Oct 10 2010

Happy Thanksgiving - all Canadians -. I find it's not quite the holiday it is in the States, but Happy Thanksgiving none the less. We'll be doing some yard work in preparation for the coming winter, as well as having a traditional turkey with some of the trimmings. There are just the two of us, but that's no reason to not have a special dinner.
I've been following a couple of blogs, well, alot of blogs, and I have to say that I agree with those instructors out there who tell us one and all, if you are going to write a blog, keep it upbeat. Parden me, but for those people aren't happy where they are, either keep it to yourself, or change your life. We only have so much time on this earth, and we each have to make the best of it.

Sept 28, 2010

Almost the end of September - can you believe it? And it looks like my warm, lovely summer weather is almost gone also. We've actually turned the furnace on today....well, just to get the dampness out of the air.

Along with September almost gone, I've lost that driving desire to make beads. I'm thinking maybe it's because September was such a slow month for sales. Yesterday I hauled out all my lampwork books and perused them hoping for inspiration. The flowers that Leah Fairbanks makes are oh so lovely - and Larry Scott's dot beads - his technique is so exacting...no spark yet.

So, what to do - maybe I need to continue making soap. Two weeks ago, I noticed that we were almost out and ordered my supplies. I've developed a recipe over the years that not only requires coconut oil, palm oil, and olive oil, but I also include castor oil, shea butter, canola oil, sweet almond oil and some good old vegetable oil - and I can't forget the goats milk and a bit of white clay. All of these oils together have resulted in a gentle, conditioning, moisturizing bar that we not only use on our bodies, but Bruce uses for shaving, and I use as a shampoo. So, if you've never tried hand made soap - the next time you feel like treating yourself, it's worth a try.

Sept 15, 2010

Tomorrow I am having a drawing on my facebook site http://www.facebook.com/pages/Jeanniesbeads/125348505100 - it's a $35.00 coupon to be used on either my Etsy or Artfire site. All you have to do is click on the button to "like" the site - good luck. I'll draw the randon winner in the morning - Ontario time. Good luck!

Sept 15, 2010

My kiln is back in working order! The relays that I ordered were here in record time. I changed them out one by one to determine which one is bad, so now I have a working kiln, and a spare relay!

Florida was fun - although I didn't like the fall I took while on a 27 mile bike ride. Luckily I was homeward bound, and only had to ride about 5-7 miles with a bruised hip and skinned knee and elbow.

Sept 5, 2010

.....What to do when my kiln is on the fritz???? Some of my experiments worked having them sit in a fiber blanket - some of them just cracked .....

August 16, 2010

Photography - there's always room for improvement! I thought my first picture was "pretty" good - good enough for listing this set of beads - but as the day wore on and I thought about it, I decided it was a pretty "blah" picture




so decided to re-shoot it - this week, I'm trying something different - taking a picture on a mirror.



Definitely worth the extra time it took, I think.

August 7, 2010

Two days worth of torching, and one small handful of little beauties! Take a look at these? Can you imagine that a couple of these tiny beads have as many as 36 dots! Most have around 18. Of course, this doesn't include the rejected ones - the god awful yellow ones that are just plain gaudy - the ones that came out just a bit too small, and a couple that came out too big. The interesting thing about lampwork is that in alot of cases, you just don't know what the finished bead is going to look like till you see it. Alot of the glass colors look different when they are hot (molten)....like red. Red turns black when it gets hot. Try and make a red bead with black dots - you're working blind.



I am pleased to have a commission to create another necklace like this picture - just tickled! It will probably take one more session at the torch to make sure I have a good selection of beads for this beauty -

August 6, 2010

Are these not Cool! And so easy to make. The instructions by Cindy Gimbone are in the Aug issue of Step by Step Wire Jewelry - if you need them. They don't give the instructions for making the lampwork bead though. I just used somewhere between 3-3 1/2" of 14 g wire, made sure that the glass was melted onto as much of the wire as I could, then wire wrapped it and used my ring mandrel to bend the ring into shape. Such a fun, easy project! I'll "antique" the copper wire ones in Liver of Sulphur.

August 4, 2010

Twas a hot and humid run today. Aila was happy to get watered down with the hose once we got home. It helps her cool off a bit quicker I think.

I've put a couple of my older items on Artfire on Clearance today. It's time to make room for some new items. I've also listed a couple of new items there, as well as on Etsy.

