Wednesday, May 15, 2013

A Time To Stitch 3 hosted by Therese Frank and Christine Altmiller


   


Hi Y'all,

It is time again for another round of A Time To Stitch hosted by Christine and myself.  This time around the stitches we chose are Ladder, Square, Brick, Cellini Spiral, Russian Spiral, and African Helix. The rules were simple pick one flat stitch, one spiral stitch and create pieces using those stitches. The stitches could be combined in one piece or separate pieces.  If one was real ambitious they could create with all of the stitches.

Along with my creations I will also be showing the creations of two of my beading friends, that do not have blogs.

Let me introduce you to Crystie Willard.  Crystie and I met a long time ago, but just recently became good friends.  She is a very talented hair dresser and becoming a very talented bead weaver.  Here is what Crystie created...


Crystie started this pendant when we went on our beading retreat in Florida.  She wanted to learn how to do bead embroidery and asked me if I would help guide her through the process.  I think this pendant turned out gorgeous.  Crystie used three of the stitches in this challenge in her piece, brick stitch around the edge of the pendant, ladder stitch for the bail, and Russian spiral for the neck strap.

Next I would like to introduce you to Cynthia Wilson.  Cynthia and I met at the former High Strung Beads bead store one day when I went in to get a few things and have been friends ever since.  Cynthia is now the co-owner of the new bead store in Montgomery called the Enchanted Bead the home of the Bead Fairies.  Here is what Cynthia created...


Cynthia created this beautiful bracelet using the ladder stitch.  I just love those yellow glass beads in the middle.  Yellow is a hard color to work with, but Cynthia managed quite beautifully.


Cynthia also chose to use the Russian Spiral to make this dainty little bracelet for her grand daughter.  She used size 15 and 11 seed beads in this bracelet.  

Now for my creations.  I did all of the stitches except for the African Helix I just did not have the time to do it before the reveal date, that is what happens when you sign up for just about every challenge you come across on the blogs. Oh well moving on, here is what I created...


I love Tracey Gwillimas designs they are so pretty and when I came across this tutorial I just had to have it to make this bracelet for this challenge. 


Some of y'all may recognize this from my BSBP post, but since that was going on at the same time this challenge was announced I believe the brick stitch in the flowers qualifies for this challenge.  The Gumdrop flowers are from Kerrie Slade's Gumdrops In My Garden tutorial which is free at Bead and Button web site.


Cellini Spiral is my favorite of the spiral stitches I just love the look of it.  I made this bracelet with leather that I knotted with square knots.  I gave this one to my niece Belle.


This bracelet was made using the Square stitch and is my very first time using this stitch.  I love this stitch it is so easy and fast. In this bracelet I used size 6 seed beads and 3 mm glass cubes.  I call this one Block Windows because you can see through the glass cube beads.


This bracelet is done with a tutorial that Kristen Stevens posted on Art Jewelry Elements blog on May 13th.  Kristen tried to tell me over the phone a while back how to do the Russian spiral using twins, but I am a visual person, I need to see it to do it.  So I was very excited when I saw this post, that I got started on it right away.  The stitch is very easy to do and works up very fast.  Thank you Kristen for sharing this tutorial with all of us.

Thank you to all that participated in this challenge, and a big thank you to Christine for being my co-host in this challenge.  Christine and I enjoy doing this challenge and will be thinking up some stitches for A Time To Stitch 4.  I can not wait to see what all of you have created I just know that I will be blown away by your creations.  

Here is the list of participants please go see what they have created.

Therese Frank  (you are here)



Happy beading Y'all,
Therese

Saturday, May 4, 2013

Hats Off Challenge - Hosted by Bobbie Rafferty









Hi Y'all,

Today is the reveal day for the Hats Off Challenge hosted by Bobbie Rafferty.  Bobbie lives in Louisville, KY and tomorrow is the start of the Kentucky Derby weekend.  Bobbie had this idea to make jewelry that was inspired by the hats that ladies wear to the Derby, so she asked if anyone else thought that it was a good idea and if so would you like to join in on the challenge.  Twenty six of us thought that it sounded like a good idea and something fun and very challenging.  
I had a hard time with this one.  I had this vision in my head but I just could not get my hands to work what  I  had envisioned in my head.  I tried but the more I embroidered the worse it looked to me.  So I stopped and went to plan "B".  Plan "B" turned out so much more prettier then plan "A".

Plan "A"


I found this picture on the internet for my inspiration.  I had this face cab for a long time, so even though the face is not as beautiful as the inspiration photo I thought I could make it work.  I used blue, because the face cab has a blue wash over it to bring out the features of the face.  My first mistake was using the blue to bezel around the face, but then I thought about doing a bow at the bottom to make it look like the hat has a ribbon tie.  The part that I just could not get right is the part of the hat that goes across the face cab's forehead. This piece reminds me of "A Christmas Carol" the ghost of Bob Marley.  Can you see what I mean?  The only part of this that I really like is the rivoli flower I made on top of the hat.  I asked my Mom what she thought of it and she said "Are you making a Witch?".  That is when I tossed it down onto my work table and said that does it I am going on to another idea!

Plan "B"



I went to Hobby Lobby yesterday and found this little straw hat, the flower arrangement, cup chain and ribbon.  On the back of the flower arrangement there was a hair clip and a pin back. I took both of those pieces off of the back of the flowers and set it aside.  the cup chain was a little to long so I clipped of two cups and four fell off, Huh how did that happened? (scratching my head) Now it was to short, but being the crafty person that I am I made it work by gluing the flower arrangement over the gap. Before I glued the flowers on I wrapped the cup chain with the ribbon and glued it to the hat. I let the glue dry, and then I turned the hat over and glued the pin back to the side that the flower arrangement is on, so that it could not be seen.  Ta Dah a Kentucky Derby inspired piece of jewelry!

Thank you Bobbie for this very challenging challenge although plan "A" did not go the way I planned. I enjoyed making plan "B" it is always fun to go back to the craft making part of my creativity.

Please go by and visit the other participants in this Hats Off Challenge.

Bobbie Rafferty www.beadsong.blogspot.com
Christine Altmiller www.onekisscreations.blogspot.com
Sally Russick www.thestudiosublime.com
Susan Nelson Bowie www.susanbowie.wordpress.com


Happy beading Y'all,
Therese