Time To Put On Your Big Girl Panties!

How often, when there is something you don't want to have to do, does someone tell you to 'put on your big girl panties and get on with it'?  At the start of this week I had a few conversations where it came up and suddenly I had an image in my mind of a beaded pair of panties.  Strange what gives us inspiration, isn't it?

I sat down to come up with a basic design and started beading.  I ended up with these two fun brooches:

They are bead embroidered with a picot edging to represent a frilly/lacy edge.  The leg/waist holes I beaded in a matte, slightly darker colour to make the front stand out more
When I posted them on FB in the beading groups I am a member of they got a great response so I offered to post the template online.  I also had people saying I should do bras, skimpy knickers, boxer shorts etc...  so I did.  They are not beaded yet but I have the templates all done and ready to go.  Here they are:

Hopefully you will be able to download them and print them out (I drew them on an A5 size sheet of paper originally) so you can make your own fun brooch for yourself or as a gift.  If you do, I'd love to see them!  You can post them on my Delicate Sparkles FB page.  

The possibilities are endless.  Have fun! :oD

Finished?

I'm in two minds over this now I've got the stem embellished.  My original plan was to bead the whole glass, then I thought maybe I'd bead part way up but I rather like it just the way it is.  What do you think?

As you can see from this close-up, I attached 5 bezelled 4mm chatons around the top of the stem and joined them together with pearls to give them a bit of stability as they were 'rocking' from side to side when I touched them.  I was unsure about whether I needed to add a row of crystals to the top as I have done underneath the chatons but decided to leave it plain until I've made the decision about the top of the glass.  I might just leave it as it is and add a different row to the very top edge of the stem instead.

So, what do you think?  Am I finished, or not?

Frustration

After yesterday afternoon's beading session, it's a minor miracle that I actually have something to show you today!

I reached the edge of the base and was quite pleased with it.  The beadwork sat nice and flat to the glass and the last row of beads just peeked out over the edge.  Perfect.  Until I tried to peyote off them, down around the rim.  As I was beading I was pulling the thread tight to try and pull the beadwork in around the side of the base to 'capture' it in a sort of bezel.  The sides taper inwards and I hoped that that would be enough to hold the work in place.  No such luck!  As I worked my way around, the bit I'd already done kept peeling off and wrinkling up.  Despite trying to hold it in place with pegs while I worked I finally had to admit defeat and think of something else.

After chatting to some friends I decided to try a kind of netting instead of the peyote and added 3-bead picots all around the edge.  I connected the picots together and pulled the row in tight.  This worked much better but it was still able to slip back off so I repeated the process to take the beads just over onto the underside of the base and finally worked a single row of peyote for stability.  Success! :oD

As you can see I also added some red seed beads to the edge, in two sizes depending on the size of the gap.

I'd like to add more 'jewels' towards the edge but I don't want to overpower it so I'm unsure whether to do that or not.  I will be adding some to the stem though and I'm hoping to get that done this morning.  This afternoon we're off to Anfield so I won't get any done then.

Jewels!

The beads I needed to continue with my goblet arrived yesterday morning so I spent some more time on it, around another 7 hours or so, plus another hour this morning so that I'd got enough done to show you.

I was so impatient to start adding some crystals that I figured out where I needed to place them almost as soon as they arrived.  It took a couple of attempts to finally get them so I was happy with how they sat in the beadwork but once I'd figured it out, I added some golden glass pearls in the same way.  This morning I decided it needed some smaller splashes of colour and settled on red seed beads to provide it.  Adding them was actually more of a challenge as I had to work many rows in from the edge and still try to keep the beadwork flat to the base of the glass.  Here is a pic of how it looks now:

If you look closely at this next pic you can see that there are very few increases in the beadwork.  I've mostly been just adding extra beads per stitch as, not only does this make it easier to stitch, it also makes quite an interesting pattern.

