Monday, November 19, 2007

My Mom's Birthday Present

My mom had her birthday earlier this month and the present I made her finally arrived in the mail today. So here it is. I've been playing around with the spiral stitch lately, so of course her present was made with the spiral stitch also. The earrings are made with a single spiral stitch. The earrings I designed myself with gold filled wire as the base. It was made with myuki delica seed beads, fresh water pearls and gold filled spacer beads. I wanted to incorporate the spiral stitch into the earrings so that they would go perfectly with the necklace and that is why I made the hoop shape with the gold wire.
The necklace was made using the the double spiral stitch with varying patterns in the seed beads in each section. Each spiral was either made with white freshwater pearls or dyed copper freshwater pearls. The large focal beads were made from cherry quartz and were spaced out with gold filled beads, copper freshwater pearls and white freshwater pearls. The cherry quartz seemed to bring all of the copper and gold together in the piece. All in all the necklace and earrings turned out perfect. It is my most favorite piece to date.




Wednesday, November 14, 2007

Peridot and Cape Amethyst Spiral Necklace

I recently made a set of jewelry order for a customer of mine using my favorite color combination, purple and green. For some reason I just love those two colors together and apparently I'm not the only one.

Once again I used the spiral stitch on this piece. I really enjoy the spiral stitch, especially using a combination of beads and sizes. This piece was made with a single spiral stitch using delica seed beads and peridot chips. It's so pretty and sparkly.

The beads in between the spiral stitched pieces are sterling silver bali beads and cape amethyst beads. The focal bead on the necklace is set off center and was made by a wonderful lampwork artist, LeAnn Christian, whom I found on etsy. I was wanting a bead that incorporated the green and purple colors of the peridot and amethyst and the lampwork bead worked out great.



Tuesday, November 6, 2007

Colors in Contrast

I just recently put this necklace together. I bought the olivine jade doughnut beads this past summer in Tucson and have been waiting for the inspiration to make something with them. So the other night I pulled them out of my stash of beads and started laying them next to other beads that I had out and I came up with the smokey purple pearls and decided that was the match. The necklace itself is bold and refreshing, which is just what I like when the winter months start to creep up.



This necklace may be purchased at my etsy store at http://3sistersbeads.etsy.com/

Friday, November 2, 2007

Angie's Birthday Present

My younger sister Angie recently had a birthday this week and this is what I made for her. It is a beautiful three strand bracelet made with labradorite, kyanite, denim lapis, freshwater potato pearls, bali silver, and lampwork beads. The three center lamp work beads were made by Lou who has an etsy shop called abbey 753 , she also has a blog. Aren't they just gorgeous! The other lamp work beads I had bought a few years back at the gem and bead show in Tucson, I didn't even realize that they went well together until the other day when I was taking stock of all of the beads I have been collecting. It is just a really cool chunky bracelet and the clasp is pretty cool too. It is a sterling silver sliding clasp. I just love it.