August 2, 2010

The start of my birthday month. I see no reason why I shouldn't celebrate for the whole month - and to start off with, DH has decided to join me in this lampwork adventure. He's been copper coring beads for me - and NO, we did not buy any of the machines out on the market that will make coring easy for you. We have a disk cutter for cuttong bead caps, a couple of hammers for texturing, and a dapping set for forming the bead caps, and for securing the bead cap to the bead. See how well he has formed the core to capture the bead cap! This is not just a slight flare as I have seen some of the machines do - it is a well formed flare that forms itself to the bead cap (or bead) -

With whatever I've done in the past, I tend to be a tool minimalist. And believe me, I was ready to go out and buy a neat coring machine. Thanks to DH, we've not only saved ourselves some money, we are continuing to do what we love without collecting a bunch of "one use tools".

July 31, 2010

Happy end of July people - hopefully August will be a better month. I'll have pictures of beads in commemoration of my brother Dan's life hopefully later this weel.

July 28, 2010

Version of Amy's "Storm" technique. This is my first attempt at actually writing down instructions for some bead I've made, so please bear with me....no pun intended. My husband once ran into 2 grizzle bears on a run in British Columbia, but he is still here today to talk about it - so anyway - on to the instructions.



1. I've made a thick 2-4mm stringer of Amy's Storm Technique as she describes in her tutorial. See her Etsy site at akdlampwork Sometimes I twist the stringer as it is pulled out - I think this sort of helps add to the "storming" of the glass - Just remember to have a sort of thick stringer - as you are going to make a disk from it.



2. Starting with a small base of black, (about two times around the mandrel) I then add a disk shape from the stormed stringer. I try to add at least 2 or 3 rounds to the disk.



3. Then, I add 4 dots of clear to both sides of the disk and melt them in. The clear dots are off-set from each other -It might be interesting to see what the bead would look like if the dots were adjacent to each other. Please forgive the poor pictures. I am not used to making a bead and having to take a picture of it also - and then try to figure out the settings of the camera.





4. Encase the bead with at least 2 rounds of clear. Something I have to keep reminding myself of is that "more clear" is better.

July 21, 2010

So, I had a special request for two sets of my "sparticle" beads, and got a bit carried away, trying to decide what my customer really wanted. Here's the result.

July 18, 2010

Maybe this will be the saga of a quilt I am destined to make. June's Challenge. I've never had 27 - 1/2 yards of fabric, with corresponding background fabric at my disposal to make a quilt, and now I have. The history of my quilt making has been as follows: When Hubby and I were poor, and he was finishing up his degree at Michigan Tech, I could afford to go to Ben Franklin to find some sort of cotton material to make a quilt with. All I could find was this hidious green, orange and yellow callico - and with that, I made my first quilt. My daughter has it now, and won't give it up for the world.....
Twenty years later, we were in Northern Ontario - Timmins, South Porcupine, to be exact, and the only fabric store around (and I mean for at least 60 miles, was FabricLand. Needless to say, when we planned a trip to my brother's in Marquette, it tried to correspond with a sale at JoAnn's, where I would just buy 1/4 yard or 1/2 yard of pieces of fabric that I liked. I'd take them home with me, add them to whatever other fabric I had, and then I'd make some squares, and when I had enough, I'd see if they were enough to make a quilt with. I also enjoyed making alot of miniature quilts....mainly because I could try out a technique, and it wouldn't take up that much material.
Will, because of a newfound friend and cousin of mine, I have been given 27- 1/2 yard cuts of corresponding material, and not only one, but two pices of background fabric to work with, and the instructions are to make a quilt.....Do you know how exhausting it is for me to find a pattern - something I want to work with for a long time!!!! I've looked at my books and magazines for three days, then searched the internet for inspiration - to no avail.
Today, I decided to just start - I've always liked the Carpenter's square pattern, and I've cut it out and am hand piecing it. I don't know where this quilt is going yet - I'm thinking that something will be the center medallion, and I'll work around it -
The picture is the fabric I've been given to work with - any ideas?

July 17, 2010

I'm quilting again! And overwhelmed! I received a present from my cousin - there are 4 of us doing June's Challenge - and here's a picture of the fabric she sent! 27 coordinating fabrics...now to decide on a pattern. That will be hard for me - any suggestions? I thought I might do an applique, but then decided that I wanted this quilt finished before 5 years were up - so now I'm thinking of a medallion in applique, and sewn borders around the medallion.....




And here's a quilt I started to assemble from pieces I've been working on - I like it. I've been going through my scraps and cutting 4 inch squares to make half triangles for the next border.





And finally, we are attempting to copper core some of my beads. Instead of buying a special machine, we've been using a dapping set. It's a learning process -

July 7, 2010

I think my focus this past week has been to see how many different designs I could make from Dots - Still practising the new techniques that Kristina Logan showed us at Bead and Button.

