BEADchatter

February Already!

2012-02-09T21:18:00.002Z

Bead of the Day: "Winter Slumberland" (sold on ebay)

We've been so busy trying to find a new place to live that I have totally neglected my blog - again! :( So I thought that if I keep it brief then it'll take me less time to write things which is always a problem: I write something, then I read it, re-write it, read it again and so on!

Anyway, in January I had to re-think my plans for the next book. Originally I thought I'd go to have a number of classes with Akihiro Okama and then I'd write a book of projects on japanese beads (tonbodama). But it felt like a book like this was very niche and it wouldn't appeal to a large number of lampwork artists and lampwork fans. Instead, I'll be working on a follow-up to my "Glass Bead Jewelry Projects" with possibly another 15 projects. The projects, however, are going to be more complicated, with more advanced techniques, like making and working with your own hand-pulled murrini, creating multi-layered paperweight-like base beads, decorating them using the very thin stringer, etc. etc. I've got lots of projects in my head; the trouble is, I've got to put it all down on paper and, what is a lot more difficult, to capture it all in photos.

I've also written and sent off two tutorials: one for the Bead and the other for Beads&Beyond. I'm not sure if I'm allowed to blog about the contents yet, so I won't :). The only thing is, as it's been bitterly cold and I have practially been unable to work in my usual place - conservatory - I've have a LOT of problems with making the final pieces for the articles, as I needed to send them off to be photographed by the magazines. Luckily for me, this hurdle is over and I'll be looking forward to seeing my projects in the summer issues - I'll keep you updated.

My little garden fairy is all covered in frost - Derbyshire proved to be very cold!

I've also been doing a lot of reading: Rod's second book in the Demi-Monde saga ("Spring") is out now, and I've been proof-reading the third, "Summer", and his other book which he wrote previously but haven't published yet. After that I've got the forth and the last of the Demi-Monde, "Fall", which is also written and is now with the editor. Busy!

Soon I'll start packing. Sadly, it will affect my bead making process... But I look forward to the new place and the new ideas!

Happy New Year!

2012-01-05T10:20:00.006Z

Bead of the day: "Christmas Box"

Christmas is still coming to Russia: the Russian Orthodox Christmas is on the 7th January, and then on the night between 13th and 14th January it is the old Russian New Year - how cool is that! That's why I chose this bead for my today's blog: I made it some time ago, it is a hollow bead in the shape of a box with a decorated core. The festive theme involving red berries and green leaves of transparent glass with golstone-enhanced branches all of which is a slightly raised design is especially pretty with the light going through the bead. I've also partially etched it for the "frosted" look, but you can still peek inside. I'm not sure how good it looks on the photo, one really needs to see it in person, so as I don't usually go to fairs it is going to be more difficult to sell it - if I ever decide to do it.

I had some wonderful presents from my family this year, and they are especially dear to me because clearly a lot of thought was put into them. One of these which left me speechless when I opened it was a calendar designed by my children for me. I had told them I'd like a calendar and it had to be with flowers. But what I didn't expect at all was that they had contacted one of the internet companies which would print it and post it to you. So they put in photos of the previous year and even some older ones, including the pic of my parents at the datcha, and the leavers' ball, and many more. It is amazing...

Rod and I also received this lovely card which I loved so much that for the festive period I made it my FB profile pic, it's so cute! We don't usually give cards to each other, but the children said that they just couldn't resist when they saw it!

Happy New Year, and I hope it'll be happier, healthier and in general a lot better for all of us than the previous one!

Post-Christmas Lazy Days

2011-12-29T11:59:00.004Z

Bead of the Day: "Ebay 1.6m Assortment"

Christmas is behind us, and the New Year is coming. I love these days: they are always so lazy - if you've got nothing planned, like me. Of course, there are bits and pieces to do, but generally it's relaxing after the pre-Christmas rush.

We had Rod's sister staying with us over Christmas, we went out for dinner on Christmas eve, as we always do, and for lunch on Boxing day, and it was her treat for us. There will be visitors in the next couple of days, the children's friends. I haven't been doing much in terms of bead making, and today is a lovely day, not too cold, so I will probably attempt to start on my tutorial for Bead magazine. It will be on making the Matrioshka bead, the winner of the British Bead Awards 2011. Although the actual article will be going into one of the summer issues of the magazine, they need the material for the 18th January, so I'd better get on with it. The actual making of the bead isn't complicated, but there will be many steps, especially on the shaping. So I'm looking forward to this challenge.

Also, and now it's not too early to reveal this little secret, one of my beads was included into the "Flow" magazine gallery of the winter issue, which is usually the issue dedicated to women in glass. I've had to keep it a secret until the issue was out, and now it's available, as I understand, but I haven't received my complimentary copy yet :(. I was also putting in some info about my book, but I haven't heard from them, so possibly they haven't liked it and didn't include the little promo write-up. Never mind.

Well, I hope you all are having a lovely festive season, and I'll be keeping you up to date with what's going on here. And I've started putting my "bargain" bead assortments on ebay, hence the photo of the Beads of the day. I don't think they are going to be too expensive, so if you are looking for some beads to practice your jewellery-making techniques on, they are there!:)

And the Winner Is...

