Bead Journal Project

Here's October's Bead Journal Project small quilt http://bjp2013.blogspot.com  

The three glass pieces are surrounded by beads to hold them in place.  The lines echo the ones on the glass pieces. They are stitched with beads on each side. Both the background and the binding are batiks.

This reminded me of a spider and seemed perfect for the Halloween month.

Quilt

Here's the detail of an experiment I tried. I decided to use a Batik and then arrange and couch a satin cord on it to create a scene for the glass cabochon I'd done. The cord was whimpy, so I hand embroidered the chain stitch on each side. Once I'd stitched on the cab and added beads around it, it wasn't important enough, so the lines of beads came next.

It just wanted simple quilting and borders. Now blogger wants me to load photos from Picasa, so I have to move them there before putting them on my blog. Of course, it's sideways! Oh well, life's too short to worry about these things.

Gift, beads

Our friend has been gone for a while and did a lot of beading during that time. She gave each of us in the quilt group a necklace she had made. This is mine. Isn't it beautiful?

I had to make a trip to Seattle on business today. It's strange but the car automatically takes the exit at Lacey and goes to Shipwreck Beads. Here's a selection of the ones I bought. I have to decide before going what type I'm going to focus on or all is lost. It is the size of a warehouse for those who haven't heard of it. This time I bought lots of Toho beads, seed beads in other sizes, and the four strings of decorative beads.

Beads, cord

When Quilt group met on Wednesday, our hostess showed us how to do this crystal bracelet. It can also have seed beads crossing in one or both directions. I liked the crystals so well that I didn't want to cover them up with seed beads. The crystals change from copper to olive which doesn't show very well in the photo in spite of my trying to alter the color. This part I finished in about an hour, so it is a quick project. Finally, I used the Diva cord maker that I bought from www.joggles.com ages ago. It will be used on a felted purse.

Beads, felt

A friend taught a class on how to make a beaded cuff by beading on an interesting fabric. I used a batik scrap and made the lower bracelet. After I finished the felted purse, there were pieces of felt left, so I decided to make a cuff. I didn't want to bead too much and hide the felting design, so I only did a bit with more on the area that would be shown when worn. It only takes a 2" wide strip of felt the length of your wrist plus whatever you want for the overlap. The beaded one is satin stitched by machine around the edge, but the felt one only needed a straight stitch to join the front to an Ultrasuede lining. I had used a fabric marker to color the edge before assembling it. Both have a strong interfacing to support the beads.

Beads

Here are some of the beads I made for the course I'm taking from The Thread Studio. The dark ones with the green are fabric with glitter glue added. The glue has dried completely and isn't tacky to the touch, so it works. I like glitter glue. The thin bluish ones are painted Tyvek. Some of the wire ones have yarn wound with the wire. They are fun to make and would be good on a journal.