by the time we arrived back home.  We took a slightly longer route to avoid rush-hour traffic going through Chicago and it paid off.The service was lovely, and it was nice to see everyone again although I wish the circumstances could have been better.

New Bicone Focal In Etsy

Now that I'm back, I'll be putting up a new focal bead in my Etsy shop this morning, so I thought I'd post it here first.  This bead is called Forrest Hideaway due to the rich green and brown shades in the bead.  This little treasure can only be found at my store, so please stop by and take a peek.  

Its organic design gives it the feel of a natural agate stone that has been shaped and polished into this bead you see here.  I hope you like it as much as I did making it!

Have a great day, and we'll chat soon again!

My First Day Back - New Listing Tonight

Just a quick post this morning since I need to get to work, but I thought I'd let you know that my first day to work was fairly quiet and uneventful.  There were no huge problems, missed deadlines or other drama that I was dreading, which is always a good thing.

New Etsy Item

Tonight I'll be posting this organic bicone focal into the Etsy shop.  It's called Edge Of Spring since it has the green and salmon colors of spring mixed with the cool whites and tans of winter.  This bead would look great on both men and women and the layers of transparent colors over the pastels, make it quite an interesting bead!

Have a great day,

Lloyd