2011-12-22T10:57:00.002Z

And the winner of the Festive Prize draw is Jane Tyrrell! Jane writes a wonderful blog (http://jane-janesjournal.blogspot.com/) of which I am a follower. She also has an Etsy shop (http://www.etsy.com/shop/janesgemsandjewels ) where she sells beautiful jewellery and cards that she makes. Jane is a very talented jeweller, so it would be great if she lets me have a pic of what she's made with the "Morning Glory" beads. Thank you, Jane, for your support and I hope you have a lovely Christmas and a healthy, prosperous and peaceful New Year!

Apart from doing the Prize Draw, I've been thinking about starting a business page of Facebook for Nelli Rees Lampwork. The thing is, that although everything takes a lot of time for administration, it will give me a great chance of putting the links to my Etsy and ebay listings, especially if and when I put new beads and jewellery for sale. Whenever I do it on Facebook on my personal page, I always feel like I'm bugging my FB friends with my business things. My personal FB page is kind of for my "personal" things and announcements. I think it would be a good idea to split the two. So if you, my dear followers, get an invitation to "like" my new business page on FB, this is the explanation why I've done it.

Also, as you might know, my husband Rod has been writing "The Demi-Monde" books - saga, as they call it now, because there are four books in this series. It's been very close to both of us, as Rod asks me sometimes to proof read his work, and we do discuss the plot and the characters. So I'd also like to let my friends know what's happening on the Demi-Monde side of things, and again, I'd rather use my business page for these announcements.

I've looked into it, and it's not difficult, I'll just need to put some pix together to post on my profile etc, and I'll be in business! Talk to you soon!:)

Festive Prize Draw

2011-12-17T11:03:00.015Z

Bead of the Day: "Morning Glory"

The heating in the house we are in has decided that it's going to celebrate Christmas by not working. Yesterday the boiler gave up; thank goodness, there is a gas fire in the living room, it's not amazingly hot, but at least it gives out flames - to cheer me up.

On the bead front I've been busy this week sorting out all my beads, old and new, so in the next few weeks I'll be putting strands of 80+ beads on ebay. There are all sorts, as you can see from the photos:

I've got three Tesco's "15 Caramel and Belgian Chocolate Bites" tub-fulls of beads: two of them - beads made on 2.4mm mandrel and one - on 1.4mm mandrel. Now you know what I like to eat from time to time - alas, these three tubs have been empty for a long time (chocolate-wise, I mean:)).

It's this time of year when families get together, we give presents to each other, we celebrate and feel excited for the new year to come and bring us amazing adventures. So I'm announcing a Festive Prize Draw for the followers of my blog: this beautiful and happy bead set of three "Morning Glory" lentils and three etched white donut beads to give away to one lucky follower of my blog! The lentils have my "Morning Glory" design on one side which comprises two pink flowers, several bright yellow and orange "buds" and a variegated vine going around the flowers and buds. The design is raised. The other side of the lentils does not have a raised design, but there are sways of several shades of green glass there. You can make either three pendants out of this set, or a necklace/bracelet. The pix were taken, as is usual with me, in the natural light, so I think the green on the photos is a bit darker than it is in real life - there wasn't much sun today in Derbyshire, just snow!:)

To participate in the draw just send me either a comment on this post or an e-mail - whichever is easier for you. I'll draw the name of the winner on Tuesday, the 20th December, so that, hopefully, the beads reach you before Christmas. Good luck!

New Designs for Christmas

2011-12-09T11:58:00.002Z

Bead of the Day: "Winter Wonderland"

The last post proved to be very popular, so thank you all who made comments here on the blog and on FB - very much appreciated, especially that I realise that I need a tutorial on how to use these tiny thingies.

Yesterday was - at last! - spent at the torch. Well, half of the day to be honest. There are always things in the way when you are at home, especially near Christmas time. I won't go into detail, but in the afternoon I finally got back in front of the torch - yey! I had lots of ideas, as you do when you've been away from it for such a long time, so I started melting glass happily, feeling extremely inspired. I made several focal beads, all of them with my own murrini, decorated with goldstone, silvered ivory stringer, the base bead was out of dark irovy overlaid with crystal clear in places, and of course, lots of Double Helix Aurae - for the lovely Christmas sparkle. I love Aurae - easy to get good results and it can be reduced into so many shiny colours: silver, gold, copper, and even gold and copper - with many shades. The bead with the murrini was dedicated to the star which was born for Jesus.

However, I'm using past tense here. This is because... Sadly, all my beads broke. I work in the conservatory, and to make sure there is plenty of fresh air, I open windows and the door. Yesterday was an exceptionally windy day, so no matter how hard I was trying to keep my beads in the flame, obviously, it wasn't enough. I was sad when I saw them all cracked, but I'm not anymore. I just need to work harder. The other thing is, I like the design I've come up with, especially with the star, so I'll be using it again - and it's not windy today!

One more thing to mention: I've decided to hold a raffle for my dear blog followers, and the set of beads that I'm going to give away is almost ready, I just need to make one more bead - it's always the way, isn't it? So I'll be "officially" announcing it in a couple of days, so that the beads would get to you in time for Christmas! :)

Cable Thimbles - Almost a Product Review

2011-12-06T20:46:00.010Z

Some of you who have been on FB recently might have heard that I've been making jewellery. That literally means NO making beads. I've been missing the flame and the cold in the conservatory, where my "studio" is at the moment. But. One has to do what one has to do. So many beads, so little time!

A while ago I bought these little "cable thimbles" from Palmer Metals - this company does offer best prices on sterling silver and some other stuff. I forgot all about the thimbles, as you do! So today, while looking for something else - again, those of you who have been on FB will be able to imagine just what this means on my desk! - I came across these little fellars and I thought, I'd give it a go.

