Heart Ornament Bead Embroidery Tutorial

While it's not technically jewelry, I do have a new free beading tutorial over on About for Valentine's Day. It's a bead embroidered heart ornament with a hint of vintage whimsy.

Don't be intimidated by this one. It's actually a perfect project for beginners. And if you'd like help with it, just post a comment here or start up a conversation over in the Beadwork forum.

If you're looking for a good bead embroidery reference book to take your designs farther, check out my recent review of Dimensional Bead Embroidery.

Easy Mold Making for Resin and Metal Clay - Putty!

Once you get the hang of working with resin or metal clay (both of which we'll cover in my next book, cooincidentally), I strongly recommend that you try making your own molds. It's not difficult at all when you use a silicone putty mold product, like EasyMold (the purple stuff) or Mega Mold (the blue stuff).

 

These products are packaged in two separate parts, and each part is a different color. To "activate" them, you need to mix together two equal portions of the parts. Unlike liquid products (like epoxy glue and resin), you can mix putty parts together with your fingers. You simply stick the two parts together and kneed them until their two colors blend into one.

Tip: I use a kitchen measuring spoon to measure out equal parts of putty. You can use one to scoop the putty out of the jar, and then use your finger or a butter knife to level it off.

Once the putty is mixed, you need to work relatively fast to press it onto the object you want to cast from. Putties typically have only a few minutes of working time before they start to set up.

After applying putty to your object, and doing your best to push the putty into all of the grooves and indentations, you set the putty and the object aside. EasyMold cures in about 25 minutes, and Mega Mold cures in a stunningly fast 5 minutes. Once cured, you simply flex the putty (which is now a mold) to pop out the object.

Silicone putty works best on objects that don't have extreme relief or tiny crevices, which are prone to trapping air bubbles that can wipe out detail. Spend a little time experimenting to see what you can do with it. Since it's easily portable and nonmessy to use, you can even take it with you on adventures and make molds from things you come across, with discretion of course. ;-)

To learn a lot more about making and using molds with resin, pick up a copy of The Art of Resin Jewelry by Sherri Haab. Sherri covers not only putty, but also liquid silicone pour-on and paint-on mold formulations. She also demonstrates how to create completely three-dimensional items using your molds.

Images courtesy of beadjewelry.net's affiliates Blick and Amazon.com

Secret Snowflake Challenge Blog Hop Reveal

It's time for the blog hop reveal in Michelle Mach's latest design challenge! The theme was Secret Snowflake, and the goody bags were something special. They included gorgeous embossed note cards, gift boxes with ribbon, a slew of wintery blue and silver beads and components, and three glassy porcelain discs from Chinook Jewelry.  

Logic and reason would dictate that I use the Chinook porcelain as focal pieces in my design. I mean, take a closer look at these beauties:

But somehow I managed to get weird again and make my design without them. (Go ahead and get on my case about it, but just remember: I let my haters be my motivators.)

(OK not my quote, but still.)

So, anyway, somehow I found myself completely consumed by the colors and textures of the other components, even though they weren't quite as expressive by themselves as the porcelain certainly is.

I got to work with some bead embroidery. Rather than drawing out a pattern, I used the silver tone wavy metal ring as a base to bead within and around. Since it was so thin, I didn't want to use glue to tack it down. Instead, I stitched it to the backing with some gossamer non-woven monofilament that I picked up somewhere, sometime, in the past. (The stuff is literally hair-thin, and I've never used it for anything before.) I then glued down some vintage plastic pearl beads that look a lot like little cabs. Here's what that initial phase looked like:

From there, it was all about filling in the design with beadwork, taking a very freeform approach. I did decide, however, that I wanted a flowy vintage look with the dagger beads in the upper left and an icy trail of fringe flowing down from the lower right of the ring.

