The Time! Where does it go?

It's nearly the Ides of March, and not only haven't I got the software finished, I haven't blogged lately either. But this is me, refusing to feel guilty. Life is too short for spurious guilt.

There has been movement on the software front. Finally got the icons I need for the interface done, and the major screens are now shaping up really well. Perhaps a screen shot early next week?

I have done some beading, though never as much as I wish I could.  Let's see, what can I show.....?  (sound FX of rustling through photos)

First is a wonderful necklace that my husband says is his favorite so far of anything I've done. It's a quiet, elegant piece, and it doesn't garner the same kind of attention and/or compliments from passersby that some of my showier bits do. On the other hand, when I tell people I made it, their eyes get real big, because it looks so complicated, and yet so cool.

The neck band is all peyote, done with raku color small bugle beads. Yes, it's asymmetrical.  The pendant and fringe beads are real porcelain raku, from Xaz Beads. I bought these a few months ago at the Pasadena Bead Show, and have been wanting to use them since. They are wonderfully light, and have a surface shimmer that just won't photograph.  I fastened the whole thing together with a snap catch behind the pendant, so it goes on very easily.

Then I felt the need to do something spring-like. Even here in southern California, I get springtime cravings for color, the way I used to do in the terrible gray months in Michigan. So I spiraled my way into color delirium, I don't know what I was thinking when I bought those neon bright shocking pink beads, but they work nicely in this bracelet.

The bracelet is now listed on Etsy, too.

The spiral was fun, although for some reason it seemed to take me a long time. Perhaps because I'm just not getting enough beading time. I found some nifty magnetic catches I used in this that are so strong, they stick when you put one on each side of your finger!  On the other hand, they have holes in the middle for a knotted thread, but when faced correctly to embed the knots inside each piece of the catch, the magnets are incorrectly oriented. What genius decided that the NS magnet poles should face in the SAME direction in each catch piece? It's like selling only left shoes.

You'll notice in the second picture that the bracelet is resting on a...what is that thing?  Oh, it's my new Wristometer ©, a bracelet sizing mandrel that's printable on a single sheet of cardstock or paper.  Then you cut it out and tape it into a cone-like shape. This is something I've been working on and hoping to get out there soon.  Like next week.

There are other bracelet and necklace sizing options out there, but I think there's a place for a very low-cost, portable, and easy doo-dad for sizing how big a bracelet is. It's remarkable how the length of a bracelet when laid flat has so little to do with what size wrist it will fit! Depending on the thickness of the beading, the flexibility, the catch, all those things make a difference in fit.

So keep watching this space. I'll try to provide more updatingness. And promptidity.

Egregious Use of "Quotes"

Saturday we went to the Pasadena Bead Show. This year I spent a lot less, and lot more selectively than I have on previous trips. Perhaps that's because my budget is limited. Perhaps it's because the one vendor I wanted to really visit, Out of Our Mines, wasn't attending the show this time.

Pity. I really wanted a shot at their wonderful cabochons. Although they have lots of items up on their website, there's just no substitute for fondling the stones in person.

Anyway, I had a good time, frugally speaking, and found some lovely old undyed coral branches, only $20 a strand!!  And also some wonderful raku porcelain beads and donuts by Amy Mealy of Xaz Beads.  These beads are gorgeous up close. The play of color is incredible, and the beads are light, since they're made of porcelain.  The price is also great.

I found some lovely coral rounds and turquoise teeny almost heishi strands for reasonable prices as well.  I picked up some ear wires, as I've been plunging into earrings lately. No silver, other than a pair of silver spiral earrings that I'll probably just keep for myself, since silver prices are going through the roof.

At a booth called Mineral Treasures, we found some Russian rockhounds who just love their rocks. They know every mineral intimately and are glad to share the details. In depth. They kindly dismantled a necklace when all I wanted to buy was the wire-wrapped dendritic quartz pendant. The rock is similar to the one pictured here.  They have kick-butt labradorite, too.  Great prices, as well.

And then there was the one, truly evil, item. Dichroic coated seed beads. Yipes! I won't say what I spent for them, but they come in tiny 1 gram vials just like crack cocaine. They're about as expensive, and just as addicting. I found the website for Dichro Beads, who makes them. Turns out the coating company she uses is right down the road in Orange, CA. Hmm. Wonder if I could get them to coat things for me? $8 per gram is steep. On the site, it says "use sparingly" but I guess that's just because using them in masses would break the bank, hey?  You need as little as 6 grams to spice up a necklace, they say...well, using my old-school math, that comes out to $48 just for accent beads. Yipes again!

Since dichroic material is so hard to photograph well, I suspect the sample pieces you see on the site are spectacular in person. The worked beaded beads I saw at Paula Radke's booth, where I purchased them, were quite lovely. I only bought two vials, and I'll report back on how using them turns out. A single gram has between 180 and 200 beads, so I will indeed have to use them sparingly.

What's this about quotes, you say? On our way home we saw this sign.  I sat there staring at it, still kind of stunned from the sensory overload of the bead show.  Then, slowly, something penetrated.  I scrambled for the camera before the red light changed.

"7"???  What did they mean, "7"?  Were they not open seven days a week? Did they think there were other days?  Did they want to emphasize the number 7 even more than just making it bigger and bolder than the rest of the text in the line? Did they not understand the use of quotes?

I'm still confused.  But I'm guessing so is the sign-writer.