The bracelet I was working on was almost ready: I only needed to attach my toggle clasp. While it is the "finishing touch" on a jewellery piece, everyone knows that attaching a clasp could take longer than making the actual bracelet itself. The first end was easy: I always start with the toggle, and here I had a lot of space wire-wise, so I pulled the stringing wire and hid it under the bead - no problem. AND I THOUGHT: hey, this is great! My bracelet ends are going to look soooo neat and professional!!! And I would do anything (well... to an extent!) for my jewellery to look just that. And I went on to attach the "toggle ring"...

... put the wire through the first groove...

...and back into the opposite one...

...got my toggle ring on...

...and began to pull the wire, and that's where all the problems started. You can see, that the thimble simply disintegrated.

It took me ages to arrange it in the way which would be acceptable to my own quality control and to customers. Another thing was happening: the tiny crimp kept getting onto it as well, unfortunately, I haven't got that photo, I was too stressed to let go of my work and take the camera to take a shot!

Verdict: at 16p per thimble (remember, you'd have to have two - for each end) as an addition to your cost and having spent a good twenty minutes putting it on... sorry, I don't think so. BUT: if you've had better experience with these, please do share it!

Quirks, Wirework and the Washing Machine Accident

2011-11-30T17:09:00.006Z

Bead of the Day: "Byzantine"

"Byzantine" has to be the bead of the day: it always cheers me up, and I get into a super-good mood when I make them. And today is one of those days: you either love it or you hate it. Or you just laugh at it - that's going to be my choice!

I've been trying to make lots and lots of jewellery recently. It's near Christmas, and I've got some beads that I can use for bracelets and things, so - great, let's do it! But, of course, I've also been making beads, so the actual jewellery-making keeps being postponed - bead making taking precedence. Today I also decided to wash pillows - god knows why, it's difficult to dry them even in dry weather! So those of you who have been on FB realise where it's all going to. Yes, the pillow exploded inside the washing machine. Never ever anything like this has ever happened before. I opened the door and... duck feathers were everywhere! Well, thanks to good friends Nicky Townsend and Jan Edwards (Jan is a writer, by the way) - they told me what to do, hoover time!!!

Then I went back to my jewellery. I had this lovely idea of making this bracelet using some of my wirework skills. All of you brilliant wireworkers, I admire your patience and reserve! After about two and a half hours (!!!) of sweating and managing to cut my finger (I really do not know what happened there!) I was finally looking at this super-duper bracelet:

Bracelet with "Quirks" beads and wirework

It's photographed on my lap, by the way, that's where I've been making it. I'm just glad that none of the duck feathers from the blooming pillow have got into the shot!

But. The bracelet was initially too short. I added this little red bead on the left at the top next to the clasp. Now it is too long. Oh, dear.

Let's see what tomorrow brings! :)xx

Flowers for Jo

2011-11-27T21:41:00.006Z

Bead of the Day: "Flowers for Jo"

About ten days ago I came across a post on Facebook. I couldn't make out who the lady was. I was sad, but it was kind of impersonal, because I didn't know. Thanks to GBUK's email received tonight, now I realise that we lost a great lampworker and a wonderful, wonderful person. So this post is dedicated to Jo Rohrer.

In those "olden" days I didn't know anything about lampwork or beads or making jewellery. One day I was happily walking around WHSmith's - oooooh, I don't know, four, five years ago? - when these beautiful beads caught my eye. Turquoise and red on the cover of Bead magazine. So I bought the mag. And discovered a whole new world! And it was only because of the beautiful beads on the cover! The beads, as it happened, had been made by Jo Rohrer.

But it was just a name then. We know the names - the stars of the lampwork community: Diana East, Ray Skene, Sally Carver... Many from abroad - Loren Stump, Akihiro Ohkama, Corina Tettinger, the list goes on... Only rarely we can see these amazing people, usually it's during demonstrations; it's quite difficult (at least it is for me) to come up to them and have a chat or possibly to become friends.

As time passed, I started making my own beads and jewellery, I went to fairs and various events. And once I was lucky to meet Jo. It was in Dulwich. She came up to us and we chatted, and she showed me her beads and her display. She said she loved fairs because they gave her a chance to meet her customers and her fellow bead artists. I remember her beads: elongated and flattened, in beautiful organic greens. After that meeting we wrote to each other; she gave me advice, congratulated me on my lampworking successes and simply just kept in touch. She was always very kind and generous sharing her knowledge: which fairs to go to, which events are cheaper than the others, what a pain Double Helix can be...

I never suspected that she was ill. Last time she wrote to me was about my book; she said she'd been reading it and it was very good and so beautiful. It was two weeks before she left us.

She was wonderful. Inspirational and very kind. My thoughts are with the ones who were closest to her.

The Bead Awards

2011-11-10T07:59:00.004Z

I can just sit here at my computer and read other people's blogs - very happy! But I've got to tell you a little about the British Bead Awards which took place in London on 15th October.

The Big Bead Show was very well attended, with lots of marvelous things to buy and many people to say hello to.

The creations of the Bead competition finalists were displayed in the Sports Bar. There were some gorgeous pieces. I can sympathise with the judges: I liked everything, and it must have been soooo difficult to decide who the winners were.

