Dancing With The Muse - OT

Oh man, now THAT is my vision of heaven!!!!! I was on a roll one day last week, then realized I was down to my six skinny mandrels and the ones I have dipped at the end to make vessels....neither of which I was planning to use at the time. Arrrgh!

Can't wait to see your new goodies.

-- KarenK Desert Dreamer Designs

And these are ready-made mandrels, too! I've never had any before. I've always just gone to the welding shop and bought tig rod in the past. Oh how I hate cutting and grinding mandrels... And I'll have more hollow mandrels, too! Heavenly!

I did some holiday-theme beads that I like a great deal: Various color combos, but the basic idea is a tubular bead with colored ends (deep, dark red... olive.. etc.). The main body of the bead is ivory or dark ivory, which is then wrapped in silver foil. Burned that off, then did small groupings of holly leaves and berries. They turned out really nice!

Those beads sound great!

I'm lucky, Mike cuts my mandrels and grinds the ends for me....then sneaks in a project or two at "my" bench. LOL I'm not saying a word, since none of it would be set up without him. Last weekend he looked at all the files and stamps scattered over the bench (and listened to me whine about stabbing myself in the wrist trying to find another needle file) and cut up a piece of 2x4 for me, then proceeded to drill "just right" sized holes for all my files, stamps and chasing tools. He even made extra holes for more stamps and tools. It's great to have a man around with a drilling fetish!

-- KarenK Desert Dreamer Designs

You just gave me the goose bumps, Tink. I'm glad your muse is back and in creative order. Getting new equipment and setting up your studio is just going to add to the juices!

-- Margie

Shit if I had known you were running low, I could hace sent you a bunch. I hace tons of them.

Whacking welding rods with bolt cutters is fun! =)

They sound really cool!

Chuckle, um, yup. Seconded.

Tina

I know exactly what you mean. I've been doing awful at the torch lately. Then I burned some of my favorite toons on a CD, put it in and went to town. Purple Rain was it for yesterday. I made everything purples. Some days I feel the muse flips me off to, then I have a day like yesterday.

Today I'm suffering from d*(^& allergies. I'm taking benedryl out the wazzoo and I'm hoping I won't fall asleep. It usually doesn't make me sleepy. I set out fun colors for listening to 60's flower child music. I was at Woodstock. Look for the baby covered in mud naked. Yep, that's me.

I can't wait for pictures!

Maybe THAT"S why Benadryl doesn't work for me! I've been taking it orally for all these years! Thanks so much!

On Wed, 15 Oct 2003 20:09:24 -0400, CLP wrote (in message ):

Bwhahahaha. It took me a moment there (must be the pain meds), but I ended up splurting Diet Coke all over the keyboard. Thanks!

Back on Topic: my muse is telling me that she wants me to take a hiatus from making jewelry and make some more sculptural, artistic pieces. I've always liked those beaded kimono sculptures, and am in the midst of trying my hand at that. Of course, being me, I have no intention of using a pattern, and worked out all my measurements on my own. All the patterns I've seen are in peyote, and I am going through a right angle weave phase, and really; who here thinks I could ever even bring myself to follow someone else's pattern?

Besides, all the patterns seem to be for dinky little kimono -- the one I want is big, about a foot tall. The game plan (today) is to make it, and fit the stand with a light, so the beads can glow from inside. I've gotten the sleeves done so far, and am waiting for more fire polished crystals to begin the body of the piece.

Next on the agenda is to make one of those water spigots with beads coming out of it. That will also be fitted with a light, and will decorate my bathroom. I'll come up with more info as I get closer to the project. Right now, I want to use all sorts of water shaded transparent seed beads, and if I win the lottery, it will be water shaded Swarovski.

I'm also kicking around a window treatment made of beads. My bathroom has a tropical fish motif, and the bathroom window has a [not] glorious view of my neighbor's garage. I'm trying to figure out how to make this work, but I think I'm going to make a wooden frame with regularly drilled holes (with my new and wicked cool Dremel drill press), and fit those holes with wires (almost like mandrels) I'll string the wires with water shaded fire polish beads and Indian Lampwork Fish beads. I think that this would be a good application for those beads, because they won't get any day-to-day wear sitting in a frame, and I am nowhere near wealthy enough to afford lampwork fishies for a window treatment. I'd bet that a kilo or two of the Indian lampwork will be plenty.

I want to try my hand at making at least a few of those beaded Christmas ornaments for gifts, too.

Yes, I have a pushy muse. She thinks that I have 50 hours a day to bead, and comes up with far more ideas than I can ever implement. :-)

Kathy N-V

That's sweet :-) Thank you... I can't imagine what it will be like to have twice as many mandrels. My studio wench, Donna, was here today and she cleaned all my mandrels and re-dipped them, cleaned all the beads I made last week, cleaned and organized the studio, pulled PERFECT twisties for the tiger beads I've been doing (which I am really pleased with) and did some other stuff.

She's spectacular, and we make a killer team :-)

I hate it. But it saved me a ton of money that's for sure. I don't mind the whacking part, but the grinding sucks. Hey, I just remembered that my ex has given me at least temporary custody of the GRINDER! YAYYYYYYYYYYYYY!

They are really pretty... I should try to take some pictures tomorrow.

The water facet sculpture reminds me off a plan I haven't worked on yet. A year ago Spring I saw some cool sculptural things. One looked like a gnarled rock bowl with beads spilling out of it. So when I went to the fair I saw an odd formation of lava. It had been stuck in a vent tube, where the air blew it into a strange fibrous mass. It reminds me that I still want to do this.

Another undone plan is to get some diamond willow and rout a grove in a sinewy branch and put a wire mesh in it, from which a beaded blanket of northern lights will swirl.

And I will send you the few Indian fishes I have been wondering what to do with. That window treatment could get very heavy.

Tina

"Kathy N-V" wrote

Go Tink!! Go Tink's muse!!! Can't wait to see pics.

Christy you crack me up!!!!

ooh- lots o cool ideas!!!!

Tink -- good to hear. Thanks for the update.

Becki "In between the moon and you, the angels have a better view of the crumbling difference between wrong and right." -- Counting Crows