November Already??!!

Okay, where did July go???!!! I cannot believe its already November! And I haven't even thought about holiday themed jewelry yet. Wow, I'm slipping (well, maybe not, I bought holiday lights beads and snowflake buttons on Sunday...). But in my defense, I've had a busy past couple of weeks. My brother got married earlier this month so I was up to Minnesota for that. Then the animal rescue group I volunteer with had its first three events of the fall season last month so I had a lot of volunteer coordinating to do. On top of that, I made earrings to sell at one of their events (an "adopt-a-thon"), with all proceeds going to the organization. I managed to make, I think, 8 pairs of earrings, and sold 5. More on that in a minute. Then, when I could fit it in on the weekends, I was finishing up a course I'm taking at a local community college. So all in all, I had little free time to blog or to bead much of October. But I'm back and I have lots to talk about.

First, the charity earrings. I kept one pair for myself, and so I could get pictures and so I'd have a model to work from in the future. I made some simple pieces using shrink plastic and beads. Basically they were just circles with dog or cat graphics on them. One pair had a dog in a wash tub getting a bath. They shrank less than round, slightly oval, but were otherwise cute (sold). Another pair had a cat in front of a TV. I called these my "Murry Line" in honor of a cat the group had at one point that love to watch TV. He was adopted some time back, but the earrings didnt' sell. They too didn't shrink up round, and I realized when I was putting them out on the table that one had a little burn mark on the back. I'll just have to try making them again. Another pair were white circles with a stylized cat, and I used pink fiber optic beads that had rhinestones set in them for accent. Very cute, they sold. Another pair were tiny little brown circles that had a bone shape punched out of them. Accented with a little turquoise bead. They didn't sell. Think it was because they WERE so small that no one could really tell what they were. And then the remaining 3 or 4 were all my "rawhide" earrings. Basically I took polymer clay and made miniature rawhide bones (like you'd give to your dog, the ones with the knots at each end), stuck a headpin through them, attached earwires, and viola! They sold like hotcakes. Plan to make more for events in January. When I get a picture, I'll attach it, I'm really pretty proud of the rawhide line.

My idea for organizing myself and narrowing down my month project choices has changed slightly. Of the five projects I wanted to complete in October (spiral rope necklace, woven bag with bead accents, cherry earrings, wire necklace, and the grapevine bracelet from Bead Unique magazine), I completed one. I completed my first spiral rope and loved it. Have plans for more. The woven bag instructions were difficult to understand and I gave up. I worked on the vine bracelet but only completed one of the five leaves (will continue to work on this though). The wire necklace was pushed aside for experiments with wire, since I'm not great with techniques yet and decided I needed more practice on the basics (my wire wrap loops still leave something to be desired, but they work). And the cherry earrings, well, I only touched them to move them out of my way a few times. So for November, I decide to narrow it down to just two projects. If I finish them, I have two "alternate" projects waiting in the wings, but out of sight. That way, I only see the two projects I want to work on and that's all I work on. I won't get distracted. So for November, my goal is to complete an Eni Oken tutorial (wire wrapped pendant) and to make a simple S-loop wire bracelet with charms (from Beading Help Web). If I complete both of those this month, my alternate projects are another wire wrap piece (cage bead) and a chain maille piece (simple weave to start). November is offically a wire month for me. I started last night on an Eni Oken piece, loving it so far. I like the sculptural aspect of it I think.

Continuting to work my Muses of Beading projects. My ideas for Urania include some difficult wire wrapping, hence my need to hone my wire working skills. The deadline for that project has been extended to January 1, 2007, so there's still time to join in!!

That's it for now. Until next time.