My "Matrioshka" set won 1st place in the Handmade Glass Beads and Components category. Unfortunately, we missed the actual ceremony: on the way to the racecourse we took the wrong turning and ended up somewhere else. I'd like to say Congratulations and Well done! to everybody who took part in this competition, especially to those who I know personally and who are some of my favourite people in the glass bead making community.

Chloe Menage, editor of Bead, agreed to have this pic taken with me. Thank you, Chloe, for the super event (and the award!), I have really enjoyed it!

Back Again

2011-11-08T07:58:00.006Z

Beads of the Day: "Indian Summer"

Hello again!

I cannot believe that more than a month has passed again since my last blog! And I was starting so well, really determined to keep on writing. I looked at the date of the last blog: two days later my eldest daughter was in hospital undergoing a very serious operation. So I hope you'll understand why I haven't written for some time. I've prepared a separate blog about it, but every time I try to read it through and possibly edit it, I get very emotional again, so it's still difficult at the moment. My daughter is OK now.

The beads of the Day are the "Indian Summer" set in warm shades of oranges, yellows and turquoise: like those beautiful days in autumn with the quiet sun and golden leaves, when it is still warm, but you know that it's not going to last for long, as mornings are getting colder. We had this weather only last week, but now it's turned so cold, and one of my customers has mentioned that they've had the first frost: winter is coming.

There have been good things and bad things happening - isn't life all in stripes, a bit like a zebra, I suppose. And I'll be posting more, as some things are very well worth mentioning here. At the minute I just want to say that I am back, and hopefully will stay that way.:)

Making Triangular Spacers

2011-09-22T08:27:00.005+01:00

Bead of the Day: "Triangular Spacers"

The Blogger wouldn't allow me either to see my followers, or to comment on other people's blogs - very distressing. And what are all these spaces between paragraphs, as soon as I publish my blog? I'll have to look into it.

Yesterday I wasn't doing much in terms of bead-making, unfortunately. Very rarely, but I get a day, that no matter how inspired and motivated I am, I just feel drained of all energy, and I can't do anything. Maybe, it's got something to do with the atmosphere, as it was raining yesterday. But today is sunny, and I'm all ready to make something great.

So todays' Bead of the Day is Spacer Beads. Talking about spacers: I find it quite hard to make these lovely tiny thin spacer beads which are so popular at the moment. As I found out of experience, I have to make a really very thin disc, and then quickly heat it on each side (literally, almost to pass it through the flame, the heat should be minimal), but of course I have to be careful not to overheat it, because this is when the problems start! With overheating the bead immediately becomes thicker, loses its "thin loveliness" (ha-ha! this sounds ridiculous!), and if I am completely unlucky, it becomes lopsided. Then there is only one remedy - to add more glass, but in this case forget about the spacer being thin, it'll be just like a normal plump bead, only smaller.

So! I've come up with this brilliant idea - brilliant for me, because, I have to admit, more often than not, I bugger up these little thin spacers and instead get normal small beads. And what I do when this happens is I take my marver and turn the round bead into this pretty triangular one. In my book I remember writing about square spacers - ooh, this was AGES ago, I mean, two years ago - everyone who does lampwork knows that two years means a lot in terms of your development as a lampworker. And I have to say, square spacers are actually trickier to make, as they require both pairs of four sides being parallel. With a triangular shape, however, you don't have to be so precise.

I just love them! And they have been selling quite well in sets, so hopefully, my customers love them too!
"Atlas" bead set with triangular spacer beads on the ends

Lilies and Petals, Planets and Implosion

2011-09-21T08:04:00.004+01:00

Bead of the Day: "Planetary"

Yesterday was spent developing this new design. These beads are tricky to photograph, because there is so much going on inside - they are the ones for "gazing into", if you know what I mean. There are bubbles around the top and the bottom (you can't see those in this pic), there is a core with a lovely "lily" design and a band of silvered ivory and goldstone around the encased "petals".

Ah, this "lily" design... I literally spent days mastering it. The thing was, I bought this book by Karen J Leonardo, I suppose with the main purpose to check out the competition. And there it was, I think she called it "lilypad" or something like that. I'd seen beads with this design before, and if I remember correctly, Sally Carver won a competition with them recently. So all summer I tried and tried and tried, with various degree of success, but the beads produced by me using this "imposion" technique, were far from the image I had in my head. I found this technique extremely difficult.

One day I sat there, all upset, thinking hard about how I could achieve the look of the lilies I wanted. And I thought that it would be impossible for anybody, ANYBODY, to have temperature control that perfect, to get the lovely petals around and along the mandrel by only relying on the flame. But of course, silly me!, it's a different technique altogether: this one involves layers and layers of dots being covered with bands of large amounts of clear glass, heating and waiting for the dots to get elongated!

"Yellow Waterlilies" bead set, currently for sale on ebay

Guys, I don't know about you, but here it was a real revelation. So many people use this simple design in their work, and it looks gorgeous. Well, simple I say, of course I had to practise, but I also came up with some lovely colour combinations, and I have to write another blog on that.

Coming back to the "Planetary" design, I did use a little of the "implosion" technique here: I made a core of ivory, then created a disc out of clear on one of the core's ends. Then I used Double Helix Ekho for the dots to go onto the disc and melted them: Ekho on ivory here gives this great organic palette that I like so much, and you don't have to spend time reducing it either. Encased, put some goldstone and silvered ivory around with dots of Double Helix Calipso on each end, made indentations for future bubbles, encased again. Every technique comes handy!

