A New Favorite Bead For Me!

A quick blog post today.  It was an experimental day at the torch and I had a lot of fun.  I have some new favorite beads too!

I liked the last set of beads I made with Val Cox Ocelot spots so much that I went back and pulled some more stringers of that frit with ivory and applied them in swirls this time.  I used ivory and copper green bases and am very happy with them.  The photo does not show the pattern as well as I would have liked but you get the idea. 

I also made my first ever hollow beads.  What fun they were to make!!!  I had been holding off giving them a whirl because I was a bit intimidated thinking it would be harder then it was and that I might get frustrated too easily.  Well I have to say I really enjoyed making them and they were fairly easy.  You can see in this photo that I got the hang of it pretty quick.  Took about 3 or 4 tries and I had a decent one!  The last 3 on the right are my best attempts.  Can't wait to make some more of these with some cool decoration!

I have decided I am never going to be a flower girl - well I was a flower girl in my brothers wedding when I was about 8 but I'm talking about beads here.  I decided to try my lentil press because I hadn't really touched it in about 6 months and I wanted to get a little practice in and you will see by the poor lentil shape that I need a lot more practice.  So anyway the only thing I could think of to put on the lentils that would cover up the terrible shape was a flower.  But like I said, I'm not a flower bead maker.  I'm posting these just for my own reference as I'm certainly not proud of these beads and they will never be sold or even given away.

I did have some fun with some twisties though:

These are always fun to make and while the focus is not sharp these beads are pretty cool in person.  The first 3 are cores of aqua with the white and clear twistie applied around and then encased in clear.  The 4th and 5th bead have the same core but the twistie has white, clear and black in it.  The 6th bead is just made with a little bit of leftover twisties laying around on my work space.  The 7th bead is actually a gradation of aqua and emerald base with the white and clear twistie wrapped around it and no clear encasing on this bead.  The last bead is a white and green twistie on a clear base and clear encased.

So that's it for my short post.  I'll be making jewelry tomorrow and I hope to make some more beads over the weekend.  I've been going through my old and new books and magazines so I have lots of bead ideas I am looking forward to trying.  Can't wait to get back at the torch!  Thanks for stopping by and reading my bead blog!