Hmmmm - I don't think I can even remember how exactly I came to the newsgroup - other than that I was interested in beads and looking for places to talk about them. That was several years ago. :) I started out like most people - finding beads in a shop and instantly falling in love. My first beads were bought at a fabric store - the one where I worked actually. I liked seeds best to begin with. I started out stitching them to fabric for embellishing, and then moved on to making hair jewelry. I began weaving bracelets not long after that. Then I found rec.crafts.beads after playing with beads for about 5 or 6 years. Here, I was introduced to all sorts of cool things - it was here that I first became interested in stringing. I loved looking at all the pictures of people's work, and also loved looking at pics of beads themselves. Searching eBay came not long after that - along with beginning to make work that was good enough to sell. I fell in love with lampwork and began to buy tons of it, making it into jewelry and collecting it. Same with Swarovski and sterling silver. Those became my three favorite types of beads - along with seed beads of course. As time passed by I became practically obsessed with lampwork. So much so that I started posting lists of it from eBay and Justbeads and other places. I was so in love, that I talked about it non stop. Pretty soon, the posters here got the idea of helping me take my first class, and they got together (with Sooz heading the whole thing - that sweetie!!) and gave me a gift ceritificate that had enough money on it to take a local bead making class and buy some supplies. I was dumbfounded, moved and ecstatic. I took that class - a little over a year ago - and was hooked. I have met some wonderful people from this group, and hope to meet many more. The first person I met face to face was Paulette Insall - we became friends instantly, and because we lived in the same town, we spent a lot of time together. She is also a lampworker, and soon we struck up a deal where I became her apprentice. That lasted not long enough, because I then had to move to WA for hubby's work. We still see eachother often though, and remain very good friends. This group has gone through a ton since I have started posting - and I am sure will go through a lot more. I have forged some wonderful and lifelong friendships here, even with people I haven't met face to face. I love it here - no matter what we go through - and will always be grateful to the people here for helping me to find my bliss.
- Vote on answer
- posted
20 years ago