New Beginning

2011-09-20T07:42:00.002+01:00

Bead of the Day: "Dogdaisies"

I've decided to start again after so many months of not writing anything. There's been a lot happenning, just like, I'm sure, with everyone: you get up in the morning, you live through the day, evening comes, you've done your work, you've sent your emails, you've spoken to your family. Every day seems to be the same, but it's not, every day brings something amazing.

So to re-cap what's been happenning: my children have finished school, having had A level exams, and now they will be going to uni very shortly - hopefully, I'll keep up with my blogging, so you'll hear all about that. We've been to Russia for a couple of weeks, we could only go for a short break this year as we had to get back for the "Results!" day; we stayed at my parents datcha (a little country house) near Moscow. I've been posting on FB here and there, I even managed to upload some pix. I've sent off my entry to the gallery section of "The Flow" magazine in US for the annual "Women In Glass 2011" issue together with some info about my book, but I haven't heard anything from them, so I'm not sure if it'll make it into the mag. I've also sent an entry into one of the competitions in a British mag, but I don't think I'm allowed to blog about it just yet (sad face). I've started putting some beads into my etsy shop; I thought I might as well since I've got it. We are just about to start looking for a new home, as the rent on this house in Derbyshire is coming to an end and I'm very much looking forward to going somewhere else!!! (a very happy face).

These seem to be the major things. I've been making loads of beads, though working in the conservatory in summer turned out to be not such a great idea: when it's warm, it's really hot in there, and opening windows only helps a little, as the wind goes everywhere, including around my torch, I lose control of my temperature etc. - you know. Also I had to move my "station" to stand at a different angle to the rising sun: why do we put conservatories on the sunny side of the house? It's silly, honestly: too hot and too bright, you have to put on sunglasses and a bikini to be there. So I'm really happy now with the autumn coming, as it means one thing: more bead making!

I've also decided to start this new thing: Bead of the Day. I've pinched the idea from Rod's agent; he does "Mood of the Day". So I suppose my Bead can reflect my mood to a certain degree. And today it's "Dogdaisies" (not one, but a couple of beads) - my very new design, though this particular set has already been sold. Bright yellows and whites, dots of green and lots of tiny bubbles to put a smile on everybody's face.

2011-04-24T21:09:00.000+01:00

Busy, Busy!

2011-03-24T08:41:00.004Z

So busy, that's how it's been, and that's why I haven't posted anything since my blog after Moscow. I've been making the prize beads for the GBUK competition and more jewellery to send off to Cooper Gallery in Barnsley.

I remember writing about the prize beads before. The idea then was to make them of a design from my book, and I already had half of the planned number of beads made (even with my oxycon playing up all along!). I thought that a set of beads would probably be better than one focal: I make various types of focals, and people like different things. But with a set, even if the person who wins them doesn't like them, she or he can always make a couple of pieces of jewellery and sell them and get some money - an incentive to participate in the next year's competition!

When I got back from Moscow I found out that I had been awarded the Dan Klein Travel Bursary by the Contemporary Glass Society (CGS) worth £500. It was amazing news! I planned to go to Japan to learn how to make tonbodama, traditional japanese glass beads, in order to write a book on the methods and designs associated with them. A couple of days later we saw the terrible events in Japan... But I'm still determined to go there this coming summer.

So Rod suggested that I make tonbodama beads as a prize for this year's GBUK Bead and Jewellery Competition taking place at Flame Off (8t-9th April). What a great idea! The only thing is, it takes me about 40 minutes to make one of these beads. The most difficult part is to make the shape. When I wrote a tutorial for the book, it simply read "Make a barrel-shaped bead". Of course, to make a nice plump barrel-shaped bead, with "dimples", with a slight curve... is a tutorial in itself. I should actually write one with step-by-step pix, as I have by now figured out how to make this shape quicker, but still it takes time. Then, there is the division of the surface of the bead into three parts for three flowers. The next thing is to make sure there aren't any signs of pulling left - so you need to flame-polish really well. The last difficult bit for me is right at the very end: to reduce the accent dots of the Iris Dark Blue reduction frit stringer, because if you leave them just a touch longer in the flame, the beautiful porcelain white surface of the bead goes yellow or even brown-black within a tenth of a second, and the whole bead goes to the bin!

But here they are, sent off and received safely yesterday by Charlotte, our Chairwoman:

I have to say that I've improved, and now it takes me about 30 minutes to make one.

I've also sent off my entry to the bead competition, but although I'm really excited about the bead I've made I am not allowed to blog about it, so it'll have to wait until the middle of April!

From Russia With Love!

2011-03-15T20:24:00.007Z

Helloooooo, I'm back!

This was Moscow a couple of weeks ago, out of the window of my parents' flat:

As you can see, it was all covered in snow. Actually, this was when the snow started melting! My parents' apartment looks out to a kindergarten, it's a shame it was a bit too early when I was taking this pic, as you can't see the kiddies - they are so funny in the snow! The problem is, they just have a good time and enjoy themselves - winter is a wonderful time, you don't get mucky, just a little wet, but it's not a problem, you go inside and put your coats, hats, gloves and boots on the radiator - until the afternoon. This kindergarten looks lovely in the evening, when the street lights are on, it all looks so mysterious... Twilight used to be my fave time of day.