You will also notice that where the pearls and crystals have been added, it has caused 'bends' in the straight lines out from the stem.  At first this really bothered me but now I think it maybe adds interest.  What do you think?  As you can see I'm getting really close to the edge of the base now and this is making me slightly apprehensive as I'm not sure if I'll be able to get the beadwork to sit around the edge tightly enough to hold it in place.  I'm debating whether to try and bead the underside too, or maybe just a small bit around the underside edge.  It will have to be trial and error to decide it for me, I think.  Then it'll be on to beading the bowl of the glass which will provide many  more challenges, I'm sure! :o)

Trying Something New

So, a week or two ago I was looking at some pictures of beautiful beaded creations by Linda L Jones and was inspired by the beaded bottles, in particular.  Days later an idea was forming in the back of my mind and I decided I'd like to have a go at something similar.  I wanted to start small as I've never done this type of beading before and thought a miniature bottle of Mateus Rose wine would be good.  It's a nice shape and there's the added bonus of getting to drink the wine first. ;o)  Unfortunately, it seems that the local supermarkets only stock the full sized bottles now so I had to have a rethink.  We went to Ikea at the weekend and I came home with lots of inspiration in the form of a vase, some little jars and, my favourite find, a small wine glass.

I'm planning to bead the lids of the jars and keep my crystals in them, the vase will be beaded in bright colours to make them stand out against the black glass and the wine glass will hopefully become a jewelled goblet.

Some weeks ago I had a dream about making a beaded dagger.  I haven't done anything about that yet (I'm going to use a letter opener for the blade) but when I saw the wine glass I had a sudden image in my mind of the two together so that's what I'll do.

I started by beading around the stem of the glass.  After a couple of false starts I realised that I was trying to do it the wrong way.  I'd started from the bottom of the stem where it is straighter, thinking that it would be easier to bead around the straight bit.  In fact, I had to start in between the two rounded bits so that they kept the beads trapped in between them and allowed me to just bead without the beads moving up and down the stem.  Five hours later I had managed to get about half the stem covered.

After another two hours spent beading yesterday morning I ran out of the size 15 beads so had to order more.  Hopefully they'll arrive today or tomorrow so I can carry on with it.  This is where it's at atm.

I'm just itching to get on with it so I can start adding some teeny crystals and other embellishment.  I've ordered some dark purple crystals and pearls and I think I might add some red in there too.

I will blog again as soon as there is something else to show you.  For now, I can only wait... :o)

Lots to catch up on!

Hmm, 2 1/2 months since I last posted.  Where does the time go?  I've got quite a bit to show you so this may be a long post. ;o)

Firstly, back in October I made this necklace using a fabulous handpainted wooden button from Fiona Macneil and beautiful lampies from Laney at Izzy Beads.

I created a bezel and bail for it using delicas then added the teeny lampie toadstools to the bottom.  I made a simple spiral rope to go with it and was really pleased with how it turned out.  I've got a few more of Fiona's buttons still to play with so expect some more pics soon.

I made this Halloween bracelet, again using a Laney Mead lampie.  This time a little witch that I'd had for a while.

Her body forms part of the clasp and the fringe represents her cloak.  Another Laney bead, this time simply turned into a pendant for my Sister and suspended from a silver chain.

Inspired by some hair clips that a friend had made, I searched online and found some blanks and came up with these for my Nieces.  They loved them and I can see me making lots more.  Might see if I can come up with some Christmassy designs to put in with their presents.

This bracelet was for a 'Bah Humbug' challenge over on Bead Buddies.  We were only allowed to use black and white.  It's really light and easy to wear.

More wooden buttons, this time as earrings.  They're simply set into a beaded bezel and hung from sterling silver earwires.

 

The last couple of weeks I've had three Secret Santa gifts to make for various forums/groups I'm a member of so can't show those yet.

These started off life as a zipper pull I designed for Kieran (minus the bows) and adapted to become earrings.

I'm not really into the whole skull thing normally but I think these are kinda cute.  Then, I adapted them to become these alternative Christmas ones:

Not sure what I'm gonna make next.  Maybe more skulls, or I might bezel some more of the little buttons, or maybe some more hair clips...



I finally did it!

This afternoon I finally got around to listing the tutorials for my peyote stitch cuffs in my FB shop. :oD  I think you've seen most, if not all, of them on here at some point and probably a few extra too - tutes for the others will follow shortly.  My favourite is this one, even though I haven't worn it yet as I still haven't finished the necklace to go with it: