Caribbean Sands Bracelet

I had had the two seed bead-and-swarovski strands sitting around, ostensibly for a necklace. I finally broke down and combined them, along with raku and tigers-eye beads, into a twisted little bracelet. It reminds me of the tropics, but kinda of the desert. It reminded my partner of Davy Jones' ship from the newer Pirates of the Caribbean movie.

Hence the name.

As previously mentioned, it's glass, crystal (swarovski 4s and 6es), tigers-eye, and raku ceramic beads.

Wisteria Window Earrings

These are my attempt at 'simple earrings'. They're small and kinda vintagey-- not really my style, but not bad either.

They are composed of seed beads, Czech flower beads, Czech Picasso finish window beads, and little yellow faceted stones of some kind. They're about 2.5 cm in length without the hooks.

Obsidian Cascade Earrings

Another entry in my 'I <3 Real Stone' blog series, here are my Obsidian Cascade earrings. The obsidian chips swing within and below the hardware bits, adding an element of organic design into what is otherwise a very industrial style.

Although I love colors, I find designing in black and metal to be very easy.

Everything is copper, except for the obsidian and the hardware ring-dealies (again, their technical name). The ring-dealies are about 1.5 cm in diameter, and the earrings measure about 6 cm in length.

African Lantern Earrings

These beads were thanks to my partner. We were visiting a bead store and, in an effort to stretch my creative horizons, I asked him to pick out some things that he liked that he thought I would never choose for myself.

He chose these agate beads. I thanked him, bought them, and then left them in my bead stash while I worked on all of the glowy yellow, twilight purple, or watery blue elements that I had bought for myself.

One day, however, I took these out and messed with them, and the design came naturally. Like all my lantern earrings, these feature copper bead caps. There's also copper chain, 4mm swarovskis, and snakeskin agate beads. They're about 4.5 cm long, and the agate beads are about 1 cm in diameter.

Geology Pendant

I used to want to be a geologist, and glass (even picasso finish glass...well, maybe picasso finish glass...) doesn't hold a candle to real stone to me. I made this pendant, and, as with so many pendants, I still don't know what to do with it. (Hey, I just thought of something! Pendant <--> pendulous... there must be some kind of etymological relationship. Does 'pending' get involved too? I bet they're all from Latin. Yep, they are. Actually, seems the jury's still out on 'pending'-- it may be from French. Which may ultimately be from Latin anyway.)

This pendant is based on a design from a wirework magazine-- I don't have it with me at the moment, so I can't tell you whom it's by-- but I've added some design elements (particularly the curled wire). I really do like this thing and all its earth tones, oranges and yellows and coppers. Its focal point is a picture jasper bead (ha, try googling 'picture jasper' and see how many stone images you come up with... There's a preponderance of young actors named Jasper or playing characters named Jasper, it seems) with more jasper, size 4 and 6 swarovskis, picasso finish glass and non-picasso finish glass, and lots of 26-gauge copper wire (with a little 22). It's about 4 cm in diameter.