Apparently, the week I arrived was the coldest they had for the whole winter, temperatures going down to -25C during the day and below 30 at night. I was lucky I'd taken a proper winter coat with me, but I forgot to take a hat and I had to borrow my mum's spare pair of fur boots, as my Doc Martins just weren't cut for that sort of temperature. When you live in England, you tend to forget how cold it is out there in the world and what people have to cope with every day.

And this is the road to Domodedovo, where I landed and where I was taking off:

Domodedovo is OK, nobody can enter without their documents being checked first, so no problem.

I've had a good trip, with most of the things done on my little list. I've seen my relatives, I've been to a 55th birthday party (this is the pension age for women in Russia, so a lot of women have a celebration), I nearly met with one of my old classmates - we'll try again next time!- and I talked to a couple of Russian publishers regarding my book which I am translating into Russian. It's all been very positive indeed.

I came home and there was some amazing news waiting for me! But I have to stop now and I'll talk about it all in my next blog.

Flame Off Prize - Please Enter to Win!

2011-02-06T10:55:00.011Z

I saw an Asian glass artist talking to his glass-making gods before starting his work. Every time I want to make beads now, I come up to my oxycon and say, "Please switch on, please switch on!". Hopefully, I'll be able to take it to Tuffnells next week for a service.

Yesterday I was lucky (the oxycon did switch on almost immediately) and I managed to start on the set of beads which I'm planning to give away as one of the GBUK prizes. This year they called for sponsorship of prizes for the GBUK Bead and Jewellery Competition which will be held at the Towcester Flame Off (http://www.tuffnellglass.com/contents/en-uk/otherurl.html?url=http://www.tuffnellglass.com/contents/en-uk/d65.html) in order to popularize British handmade glass beads. For entry requirements and to download the entry form please go to http://www.gbuk.org/pages/gbuk-bead-jewellery-competition-2011/#more-149. To enter the jewellery part of the Competition, you don't have to be a GBUK member! I decided to make some of my "Mucha" design, the full tutorial is available in my book. So far I'm pleased with what I've made:

These are bright, with orange and turquoise twisties and dots (the photo, as usual with me, has been taken in natural light). The difference between these and the ones described in the book is that I have inserted some hand-pulled murrini in the same colours, so they look even better! (It was getting too much for the book, so at the time I couldn't explain the murrini technique, but I can do it in the second volume). There are only four tabs at the minute, but I'm planning to make a set which will also include bigger lentils, and some of the beads will have turquoise or orange opaque background.

I have also been proof-reading busily, as Rod wanted to send the third part of the Demi-Monde series off to his agent by the end of Friday. When I'm proof-reading, it takes me a lot longer, as I almost pronounce mentally every word I read. It's quite time-consuming, but I do enjoy it, as I get to read the drafts of novels Rod writes! Then we discuss them, and sometimes, if I'm lucky, I even manage to give Rod a good idea for something. Or so he says. By the time he finishes with those sorts of ideas I don't recognise them, but it's even better, because he is great coming up with twists and turns in his stories.

So off to make some more beads - oxycon permitting!

More Happy Ivory and Cool Fossil Beads!

2011-02-04T17:02:00.009Z

I've been busy, but not with making beads. Well...

It was my birthday last Sunday (lovely lovely day! everybody was so kind to me, I got great presents from my family and lots of good wishes from my Facebook friends!), and, as you do, I decided to try and make some beads. "To try" - that's because, as you know, my oxycon has been disagreeable lately, I really need to take it to Tuffnell for a good check. And guess what! - on Sunday it started working and I did manage to make some beads after a long time! Here they are:

As you can see, I'm still experimenting with the Effetre Cool Fossil, I just lllllove this earthy organic feel it adds to the Ivory. The bead on the left has a Dark Ivory base with large dots of Cool Fossil, worked very hot, until the glass started moving, then cooled, shaped and decorated with a twistie of Ivory and Intense Black and hand-pulled murrini of the same composition. (I was told it looks very Japanesee - yippee!). The bead in the middle is of Ivory and Cool Fossil base, but the Cool Fossil has been added in stripes, again worked very hot until it started "breaking" or "splitting" - you can see it by the "waves" created; the simple decoration here is four chips of hand-pulled murrini from a previous bead-making session (described in my blog "Cool Experimenting Part II"). The last bead, the one on the right, started as Effetre Transparent Light Amber (the photos have been taken in natural light, on a grey day - today! so you can't really see how much happy amber-coloured light this bead can radiate), then a layer of Effetre Dark Ivory was added to the surface so that parts of the Amber were left uncovered. I applied a twistie (again described in detail in "Cool Experimenting Part II") on the very edge of the Ivory and paddled it quite well, though I was keen to leave it slightly raised. At the end I decorated each side of this bead with a chip of my own murrini made in the following way:

Start with Dark Ivory, encase it with Transparent Light Amber, encase it again with Dark Ivory, cut "furrows" in the Ivory and put in stripes of Reichenbach Dark Multi stringer. When you apply this murrini, the trick is to paddle it very gently and not to overheat it so that not to spoil the complex middle. Otherwise, as you, probably, know, it will be "eaten" by the dark lines - a pretty effect, but only if you want it!

I like the etching effect on ivory, so this is just what I did: the first bead has been fully etched, the second has the lovely murrini with some shiny mirror and multicolour reduced Double Helix glass effect left unetched, and the third... Believe me, it's a work of art! I mean, of etching art! The stripes which, again, have the reduced reactive Double Helix in their composition (which is, of course, extremely difficult to catch on a photo!), have been left uneched, together with the lovely transparent Light Amber. But the Ivory part and the murrini have been etched. It looks great. I will be putting all of these on ebay over the next couple of weeks. I have to tell you that I'll be going to Moscow soon for quite a long time, but my ebay listings will be managed by Rod (he's been so kind!).