July 6, 2010

With the July holiday over, it's back to "normal" for most of us. The temperature was almost 70 F when we woke early for our morning run! I'm flumixed as to what to do today - pull and make rhubarb crumb, pick peas, wash clothes - torch - I've got a new idea to try. It includes "storming" some stringers as per Amy's tutorial. In the mean time, some bright yellow/orange/red beads I've made from encased stringer. Now on my Etsy site.

July 4 2010

Happy 4th of July, and belated Canada Day! We've had beautiful weather for both holidays. I just got in from watching the fireflies, and listening to either thunder, or fireworks (most likely thunder). I love this weather! No beads to show tonight, but a beautiful set of flowers we received from a new friend.

June 30, 2010

Ah, back from vacation. After spending 3 weeks away from the torch, it's hard to get in the swing of things.
Bead and Button was Great - lots of beautiful beads to see, and supplies to buy - and I had an awsome class with Kristina Logan! Totally awsome.
Then, it was a two week road trip to Oregon and British Columbia to see our son, and some long lost relatives.
I've been working on a special request - and as usual, it's a challenge. A customer wanted one set of beads I made awhile back in a bigger size....Did I remember the exact color combinations I used? No - do I need to be more particular about the size of bead I make? Yes. It's fun - and a challenge. Tomorrow, I'll try again - and my customer can pick.

June 13 2010

Bead and Button was so much fun! The class with Kristina Logan was wonderful. I learned a totally new way of making beads, starting from the basic bead to DOTS - so much to practise when I get home from our vacation.
I was amazed that some of the people I met last year still remembered me - just fun to see familiar faces again. Thanks to all those who took the time to talk to us and offer us their words of wisdom.

May 31, 2010

Summer weather is hear, and I'm lovin it! Of course, making beads can get a bit hot at times, as my "studio" is in the garage. I have a fan that helps. I spent the weekend doing some ruthless gardening. With the rain we've had, the weeds can take over in no time at all.

May 23, 2010

What a beautiful weekend we are having! Yesterday started out with some rain (we made it home from our 9 mile run just before a downpour), but by afternoon, the sun was shining, the yards dried up, and the temperature just right for enjoying the outside. Today was also beautiful!

I'm going on a "little" vacation to see a friend of mine - she's got some fun things planned for us - shopping - antiqueing - socializing - so I've listed a couple things on my Etsy site tonight, as I won't be around for the next two days. Anything sold will be mailed first thing Thursday morning.

Happy Victoria day to all.

May 14, 2010

I had the most exciting time on Wed night. The local sorority invited me to demonstrate my jewelry. I didn't want to take a torch to the Gallery, so made some examples, took some pictures and had an informal talk about making lampwork beads and jewelry. All the ladies seemed interested, interested enough to buy some of my finished earrings, bracelets, and pendants. Thank you ladies for making me feel welcome. Any time you'd like to do it again, please let me know.

A break in the weather today - too nice to stay inside. I've been outside weeding and trimming. With all the rain we've had, everything is just growing wild. Wonder if it's too early to put out tomato plants?

April 30, 2010

Happy Friday! Warmer weather today - looking forward to working in the gardens, and going for my run in shorts!
Well, I finally remembered to bring the ipod out with me and listen to the novel I borrowed from our local library - "Deepest Water" by Kate Wilhelm. It makes the time go so pleasantly - I just sit and listen while letting the glass melt. Not sure I'd want to be tested on what I heard later on, but I enjoy listening to the story none-the-less.
I've finally gotten around to repeating a set of beads that sold very quickly - bright, happy aqua flowers. Enjoy.

April 28, 2010

Ya know, when one spends almost all of one night updating programs so that she can download audiobooks from the library, the least she could do is remember to bring the itouch out to the studio to listen to the book she downloaded! GRRRRR.... some really neat beads came out anyway - they should be listed on Etsy tomorrow. In the meantime, here's a BHB I'm pretty happy with.

I still have clearance beads listed on Artfire = JeannieGalt Just check out the Clearance section.

April 26, 2010 Clearance on Artfire

Check out my Artfire site for clearance priced items on my focals - $5 to $7 each.
JeannieGalt All else is well - looking for some warmer weather tomorrow to try more Sparticles.

April 19 2010 Bothered

I usually don't write about things that bother me, but today is an exception.
1. Aila, our Terveran, and I were out for a nice gentle run this morning, when a runner passed us on the other side of the road. He gave us the FINGER - not once, but three times! I can understand that he might be afraid of dogs, but Aila was under control and on a leash. So - after the first time, when he looked back to check on my progress, which he did repeatedly, I waved - two times.

