About My Partner & The Beads She Sent
You can read
my earlier post about my swap partner Mystic Pesto (Moira McEvoy) and the amazing handmade pendant and
clasp she sent in an earlier post. That's right—she made the
Tree of Life wire pendant and the matching clasp that she sent, along
with a nice stash of red crystal bicones in two sizes and some crystal
rondelles. You can also see a larger photo of the bead soup on that earlier blog post.
What I Made
I made a necklace, bracelet, and earring set
with the beads I received. I tried to combine the focal and clasp in
the same piece, but the clasp is so pretty that I decided it needed to
be the focal in its own piece rather than hidden at the back of a necklace. This jewelry set is fancier than my
normal work, but that made it fun.
In addition to the bead soup
materials, I added several types of chain, brass saucers, dark brown
velvet ribbon (for the bracelet), the tiny dark brown pearls (in the
necklace), and findings (ear wires, jump rings, eye pins) from my stash.
What I Learned
almost never use gold or bright brass, but I discovered that I love the
contrast between the dark Vintaj brass and the bright gold. This is a combination I'd try again, especially for holiday or party jewelry.
For this project, I challenged myself to do a little homage to my partner, who does wonderful
chain maille work. So for the earrings, I created chain with 4mm brass
jump rings. I don't know that you can even call it chain maille, since
it's a very simple set of doubled links. It was a little tricky working with
such small jump rings (many of them ended up jumping in between the sofa
cushions or flying across the floor), so I think if I decide to make a chain maille
bracelet, I'm going to move up a size or two.
More Blogs to Visit
Please visit my partner Moira McEvoy and see what she did with the
beads I sent her. I confess to sending her a stumper—a large, floral lampworked
focal that had been in my stash for years. It was one of the first
pieces I bought on Etsy. Every year or so, I'd pull it out of my stash
to look at it, but I never could come up with a design. I know she'll
do something wonderful!
Bead Soup Participants
Find the entire participant list at: lorianderson-beadsoupblogparty.blogspot.com
**You are currently visiting #143: Michelle Mach and Moira McEvoy - This is Michelle's blog!**
I apologize for not having the whole list of partners here. Apparently, that exceeds the maximum length for a blog post on this software. (It stops inserting new text around #130.) I've never hit the maximum before. Hooray for Bead Soup!