Bead Embroidery: Polymer Clay Cab. Day 1

I posted last week a couple of polymer clay cabochons that I've made, having in my thoughts that I would do some bead embroidery.
Here is the "almost" finished result. I'm gonna work around the edges after I've cut it out, and then I'm also gonna figure out a chain and how I'm gonna attach it.

I really enjoyed this, and found it extremely fun. And with embroidery you can work pretty much how you want, and experiment with different types of stitches.
I ended up attaching a couple moonstone chips as an embellishment as well and I really, really like it.

I chose pretty much only to work with metal like colors for this one, since I didn't want to run away too far from the theme which the polymer clay cab already had.

Stretchy Montee Rings

I looked this morning at the bead channels I'm subscribed to on YouTube and noticed that Off the Beaded Path had put out a new video featuring a ring, embellished with some montees. I wanted to try this one out since I have stacked up on a couple of montees since this spring.
After I made my first ring, I felt that I just HAD to make a second one. The ring is really pretty, and it goes really, really fast to create and are a perfect gift, now when the holidays are slowly beginning to sneak up.
To go directly to the video, click here.

The supplies you need are a couple of montees; mainly size 3.2mm, but for my second one I used a 6.2mm. You'll also need 10 4mm pearls and about 10 11/0's and a few 8/0's. And some beading thread and a stretching cord. I found my Stretch Magic laying around in a box, lol.

The best thing I find about this ring is that it uses the stretch cord; means it will fit most sizes of fingers, and is therefore a really great gift if you don't know what size the person you're giving the ring to has.

Polymer Clay Cabs

So, yeah. Having my final dutch exams this week; finished the first four and still got the last one on Thursday.

I took myself some freedom to actually create some polymer clay cabochons this Sunday. The reason was that I've been having a couple of polymer clay colors laying around, I just haven't been in the mood since a little while. The other reason is that I haven't been able to find any cabs in any of the local craft stores - so I have to wait until I'm gonna make my next online purchase to fill my stash even more, Mwahahaha!

The process I went through before I began making my cabs, is that I first measured out some different sizes I wanted to make, on a paper. Yeh, I'm gonna get my hands on some molds in the future as well, lol - will make life a tad bit easier.






Yeh, the inspiration I kinda had when I made the following cab was pretty much a scarab. 

 For this cab, I wanted to experiment with the bronze powder I bought a while ago. Then I made a little texture print using some different stuff. Then I painted over the texture with the powder... shiny.

For the following little rectangle set, I ran out to the garden and tried finding a perfect leaf that I could work with. Then I put the leaf on the clay and used my roller to get the texture of the leaf. Then I used some silver powder to make it shiiiiny lol

8mm Beaded Bead

When I were surfing around on my favorite beading blogs earlier yesterday I came across a link leading to a Hungarian blog named Gyöngyikék; no idea what it means tho...

It features an article about beaded beads, and she made a really nice pattern on how to peyote stitch around an 8mm beads using 11/0's. I thought that since I have quite a few 8mm'ers laying around, and since I love making beaded beads, I just had to try this out.
I also have been trying to find a guide or something, which explain how to do beaded beads with 11/0's instead of 15/0's, so this was perrrrfect ^.^

In the article is also a graph, which you just can copy and paste in a graphic program (or print out), and then create your own pattern following the graph.

After I made my first one, I felt that it would fit as a really cute pair of earrings, so I made a second one, with the same design as the first one. And then I also made two other pairs.






I read on the blog were I found the link ( Bead For Brains: 365 -> link to the article here) to this Hungarian blog that, not only the blogger, but also a lot of readers had the problem where the last four beads wouldn't close snug properly.

I tried a solution, to see if I could avoid this problem myself; I peyote stitched each one of the circular halves separately, adding one row more for the other half. I then used a headpin (just to keep en eye where the hole in the 8mm bead was), then I put the center of the first half trough the pin, then added the 8mm, and finally the last half. Then I joined the halves together, pulling tightly through the joining - and cleverly avoided getting any ugly gaps.

 

October Moodboard

And again I just had to participate in this month's Moodboard which "Operation Tackle That Bead Stash!" is holding each month.
I really like the color scheme of this month as well, even if it really ain't any colors I would walk around in myself. Take a look for yourself, and click here to go directly to the post.

So, what I chose to do this time is a little ring, using circular brick stitch and peyote stitch for the ring base. I found these gorgeous aqua 9/0 seed beads laying around in a bag that I'd sorted out from a blue color bead mix that I bought last year or something, and finally I could actually use 'em for something. And since I really didn't have that maaaany laying around (like the color and it spoke to me) I decided on making a little ring.

I also used 11/0's and some 4mm glass beads, and one 8mm glass bead for the center.

Update and another Russian Spiral

I apologize for the lack of posting this month. I've gone and caught another cold again and I haven't really been in the mood of blogging lately, alto I got some time to bead on and off when I've had the time.

Last weekend I got another request about making a russian spiral necklace; a plain chain tho. Boo-ho, I wasn't allowed to experiment too much, well, not at all to be specific T.T
Anyway, it ended up kinda nice anyway, lol. I chose to work with a navy blue, since the costumer wanted it mainly... then I popped over to that store again to pick out a matching 9/0 to go with the 11/0 navy blue, and it ended up being a clear blue silver lined.



For the attachment I chose to work with some gold plated end caps with head pins and a matching lobster clasp.

Collar: Anubis & Book: Beaded Collars

Finally I manage to actually continue on this piece that I had begun since some while ago. I kinda saw it in front of me, and had already imagine how I wanted it, but didn't really know how to quite finish it off after I made the base that would go snug around the neck.

After I read the book Beaded Collars by Julia S. Pretl I managed to figure out how I could increase the collar so it would fall down from the neck onto the shoulders without having kinks - A perfect pass form in other words!
For anyone that is interested in learning some very basic techniques about beaded collars, I highly recommend reading this book. It gives a lot of tips on designs and also on the mathematical system on how to make beaded collars.

I used simple ladders stitch for my piece and some netting for the center part of the collar. I made the toggle clasp using peyote stitch.
The beads I used were 11/0 seed beads in purple matte iris, 40-50 gram 7mm twisted bugles in purple iris, two 4mm purple glass beads for the toggle clasp and some 11/0 galvanized gold seed beads.