I used a regular size 12 beading needle and size D Nymo for the stitching, Lacy's Stiff Stuff for the underbacking, covered the back with soft tan ultrasuede, and affixed a pin back  . . . and my Secret Snowflake Brooch was born ~~

Enough about my design! It's time to continue the Hop and go visit these awesome designers as they launch their reveals Sunday morning:

• Alice (Alice Dreaming)
• Chris (beadjewelry.net) <<<<---------YOU ARE HERE
• Christa (Adventures of One Beady Woman)
  
• Crystal (Here Bead Dragons)
• Cynthia (Cynth's Blog)
  
  
• Dawn (Morning Glory Beading)
• Donetta (Simply Gorgeous)
• Erin A.
• Jennifer (JenniferJW)
• Jennifer (Jewelry, Art and Life)
  
  
• Kari W.
• Kate (We Can Make That at Home)
• Kay (Palm Coast Art)
• Linda (Lindy's Designs)
• Lisa C. (A Bead a Day)
  
  
• Lisa (Inspired Adornments)
• Mary (MLH Designs)
• Michelle (Beads & Books)
• Michelle B.
• Millie (AMM Jewelry)
  
  
• Norma (Moonlit Fantasies)
• Pam (The Crazier Sister)
• Rebecca J.
• Renetha (Lamplight Crafts)
• Rosemarie (Gem Rose Designs)
  
  
• Shannon (Falling into the Sky)
• Susan (Bead Inspired)
• Therese (Therese's Treasures)
• Therese (Domestic Goddess Enterprises)

Interested in learning some bead embroidery techniques? Check out my review of Dimensional Bead Embroidery over on About.com.

New Loom Beading Tutorial Series

We're diving into loom beading over on About.com Beadwork this month. If you've never tried loom beading, or if it's something you'd like to revisit, hop over and give it a try!

The series begins with the very basics: Types of Bead Looms and The Parts of a Bead Loom.

Next, grab a loom -- either a wire frame or wood frame model is fine -- and give simple warping and beading a try.

Coming soon: Winding longer beadwork on your loom, weaving-in warp threads, beading with a shedding device, and even no-warps beading. Be sure to sign up for the Beadwork Newsletter for updates.

• In the meantime, reply to this post in the Beadwork forum with your questions about loomwork.

• And if you're an experienced loom beader, take a minute to share your tips and advice with new beaders.

More Bronze Wire for Jewelry Making

With the craziness in the metals markets of late, we jewelry crafters have really been scrambling for affordable metals. The options are fairly limited. There's copper and brass. Nickel silver is off many designers' lists because of the nasty dermatitis it can cause. Annealed steel is doable, but very prone to rusting (although I do have an update on that coming soon). Stainless steel is stiff and hard to work with, and aluminum wire is awfully "industrial," except when colored . . . in which case it tends to scratch and chip from pliers.

But here's another option: bronze.

Turquoise Paisley Wrap Earrings

Until recently bronze wire was pretty hard to find. At least, I found it so. Then while reviewing a draft of my upcoming book (More Teach Yourself Visually Jewelry Making), my tech editor Marti pointed out that bronze wire has become much easier to procure. (This is probably because of the popularity of bronze clay, and the fact that you can fuse bronze wire with your bronze clay.)

So, what exactly is bronze? According to Wikipedia "Bronze is a metal alloy consisting primarily of copper, usually with tin as the main additive." The tin seems to be what sets true bronze apart from bronze-like metals, such as red brass -- which is also called "jeweler's bronze" (not bronze).

Phosphor bronze wire from Wickwire Jewelry

Tip: When looking for true bronze, look for wire labeled "phosphor bronze" or "tin bronze." Avoid "bronze" that contains zinc (unless you're looking for brass).

I purchased my first true bronze wire recently from Wickwire Jewelry. Read more about it in the product description here.

What impresses me the most about this bronze wire is its beautiful color: a soft, pinkish gold. Definitely not brown like copper or yellow like brass. I love it so much, in fact, that it's playing a star role in my next project book in the Visual series.

Volcanic Hoops

Keep in mind that bronze will oxidize naturally over time. Its patina has a gorgeous antiqued look, but if you want to maintain the raw bronze color, you'll need to polish it from time to time (like you would with silver).

Wickwire currently stocks dead soft, true bronze wire in a super wide range of gauges -- 14, 16, 18, 20, 24 and 26 gauge. Here are some other vendors currently carrying bronze wire:

Metal Clay Supply -- 14, 16, 18, 20, and 22 gauge -- dead soft

Cool Tools -- 16, 18, 20, 22, 24, and 26 gauge -- dead soft

The Ring Lord -- 14, 16, 18, 19, 22, 20, 21, 24, 26 -- some dead soft, some half hard, some 3/4 hard, and some hard

Are you using true bronze wire in any projects? How do you like it?