New listings

I admit - I'm not a very organized ArtFire lister. Once in a while I take a batch of beads and jewellery and photograph them. Then I have a bunch of items to list and I try to list one every day. But when I'm out of new photos, it normally takes a week or two for me to get the camera out again. So that's why I'm an periodic lister. If you ever wondered. :)

This week I've been listing some new jewellery I'd like to show you.

Cosmic Ponds lampwork bead on Sterling Silver Necklace

I rarely makes those large beads with reactive silver glass, but once in a while I just get a crave. I'm really pleased with how this bead turned out. Lovely reactions and a beautiful metallic luster.

Mediterranian, Lampwork and Sterling Silver pendant

The combination of aqua and silvered ivory glass is so good! For this bead I covered the entire bead in silverfoil and added the aqua blue glass before burning the silver off. That's why the blue looks so much like water. The pendant is made with sterlings silver parts and swarowski crystals in matching colours. It has a lobster clasp, so you can easily attache it to almost any necklace you allready have!

Tiny Penguins, Lampwork and Sterling Silver Earrings

I got this idea from a friend of mine who wanted penguin earrings for his wife. I've previously made larger penguins for necklaces, but now I was challenge with using a very small amount of glass and still get the details. And I do feel they turned out really cute. So this is my third pair!

All these items (and many more) are in my ArtFire shop at the usual adress!

I don't believe it - SNOW!!!

Last night snow started to fall over Uppsala. It's not totally for April in Sweden wich is reknowned for it moody weather but the snow was still on the ground when we wole up this morning and it keeps falling. Brrr!

So I thought I'd just cheer me - and you - up with som more floral beads.

Flower and pearls

Have you been invited to a party this spring? You'll feel like a princess in this necklace. It's made of white freshwater pearls and pea green seed beads. As a focal I've use one of my lampwork flowers in pea green and the lightest transaprent pink there is.

Blooming ink

The ink blue glass from CiM - Leaky pen - is very hard to use as it fries easily. Also it has to be laid over a light colour or else it will just look black. But when you overcome those issues it's a beautiful glass! Here I put it over white and added som white flowers randomly placed on the surface. The raised stamens are also made of Leaky pen .

Tangerine lampwork flower necklace

Here I made a pendant from the lampwork flower and let it hang from a wire necklet. An everyday necklace for the happy days of spring.

Meadow

A transparent green bead with surface decoration of frit in greens and yellows and raised flowers in pink and white.

Light turquoise flower earrings

Sterling silver and turquoise says summer to me. These lentil beads have an ivory coloured flower on each side. There's a necklace to go with them too...

Voting has begun - please use your vote!

It's so exciting! 14 lovely entries are competing for fantastic prizes in Fire Divas Jewelry Challenge and voting begins today.
You simply MUST visit the Fire Divas blog and drowl over the lovely pieces and lay your vote on your personal favourite. (Not that I would DREAM of trying to influence your opinion, but one of the entries is featuring a bead of mine...)

Fire Divas is a group of 24 talented lampworkers who strives to promote, help and encourage eachother. You can find us in our blog, on Facebook and in the weekly threads on ArtFire and Etsy.

Beads or jewellery? A lampworkers dilemma

I bet all of the lampwork artists who also make jewellery know this dilemma: You open your kiln and pcik out the annealed beads. You release them from the mandrel and carefully clean them from bead release (the clay the steel mandrel is dipped in before you make your beads).

And now what?

Should I sell it as it is?

Or should I make some kind of jewellery out of it?


And in that case - sterling silver or silverplated?

Or leather or beaded or....?

And what length?

(I borrowed this picture from Reeds. Hope they'll excuse me!)

Gaaaaahh!!!

I find I tend to keep more and more of my beads as they are. This is for several reasons:

1. I think that in webshops, people prefer buying beads to jewellery. That's beacause you often want to see pices you are going to wear with your own two eyes. Beadshoppers are also used to shopping online and therefore has a lower treshold for buying stuff unseen.

2. If someone wants a bead made into jewellery, that's easily done. The customer can also decide wich material, length etc he or she wants to have. If, on the other hand, someone wants to take the bead out of the jewellery, I'd say no, of course. I might make a similar one though!

3. I have homeparties with my beads and jewellery now and then. And though people love touching and trying my jewellery on, I sometimes think they love going through my bead boxes even more! I very often get orders on jewellery made from beads out of my boxes. And here too can they decide wich materials to use etc. They even have a display of my materials at hand as I always have quite an exhibition of jewellery at these parties!

4. It's also a question of time. I love making jewellery but I LOVE making beads. And as there are only so many hours in a week...