Ah, this is only a small part of what I've been up to, but the time is running out, so I'll have to come back on this in my next blog. :)!

The Prize Has Arrived!

2011-01-29T06:57:00.009Z

That was me two days ago!

Time flies, and I was positive I was doing a blog on that day, but something happened, which was my oxycon went caputski - whatever the spelling is, the idea is the same: it stopped working and nothing would make it change its mind, so I was trying to sort that little problem out (no, I haven't solved it yet).

But back to the beginning. I was absolutely thrilled when a package arrived from Jane Tyrrell of "Jane's Jems and Jewels" and this was why I had a big smile on my face. I llllove receiving parcels, especially when it's a prize! Everything was really nicely wrapped, with ribbons and a card:

Whenever I unwrap something I feel a little upset that all the beautiful wrapping is going to be thrown away! I used to keep ribbons and things, but when we started moving houses I had to say goodbye to my treasures, as it was getting a bit out of hand, my collection of wrapping things was getting much too big! So when I opened the parcel from Jane, there were these lovely cards and the necklace presented in a pretty organza bag with little sparkly bits on it (I haven't seen one like this before).

And these are two more shots of my prize card and necklace - I love taking photos of pretty things!!! As you can see, Jane's handmade jewellery and cards are very individual, so check out her shop if you haven't done so yet (www.etsy.com/shop/janesjemsandjewels), I'm certainly coming back!

Second Review on Amazon!

2011-01-28T19:40:00.004Z

I've just gone to Amazon.co.uk and what do I see but an excellent second review of "Glass Bead Jewelry Projects"! Wow, thank you so much, Lynsey! Here it goes:

"5.0 out of 5 stars Beautiful and inspirational Book, 27 Jan 2011
By
lynsey adams "Kanga" (England) - See all my reviews(VINE VOICE)
This review is from: Glass Bead Jewelry Projects (Paperback)

This is a beautiful book, and very good value, sold at a huge discount from the cover price. It is one of the few lampwork books published in the UK, so that you can be reasonably sure that the materials recommended are readily available.

What I particularly liked was that the author is not only giving us detailed instructions on some stunning projects, but from her own experience tells of the expensive mistakes and pitfalls to be avoided.

As another reviewer says, it isn't difficult to find a lampworking book that tells you the basics of making a bead, the tools needed and how to set them up. Where this book really scores, is that the author goes on to illustrate the book with her own extremely beautiful beads, with instruction on not only how to make them, with detailed step by step illustrations, but follows this with inspiring ideas on how to make each particular type of bead into a piece of stunning jewellery.

She begins by telling us exactly what type and quantity of glass to use for the bead: 'if you want your bead to look exactly like mine you will need:', and follows this with the same information on the materials and tools needed to make the jewellery. Experienced beadmakers might not need this, but it is very helpful to a near beginner.

Projects are graded into 'beginners', intermediate' and 'advanced' level, and although I think that it would certainly take a good deal practice to obtain the results in the book, even to a near beginner like myself they do actually look achieveable. There are a few exceptions to this towards the end of the book which look much more difficult, but they are in the 'advanced' section and could be worked toward. However, even the beads in the 'beginners' section are stunningly beautiful and not just padding for the book.

This is also a great book for furthering your own ideas and designs if you are past the stage of needing step by step instructions. Change a colour here, transfer a technique there, and you can use the beads shown in the book as templates for you own unique beads and jewellery.

Many other lampworking books show beads made by other artists - beautiful to look at, but often one is left frustrated and wondering, 'how did they DO that?'. This book shows the author's work exclusively, and I don't think it suffers from doing that, as the work is of a very high standard. It reads like a series of excellent and detailed personal tutorials, written in an accessible and friendly way.

One more thing that I particularly liked - and this is only a very personal opinion - there is not a sign of any glass animal beads, distorted faces, vessels, cottages, gnomes, cartoon characters, baskets of flowers, or any other type of hideously naff, (albeit technically skilful), creations so beloved by authors of certain other lampworking books.

If you want ideas and inspiration, with detailed instructions for making beautiful beads and jewellery, with this book you just can't lose. "

"Cool" Experimenting Part II - Looks Like a Win!

2011-01-26T07:06:00.007Z

Yesterday I was making more beads with E cool Fossil. I decided to wrap it up with silver foil, and the result is shown on photo 1. Maybe, I needed to heat it more, but the shape of the base bead was so good that I was reluctant to make it back into molten glass. So it just darkened without producing any amazing effects. But don't worry, we bead artists are inventive when it comes to decorating. I wound some twistie left from the previous session (which, if I remember, was E cool Fossil and DH Aurae), paddling it down firmly, and then applied several chips of my murrini (this one is E Ivory with R Dark Multi). As the R stripes decided to be rather dark and didn't want to change into any other colour, I applied dots of DH Aurae with a stringer, reduced them to give this metallic effect and then decided to stop and put it away.

