The Process: cleaning beads

So first of all I want to say thank you to all the well wishes from everyone- it helped me bring me out of misery :)

So... after I am done making the beads, they are put in a kiln to anneal, and then when they're cool I have to clean them.




Lots of the beads I make are made on what is called a mandrel. When the metal and glass are hot they'll stick together so the end of the mandrel is covered in bead release (looks a lot like clay slip) before forming the bead.



When you pull the bead off the bead release likes to stick in the middle.

I like to soak the beads a bit to loosen the bead release.








And then I remove the bead release with a tool called a bead reamer or just a really small file from the hardware store.



Or if I have 18 million beads to do






Or I use my dremel tool if I have 18 million beads to do.







All clean :)

Coming Soon...

My Etsy shop! Woot!



So for those of you who are familiar with my blog, I have been having troubles opening my etsy store because of kiln issues which have been totally resolved!

So, I am going to be busy busy over the weekend making beads, and then making jewelry, taking photos, etc during the week... and then on Friday, the 14th of August I will open my etsy store!

Here is the collection of all the bead pics I have posted over the last few months to tide you over
(some will be available in my shop!)

Art Seymour = Bomb Diggity

I know, I know its a freaking long video. But you can play it while you organize all those papers all over your desk, or while you're waiting for your nails to dry, whatever.

Mr. Seymour makes Chevron beads using glass blowing techniques.


image from seymourchevron.com

First he forms a small bubble of glass at the end of a punty




then he puts the glass in a mold that looks like this:

then he dips the glass into another color of glass, into the mold, another color of glass, etc.


The gather at the end of the punty is then stretched into a long rope:








and cut into small pieces.


The ends of the beads are sanded down at an angle to show all the layers.

Seymour adds all other kinds of techniques to make the beads extra bomb-diggity.

Check them out at seymourchevrom.com

Upcycling

Because it sounds so much cooler than "not being wasteful".






So remember this?



of course you do- (assuming that you have a better memory than a goldfish)

and if not, you can scroll down to my last post.

so I took those (ends of glass rods, bead that cracked or just looked down right stupid)

and made it into this:

glass frits


First, I tried to do it the quick and dirty way with

a hammer





latex gloves



placed glass on news print (I know this is blue glass, but I didn't take pis of the green during all this)





and smashed away








This was quite unsuccessful and more glass went flying about than was getting smashed.




So then I made a simple ball mill largely based off of these instructions on instructables ( I love this site)

On a rinsed out maple-syrup container made of heavy-duty plastic, I marked and cut a hole in the bottom.





Then I placed a screw through the hole and tightened it on with a nut





Then I covered the end of the screw with epoxy and stuck it in where the drill-bit goes and added more epoxy.








Waited for it to dry.....



























And put in about 40 nuts (these are substituting the 'balls' in the ball mill)





added my glass and held the trigger till the battery died.

My glass came out nicely crushed




and then I added a little this




and this







and made this :)

Its not easy being green

Beads and such from the glass graveyard (aka f-ups and broken bits)

Tune in tomorrow to see their fate

Blog Pimpin': Part I

I didn't drown trying to fish (although I almost got buried in mud) I've just been busy celebrating my fiance's b-day and working slavishly on my save-the-date. Why oh why did I add so many steps to their construction...

But onto today's busniess: Pimping a blog!


Today we are showcasing Deborah G. with Sweetwater Design. She is the only bead maker I know of who lives farther north than me! However, she is in beautiful BC. I live in oil rig Alberta- so its beautiful if you like looking at hoppers and pipes.


Deborah has been creating little beads of glassy goodness since 2005. She named her business "Sweetwater" in honor of her father who died of cancer in 1995. When Deborah was a teenager her father left a 9-5 job to start a ranch and named it Sweetwater because of an underground stream running through the ranch.

I would check out this post about lampworking,



This post about color,

and this post for the very cute pictures!



And because I know you are just dying to buy her beads right about now, check her out on etsy, artfire, and her website Handmade Glass Beads to catch her auctions and for more information.

A bead tribute to MJ

So I know it's been a while since the passing of Michael Jackson, but you can't rush 'ahrt'. So here I give you several quasi-failed attempts to make a MJ face bead.



I think I have perfected my technique and am going to give it another go. Wish me luck and I'll keep you posted!

Find Your Centre

So living in a not-so-populated place you wouldn't expect to find a thriving art community. But not so in Grande Prairie! This was further made evident to me at the Third Annual Art Board Auction and Show where the Centre for Creative Arts here in town invited artists in the community to make a skateboard deck into art for their Healing Arts Program. My board was there along with over 40 others. Check them out on their website (and even bid on one if you are so moved to!)

image from http://creativecentre.ca/

In other news- I will soon open my etsy shop! I know I planned to earlier than now, but I am not quite ready yet. I am aiming to have it open by Sunday, June 14. Keep your eyes open for a grande opening promotion! In the meantime, here is a pendant that will be for sale in my shop.

It's called Tangled up in Blue, one because it looks like blue string all knotted up, and two because I sang Tangled up in Blue the whole time I was making it- in my totally awesome Bob Dylan impersionation.