On the other hand - there will always be people who loves to buy readymade. And also - not least important - I really enjoy putting out the torch once in a while and make something with some of my glassy goodies!

Just added: Flowers sterling silver bracelet

I've made this kind of bracelet before but only as a custom order. Now I thought I'd have one to show - and sell - too. So here it is:
The bracelet is made of a beautiful - and heavy - sterling silver chain that closes with a lobster clasp.
Nine of my raised flower lampwork beads dangles from it. When you move it creates a lovely ratteling sound!

There are not two beads that have the same colour scheme, but i kept them on a colour theme with a few splashes of contrast.

For more info, please visit my ArtFire store!

Just added: Helleborus necklace

I just added this necklace to my AF shop.

I made the the bead from CiM Cirrus with strokes of opaque white and raised, white flowers on the top.

I know the flowers don't really look like helleborus, but the winter colours of the bead made me think of flowers in the snow.

The chain is antracite coloured and very beautiful. I think a silver coloured chain would have made the necklace too pale, but this dark grey colour really adds interest to the creation. And so does the firepolished crystals with their AB luster!

For more details, please visit Babs Beads & Design on ArtFire

SALE

I'm having a sale in my AF store Babs Beads & Design that lasts the year out! That is - two more days. ;)

15% off everything!

How do you thread lampwork beads?

In the beginning I found it had to make jewellery out of lampwork beads because the large holes make them wiggle on the hattpin (or whatever you use).

I found som very expensive findings on the market tha I didn't have money of to invest in. But then I got another idea!

Read about it in the Europe Artfire Guild blog!

Silver and black

I listed this necklace today at ArtFire:

Silvered black on leather cord

It's on of several I've made in the same style, though everyone looks different from the others.

I really get a lot of appreciation for this style as it's beautiful in it's simplicity and easy to wear as it goes with almost anything.

Fairly rescent listings

I have a lot on my mind right, and most of it does not concern my blogs! :) One thing that occupies me is my working life, in wich I'm planning to start my own bussiness. Another thing taking a lot of time has been the guild for european ArtFire artisans. That blog is really becoming something! Check it out: Europe ArtFire guild

And in addition to this (and a ten day vaccation on the westcoast of Sweden) I've been trying to find some time for making beads and listing them on ArtFire. Here are some examples of rescent listings in my shop:

Mother of two goddess with a rose on her hip

Silver flower necklace with sterling silver chain and parts

Coral flower earrings with sterlig silver parts

Dolphin necklace with sterling silver chain and parts

Please visit my shop for further details about my items.

A blogpost - about my bead!

Yesterday, Eddie posted a wonderful post on Europe ArtFire guilds blog. And she wrote about one of my beads!
http://europe-artisans.blogspot.com/2009/04/i-wish-i-could-make-something-like-that.html

I'm blushing and smiling at the same time. :)

Pink flowers bracelet

I would like to show you this bracelet that I made a few weeks ago. It was bought to be a gift, so I didn't want to publish the picture until I knew that the reciever had got it. :)



It took all my pink colours and som purple ones to make the beads for this one. They sit on a sterling silver chain that weights A LOT!

I've been busy

A lot of jewellery partying going on so I've got my hands full with production. Here are a few examples:

Summer vaccation is over

I'm back from a long vaccation and is trying to figure out how it all was done! It's hard to get used to the alarm setting off in the morning and to all the routines the a life in a family of four requiers.

It's also hrd go get back to the torch. Not that it's not funny (I've missed it while I was away) but you loose a bit of the feeling after five-six weeks. But I practise!

During the summer I've been focusing on making jewellery out of my beads and that's also a lot of fun. A lot of kind people have been inteerested in my work and I also stood at my first market ever. Here are som pics from my both:

Note the greatest jewels I've ever made - my sweet, sweet children.

Most of the jewellery contains my own lampworked beads, though not all. Sometimes it's fun to create with bought stuff!
I'm especially proud of my earring displays! ;) Yoghurt packges and a cereal box. But it worked and I had something to talk to the customers about.

Some finished jewellery

I thought I'd show of some jewellery I've made with my lampwork beads:

Earrings for Maria

Black and white pendant

Ratteling flower bracelet

Ratteling bracelet with B/W beads

My first cross necklace

My first delivery!

Here they are!

Nine "Mantra OM" necklaces. As you see, there were different requests of color
Sorry for the lousy pic - I was in a hurry

My first order is signed, sealed and delivered today. I was quite nervous that they wouldn't like them after all, but they did! So much that I already got an order for another one!