2. Corrina has been generous enough to give out for FREE, a page showing her groundhog beads, and a short description on how they were all started. Did I mention that she is not charging anything for them? Here's her web site, and here's another web site where someone has graciously laminated the sheet and was selling them for $13 - I can only hope that she doesn't re-stock!

http://www.corinabeads.com/index.php
http://hotbeadbox.com/index.php?main_page=product_info&cPath=3&products_id=257

April 19 2010

Beautiful weather coming our way again - I can use it after the half marathon yesterday in 40 F weather - with wind.

Time to check out a really neat artfire shop - Donna has made some wonderful jewelry for us! http://www.artfire.com/users/glassandwiregems. Also check out http://ajdjss.blogspot.com/ - for other neat shops on Artfire.

Feb 19, 2010

It's just me and Aila (our Belgian Terveran) this weekend, and I've been enjoying spending time at the torch without having to think about anything else - and I'm likin the results - Here's a picture of the best so far Sparticles. I should have more like these with big holes for biagi ets bracelets by Monday!
And on a side note, the sun has been shining for two days - the snow is melting, and it feels like spring is on it's way :)

Feb 16, 2010

Sometimes things just don't turn out the way I plan. Yesterday, I was going after Bold, Bright Black and White tab beads. I was sure that Anise White would give me that result, along with doing it's thing by difusing some of the color and creating that little bit of interest you see in the twisty. I thought it would be especially appealing on a murrini - As you can tell from the first picture, you can hardly see my murrini! Subtle was not what I was after. Back to the drawing board - -- Today I tried plain old white and black - and the results are much better. It's fun to experiment though - sometimes things ture out as you anticipate, sometimes you get a suprise. It's all a learning experience.

OWOH Winner

it's 12:13, and the winner of my key chain is MITZ! I'll be sending you an email shortly for your address.

Thanks to all the people who entered this - it was a fun event - both for me as a participator and a hopeful winner!

Feb 11, 2010

I've just finished "Born to Run" by Christopher McDougall - a very interesting book, if you're into running. The lessons learned about living and running, as the Tarahumara Indians of Mexico live is inspiring. A great story. I probably will not take up running barefoot outside, but will continue to strengthen my feet and ward off my heel pain by barefoot running on our treadmil.

Feb 9 2010

Snow and wind today, so no torching in the "studio" garage! I took pictures instead, and then promptly deleted them all. So here's a set from yesterday.

Feb 1 2010

I decided it was a good idea to play with the color combinations that Michelle suggested, and I think I'm liking the results. I didn't have a deep pink, so used a medium purple instead - and tried encasing my stringers so that the colors wouldn't run into each other so easily. There are some other experiments in the kiln now - hoping to show them tomorrow. Any other favorite color combinations?

Jan 30 2010

Another cold spell has set in - and tomorrow we are supposed to run 9 miles outside - I'll have on my winter running pants as well as some fleece shorts to keep my legs warm.....

I believe I had an AHHAA! day at the torch yesterday. I've been working on disk beads and manipulating the glass, but wondered what the technique would like like on a round bead - I like the end result and will continue on this course for awhile - My next dilemna is color scheme. I will probably get into a rut using black, ivory, turquoise and mustard - any other suggestions?????

Jan 28 2010

It's too cold and windy to try and warm the garage up enough to be comfortable torching, so it's picture taking time. I collect all of my orphan and not so perfect beads and send them to an organization called Beads of Courage. Their mission is To provide innovative, arts-in-medicine supportive care programs for children coping with serious illness, their families and the health care providers who care for them. Their web site is http://www.beadsofcourage.org

Besides sending just beads, I try to make heart beads, which are given to kids who have completed certain hospital procedures. Here's a photo of the hearts I made yesterday.

Another photo is of beads that make me think of warmer weather to come.

One World One Heart

What a wonderful idea - from A Whimsical Bohemian http://awhimsicalbohemian.typepad.com/a_whimsical_bohemian/one-world-one-heart.html
This is a give-away - and all you need to do is post a comment to my blog. If you don't have a blog that your comment relates to, please leave and email address, as if you are the winner, I need some way of getting in touch with you.

My entry is a keychain/pendant. It is multifunctional - lampwork beads by myself, combined with copper wire to create this flob.



Join the Magic Carpet ride, and leave a comment. Remember, you must leave a comment to be eligible to win, I must have a way to link back to you or leave an email address so you can be contacted if you should win. This event is open till Feb 15. I will be taking entries till 12 noon, eastern standard time, and will email the winner by 7pm that night. Good luck, and enjoy. While you're here, have a look around.