Clay and new Kitty

Yesterday, Monday was a busy day. The morning was about cleaning a bit, The afternoon I went to my first polymer clay bead making class. And this is what I made:

I have made several swirled beads before, so that wasn't new, but making the canes for the flowers was new, and simpler, yet more time consuming to prep for than I thought. I was not expecting to come home with useable goodies, so that is/was an awesome thing. My flower cane is pretty good, but if I continue with it I'll need a lot of practice with the formed flowers (bottom of photo).

After class, since we have no kids until this evening my husband and I went for supper, and once we got home the people who are giving us their kitten decided to drop him off earlier than planned as he likes to escape when the doors are open to move boxes out.

So, here is our new kitten Lionblaze, or Blaze for short. Formerly known as Alvin.

As you can see he immediately helped Rick with the class he is taking...

And was curious about the camera.

And then napped on the crochet thread for my current project, and the project.

Lionblaze seems to have missed the "be aloof" part of the program and was eagsrly climbing all over us purring as only a kitten can. Unfortunately our 2 yr old crippled cat Licorice would be happier if the new kid would just go away and stop trying to be friends, it's not gonna happen.

Well when my 3 get home tonight from Grandmas I think a certain furball will be enthusiastically loved. Dunno if I should feel sorry for him or not!

Is That A Challenge!?

I have created a couple things for challenges recently.

The first one my friend Elaine (aka Tooaquarius, check her blog link <--) wanted to see how different each of our styles of jewelry making would look with the same beads. So she gave me a few and she kept some of a batch of her beads and we decided bronze/copper pearls and turquoise to go with. and here is my set:

And this week I started a thread on Artfire as a 2 week challenge:  http://www.artfire.com/modules.php?name=forums&page_no=1&op=view_topic&tid=5051  The theme is what inspired you to your current medium. For me that is a simply chained out 5 strand copper wire necklace with a bunch of brown and amber beads. The original was all glass, but I used some pearls, and semi precious stone as well.

My Artfire thread I am planning to continue as an every 2 weeks challenge, if anyone else is interested in continuing with me. As a basic shop I can't join any guilds there so this will get me some regular people to get to know as well as get the creativity going for a bunch of us. Now what will the next challenge theme be, hmm....... any suggestions?

swirlies and the re-do bracelet

Elaine of Tooaquarius is an excellent polymer clay artist and a good friend of mine. As such I use a lot of her work in my own. Anyway she showed me how to properly make swirly lentils, so one afternoon the kid and I were playing with clay, they make pokemon figurines and I did a few swirlies.

The other thing this week was a customer from a fall show bought a braclet she absolutely adored, (tells me it's her fav and that she gets compliments everytime she wears it.) But she caught it on something sharp and wanted it repaired. She mailed it in a plain evelope no insurance, and the post office machines ate it. All i got was a half shredded envelope and a part of a note. Luckily the note had her work phone number so I could call her. She asked me to remake it and said she'd pay. The first time i made it took days and days, so I wasn't thrilled but what do you do? I made the original 3 years ago, I have gotten a lot faster and completed it in a day!! what a great measuring stick for my growth as a crocheter!

So now back to the orange purse which had better turn out well after all these interruptions in makeing it!!

Creative Spree

Last week and the week previous I was on a creative spree, everyday I had another idea to play with. It's kinda petered out now, which is good, now I have loads of stuff to list :) I did 7 wire wrap rings, which is new to me and kinda fun. 2 bracelets, 5 pairs of earrings, 3 - 3part sets(earrings, necklace and bracelet), and 7 yes 7 - 2 part sets (earrings and either bracelet or necklace) I also made my very best and all time favourite set ever!! Not bad for a run. My creativity does seem to ebb and flo this way, I'll have bunch of ideas and a compulsion to make them and then it kinda dies off. Because I know this, as soon as the creativity poops out I take all the photos in bunches as well, and then I have a couple weeks worth of listings before I get another creative spurt. I dunno if other crafty/creative folks work this way or if I am just an oddity, and it works for me. Here's a few samples of this spree:

Stuff I have made with Elaines beads lately

As promised earlier in the week I have photos of the jewelry I made with Tooaquarius' beads at the craft show in Calgary.

I think I could work with her beads exclusively for a long time and still be inspired and happy with them. With all the texture, colours and shapes she does in her beads, making jewelry with them is a breeze, they need very, very simple accompanying beads. I am amazed that there's no paint involved. 12 years of skill and practice really show through.

I might be keeping the ice blossom set seen below. and am considering keeping the Coffee Break set to the left if it doesn't sell before Christmas.

My new addiction. Somehow, I don't even feel guilty :)