Monday, January 29, 2007

Learning to Bead Crochet and Other News

Mandi, over at The Bead Circle Blog, posted about a great new site the other day, Bead Pattern Central. I saw "Pattern" and was all over that in a minute. Its really a great little site. They offer patterns for sale, and most are at what I would consider to be reasonable rates. The website is easy to use, easy to navigate, and doesn't take too long to load. But what I like best is that they offer free tutorials on some basic techniques, and some of the tutorials are actually animated! I spent a little while over the weekend watching the tubular bead crochet animated tutorial. I also want to try out the Russian Spiral, looks like a neat stitch that I don't think I've seen before (well, I may have and they just called it something else).

I decided after watching the tutorial over and over again, that tubular bead crochet doesn't really look that difficult. So I printed out the instructions and gave it a try yesterday afternoon.
The tutorial has you using 45" of beads and an additional 36" of thread. Sounds simple enough. So I spent an hour or two loading beads on the thread I was going to use (I was using a fine crochet thread, think its #10 or something like that, and size 6 seed beads). I still don't quite have 45" worth on there. My hands started to cramp up after about 2 1/2 ft of beads. I'll finish loading beads tonight and try the stitching part. If I manage to make something, I'll take some pictures and post them, hopefully later this week (but then again, you know me, it may be later than that...).

I also finished off my first real project using a Knifty Knitter yesterday. I made a little handbag. I'm going to knit a little flap to use for closure, which I want to attach with a button. Then I plan to attach some beads along the bottom seam to give it some sparkle. And I think I may just do a spiral rope for the handle/strap, further carry the beadwork into the piece. I haven't decided if I want to try to create a liner yet or not, but I probably will, so I can actually use the bag (I carry a lot of little stuff). I used a brown, tan and blue variegated Fun Fur yarn, so the bag is fuzzy and the colors wrap around it in diagonal bands. That part was accidental, it just happened, but its one of those happy whoopsies. I'll take pictures when its all finished.

And the biggest news from the weekend. My husband and I have been fostering a dog for almost 2 years now (it would be two years February 9th or thereabouts). The dog came to RESCUE around the New Year two years ago. His name is Tango and he's a Queensland Heeler mix (we think with some kind of terrier). Well, he was finally adopted, officially, on Saturday, by a wonderful woman. We are so happy he has finally found his forever home. We will miss his funny little face, his goofy antics, and his Wookiee-like grunts and growls, but we know that he chose this adopter himself (he just had to wait until she could open her home up to him, her previous dog passed away some months back and she was finally ready now). And we know she will give him the exercise and mental stimulation that he needs, she'll give him the additional training and discipline a herding dog thrives on, and she'll love him unconditionally. (She even lets him sleep on the bed, he's going to be spoiled :D). We'll be getting a new foster dog tomorrow possibly. Hopefully, this one won't take so long to find his/her forever home, but we'll happily shelter and love him/her until that time comes, just as we did with Tango.

So Tango, we'll miss you dearly, but we know you've found your forever home and that makes us the happiest foster parents ever!

Thanks for reading and happy beading!

2 comments:

KnotGypsy said...

Thank you for the links to the beading patterns, and the animated tutorial. I recently began to branch out to beaded crochet jewelry. I have crocheted for years (without beads), and more recently I have been specializing in micro macrame jewelry. I like your blog. I have a similar idea. Document the creative process, with all it's trials, tribulations, and hopefully successes.

Beaded Desert said...

Thanks for visiting and following along knotgypsy! Love your micro macrame earrings!! Gorgeous! Micro-macrame is on the list of things I want to learn this year. I know some basic macrame knots, but making them look good using something besides hemp will be my challenge.

This blog has been great for me. Let's me air out my head and express myself. Whether or not anyone else reads it doesn't matter, just happy to put my thoughts and ideas out there. And in this case, happy I could help point someone in the direction they wanted to go.