Tangled Up In Blue

Early one mornin' the sun was shinin',
I was layin' in bed
Wond'rin' if she'd changed at all
If her hair was still red.
Her folks they said our lives together
Sure was gonna be rough
They never did like Mama's homemade dress
Papa's bankbook wasn't big enough.
And I was standin' on the side of the road
Rain fallin' on my shoes
Heading out for the East Coast
Lord knows I've paid some dues gettin' through,
Tangled up in blue.

She was married when we first met
Soon to be divorced
I helped her out of a jam, I guess,
But I used a little too much force.
We drove that car as far as we could
Abandoned it out West
Split up on a dark sad night
Both agreeing it was best.
She turned around to look at me
As I was walkin' away
I heard her say over my shoulder,
"We'll meet again someday on the avenue,"
Tangled up in blue.

I had a job in the great north woods
Working as a cook for a spell
But I never did like it all that much
And one day the ax just fell.
So I drifted down to New Orleans
Where I happened to be employed
Workin' for a while on a fishin' boat
Right outside of Delacroix.
But all the while I was alone
The past was close behind,
I seen a lot of women
But she never escaped my mind, and I just grew
Tangled up in blue.

She was workin' in a topless place
And I stopped in for a beer,
I just kept lookin' at the side of her face
In the spotlight so clear.
And later on as the crowd thinned out
I's just about to do the same,
She was standing there in back of my chair
Said to me, "Don't I know your name?"
I muttered somethin' underneath my breath,
She studied the lines on my face.
I must admit I felt a little uneasy
When she bent down to tie the laces of my shoe,
Tangled up in blue.

She lit a burner on the stove and offered me a pipe
"I thought you'd never say hello," she said
"You look like the silent type."
Then she opened up a book of poems
And handed it to me
Written by an Italian poet
From the thirteenth century.
And every one of them words rang true
And glowed like burnin' coal
Pourin' off of every page
Like it was written in my soul from me to you,
Tangled up in blue.

I lived with them on Montague Street
In a basement down the stairs,
There was music in the cafes at night
And revolution in the air.
Then he started into dealing with slaves
And something inside of him died.
She had to sell everything she owned
And froze up inside.
And when finally the bottom fell out
I became withdrawn,
The only thing I knew how to do
Was to keep on keepin' on like a bird that flew,
Tangled up in blue.

So now I'm goin' back again,
I got to get to her somehow.
All the people we used to know
They're an illusion to me now.
Some are mathematicians
Some are carpenter's wives.
Don't know how it all got started,
I don't know what they're doin' with their lives.
But me, I'm still on the road
Headin' for another joint
We always did feel the same,
We just saw it from a different point of view,
Tangled up in blue.

The Indigo Girls also did a cover of Tangled up in Blue. Haha- get it? Indigo? Blue?

Blue Raspberry

Ok- so here are a few beads pics that I plan to make a necklace out of.

The color combo is in honor of my love for slushies in the summer.




And a bit closer up...










And a possible clasp...




Now onto making a necklace!

Three things

FIRST ORDER OF BUSINESS:

Miss Jennifer at Uberly Ecstatic is in a crusade to start a new word. I mean if 'Muggle' and 'Grrl' can be added to the dictionary we can certainly think of an equally good, if not better word. I remember when I bought my first dictionary (oh yeah, I'm that cool) in the front section where they had the new words there was "Going Postal". Also- if I haven't become nerdy enough for you, while you're brainstorming check out Charles Hodgson's podcast "Podictionary". He goes through the history of everyday words. Some of them have some pretty crazy origins. So post your creative new words over at Uberly Ecstatic!

SECOND ORDER OF BUSINESS:

I've been tagged!!!

The lovely Krysten and her hubby Dustin at After 'I Do' left me these instructions in my last post (which coincidentaly was related to her picture): Open your FIRST photo folder.Now find the TENTH picture.Post that picture on your blog and then tell us the story of the picture!The tag FIVE friends and have them do the same!

So I kinda cheated because as it turns out there were only nine pictures in this folder so this is actually the ninth pic, not tenth, but what can I say- I'm a rebel.

This picture is just before my first time surfing!
That's me on the end there standing next to my dad, sister, fiance, some random dude, and my little brother, and that's Uncle Brian on the Surfboard (picture taken by my wonderful mother).
We were at the North Shore of Oahu in March and got surf lessons from Uncle Brian (not my Uncle- that's just part of his name), and I have to say that was one of the most awesome experiences ever. The lessons were great- a little expensive- but totally worth it because there was so many pro-surfer instructors around helping that made it really easy. We all stood up on the board a dozen times or so. Uncle Brian is pretty crazy, so that's always fun too :)



THIRD ORDER OF BUSINESS:

Beads!! I know this blog is supposed to be about my beads so I better show some pics eh? Unfortunately a week away from my torch + lack of inspiration= beads that may belong in the bargin bin, but here are some pics:

Ok- now back to torching so I can make some really awesome stuff to post soon!