A Finished Necklace and Redo into Bohemian Style

I made this pendant last year but it sat in my pile of unfinished projects for some time.  I pulled it out the other day and finally finished it off.  I love the Bohemian style and this is one of our new pieces that will be for sale in the gift shop at the Shuswap Lake Festival of the Arts in two weeks.

Fireweed Art Studio and New Jewelry Cards

Our jewelry display is now set up and ready for the summer crowd at the Fireweed Art Studio.

This is one of our new jewelry designs in denim blue and olive green.  The beads in this set were made using my mini mokume technique that is included in my Clay Color System tutorial.  I like to call them tie dye beads as they have that appearance.

We also made new cards for our necklace and earring sets.  The earrings are hung on a metallic wire mesh that is attached to the card and there is a plastic tab at the top to hang for display.

Another jewelry making class

I just finished teaching another beginner's jewelry making class at the Sewing Basket in Salmon Arm this morning.   It was a repeat of my last series of classes which were completely filled up and so I was asked to teach it again.

I put together jewelry kits for a different design this time using my tie dye beads in summer type colors.  This necklace is a continuous "chain or rope" style that is about 34" long so there was a lot of wire work  involved.

Here are a couple of the necklaces the students' finished in class: 

The tie dye beads shown above are in the Pantone Spring 2012 colors of Sodalite Blue and Cockatoo.  The beads shown below are in the Pantone Spring 2012 colors of Tangerine Tango, Cabaret and Solar Power.  I show how to make these using my "Mini Mokume" cane in my Clay Color System tutorial.

Another Lizard Collar and Ebbtide Shell in New Colors

We are now busy preparing for our last market for the Christmas season which will be the 16th and 17th at Sun Peaks.  We have our hotel room booked and plan to take a little time out for enjoyment and combine it with an anniversary get-a-way.  This is a fairly large Christmas market and our booth will be in the Nancy Green Cahility Lodge.  We have been working on some new designs to sell there and I have been experimenting with new color combinations.


This is another "Lizard tail collar" I created this time in a cranberry red, green and gold.

This is another design of ours combining our Ebbtide Snail Shell with matching Tie Dye beads in the same color combo.

I really love this color combination as it reminds me of a vintage Christmas style tapestry fabric.

Clash City or Matchy Matchy?

I finally got around to making some new buttons for a navy colored sweater I purchased some time ago.   I used my "Mini Mokume" technique that I share in my Clay Color System tutorial.  Each cane slice fits perfectly to create each individual button.

The color combination I used here was Navy (recipe # 9-7), Olive (recipe # 7-8, GoldenYellow (recipe # 6-2) and the avocado recipe I shared with you in a previous blog post (click here).


We are off to see a wholesale customer so I thought I would whip up some new jewelry pieces to wear in the same color combination.

And here are my matching pieces:  Bracelet, Earrings, Pendant Necklace and Buttons.

Which brings me to a question.  Do you prefer matching sets of jewelry pieces or do you prefer pieces that don't match but sort of go together?  I've always preferred having my clothes and jewelry matching or coordinating as much as possible.  What do you think?

A Birthday Gift Set and Color Recipe

Every year we make some jewelry pieces for Dave's mom's birthday and she always looks forward to it.  This year we decided to make her a matching necklace and earrings from our Tie Dye beads. 

Here is a closer view of the actual beads:

The colors in these beads are not the Pantone Fall 2011 colors but they are a favorite of ours.  The main colors I used to make the beads are Purple Orchid (recipe #10-8), Olive Green (Recipe #7-8 -- same as this fall's Pantone Cedar) and a yellow green mix I call Avocado (10 parts yellow, 1/2 part green, and 1 part gold).   I of course combined it with the beige mix. (recipe #2-8).

The earrings are a clip on style.  We generally makes these as a custom order for anyone who requests them.

Pantone Fall 2011 Color Combo

Here are some beads I created using a mix of the Pantone fall 2011 colors Phlox, Cedar, Bamboo and Orchid Hush.  I made these "Tie Dye" beads using a technique I call my "mini-mokume".  It really isn't a mokume gane at all but sort of starts out that way and then ends up in a nice compact-size cane for slicing.  It is a really super quick method to see how various colors will work together (or not) without wasting a lot of clay or time.  I share this technique and how to make the beads as a bonus feature in my Clay Color System tutorial.

When we strung these beads, we combined them with olive green cat's eyes and some hand crafted rondelles in lemon curry which we had on hand.   Since the Pantone Fall color Bamboo is simply a lighter shade to the lemon curry, they worked very well with this combo.

Whenever I mix up my new blend, I like to save it on index cards with the color recipe numbers and add them to the back of my Color System album so I remember what I did in case I need to mix up some more.

I also like to make up extra color chips of the latest Pantone and a few other favorite colors so I can play around with them to see what color combinations I might like.  I throw them into my purse when I go shopping and like to look for matching colors so I will have something new to wear with my latest jewelry pieces at any upcoming shows.