A gift for a treasured friend

I spent the early part of this year working on a wedding gift for a dear friend and his new wife. They've been married for several months and the wedding was lovely, but I couldn't come up with a gift that made sense to me right away. Jewelry would benefit only one of the couple. I toyed with a few ideas like beaded wine tags but that didn't seem personal enough.

Then I realized they took their honeymoon in Big Sur, and that is one of their favorite places to visit.

I had this photo I found online (sorry I've lost the attribution) to inspire me.  Bead embroidery called to me.

Gorgeous, isn't it?

I had this wonderful jasper cabochon, and some carnelian, and a little blue onyx and some apatite, some long tubes of tourmaline, so eventually, there was sea and sky, hills and trees. By paying attention to the lie of every line of beads, I was able to get a lot of texture and movement out of the seed beads.

Big Sur  approx 6" x 3" image © 2014 L Allen

The piece was built as a brooch, there are two pins in back, but honestly, it's pretty big to wear. So that both of the recipients could enjoy it, I found a lovely keepsake box at a frame store, and built my own mount out of stacked foamcore and some velcro, so the piece can be easily removed. The top of the box lifts up on a magnetic clasp so it's easily accessible.

My friends loved it, and I'm told it now resides on a table in their family room.

I hope that every time they see it, they will remember their honeymoon in Big Sur, and the good wishes I put into every bead and every stitch as I worked.

Really nifty paper beads to make yourself

I just ran across this paper bead post and thought the examples were so neat I had to drop in and post a link.

I'm still beading. I'll be posting some stuff soon. I promise.