Next I had a better idea. Using just the Fossil on its own gave me quite a dark shade, which I wasn't entirely happy with. So I made the base bead with E Ivory and then decorated it randomly with Effetre cool Fossil, melted it in completely and kept on heating the bead up to the point when the middle of the bead started to move. It took me some time, but the result was great: the Ivory together with Fossil started "to break", the two colours interacting with each other, creating a lovely stony pattern. I cooled the bead down a little, shaped it and applied three murrini chips around the middle of the bead. The rest was even simpler: heat the middle of the murrini, poke it with a spare mandrel (that's what I do anyway), apply a large drop of crystal clear on top of the indentation, heat and watch how the bubble apprears. The very last bit was to apply some dots of DH Aurae (why is it always Aurae - oh, I've got an Aurae stringer right here!) and to reduce them a little. How more organic can you go?

Photo 3 shows a close-up of this lovely marble effect. The hand-pulled murrini here consists, if I remember correctly (I really need to start putting it all down for my next book), of Effetre Ivory, Intense Black, Double Helix Aurae (again) and somewhere there there is also Effetre Med Amber encasing it all. I've already got a name for them: "Stone Blooms" (Rod helped, as usual).

I was so busy that I'd run out of prepared mandrels! But I've still got to work out how to make nice beads with Effetre cool Kiwi...

Yesterday I found out that I'd won a lovely prize from Jane Tyrrell, a talented jewellery designer who lives in the UK. It was very kind of Jane to organise this giveaway prize draw, and I was thrilled to be pronounced one of the two winners! (A big Thank You to Jane's son!!!) So now I can't wait to see the lovely necklace designed and made by Jane, and some beautiful cards handmade by Jane which she will be posting to me. I was so happy that I went to Jane's Etsy shop (www.etsy.com/shop/janesgemsandjewels) and bought some more of her cards - they are really pretty!

A great day!

"Cool" Experimenting Part I

2011-01-25T06:55:00.011Z

Yesterday was a pleasant day - I mean, it wasn't freezing as usual. Although the temperature was only about +4C and it was grey, there was hardly any cold wind, so it felt warm (-ish). I'd been waiting for the moment to get to my torch to try out my new ideas and these "cool" Effetre colours I'd just bought.

To start with, the E "cool" Fossil didn't like my way of introducing it into the flame. I even did my little trick with touching the tip of the glass with my fingers before it went in - no, there were bits flying, so this is something to remember: to be extra careful at the beginning. The first photo shows a bead with the E cool Fossil base decorated with a twistie of R Dark Multi and E Ivory. Clearly, the twistie was too dark for this combination, so forget about this one. The next photo has an E Ivory base bead with a twistie of E cool Fossil and DH Aurae - obviously, the twistie should have been less "twisted" with bigger part of the Fossil to be better seen. Never mind, there is always tomorrow, i.e., today!

So when I realised that I wasn't getting anywhere with the new glass, I went back to my old "Art Nouveau" design (Mucha - the tutorial is included into my book) and I was relatively pleased with the result.

Some of my other experiments were twisting R Dark Multi with E Ivory and working it in various temperature environments, but it kept coming out green, or much too dark for a pleasing effect. Here is the pic:

All in all, a good bead designing day and I can't wait to start it again today!

Review in Bead Magazine and "Black Swan"

2011-01-23T12:31:00.005Z

Hooray, the book has been reviewed in the Bead magazine Feb/March issue. This was a very pleasant surprise indeed. So far several people mentioned that the book is good for those who are new to lampworking. My aim, of course, was also to introduce wider audience to jewellery making - there is a chapter on the various bits and pieces, like findings and techniques, needed to make the jewellery shown in the book. That, I thought, is a good feature, especially compared to other books on lampwork, which usually have an enormous amount of photos of beautiful jewellery, but never explain how to make it. Nevertheless, the review is very good, so a big Thank You to Bead magazine!

I hadn't thought about checking with Bead if they had any spare copies of the book to give away, simply because I didn't know that a review was coming, so I might write to them and ask, and maybe I'd be able to write an article for them or a tutorial similar to the ones in the book. Also I've checked their competitions. I remember that previously they planned to have an issue dedicated to glass, so I will have to check this out too: I have noticed that there is a Readers' Challenge entitled "Glass, Glorious Glass" with the deadline for entries as 9th Feb. It would be very upsetting if I've missed this one!

I went to see "Black Swan" yesterday. I don't think I would have gone had I known what it was going to be like. I expected a psychological drama, but there was a lot of gory bits, lesbian sex (no wonder, male critics love it!) and other very scary things. There were good things too: the camerawork was great, the atmosphere of the main heroine living in a small closed shell-like world was portrayed very well. But Natalie Portman, although clearly having had some serious training and having spent a lot of time and effort, isn't a professional ballet dancer, and I'm sorry to say at times I kept remembering lovely ladies-competitors in "Strictly Come Dancing". The other problem was, just like Thomas, the ballet director, noted, Portman can't act sensual, and there was no sparkle between her and Vincent Cassel. There was one funny bit: without spoiling the plot, I'll just say: hiding the body. Ha-ha-ha!!! The ending could have been a lot more dramatic. The film left me drained, so, I suppose, that should mean that it was good. I'm sure a lot of people will like it, but it wasn't for me.

New Exciting Glass Arrives!!!

2011-01-21T11:48:00.005Z

Ah, this cold seems to be going on forever! I can't start making any beads, though I have so many ideas! This is the problem with sitting in the radiator-less conservatory. Or, maybe, I'm just being lazy. Anyway, the other day I was thinking about what I was going to get from Tuffnell Glass with my £25.00 voucher. I had to go on their website to remind myself of all the beautiful and useful things that one can buy there. Effetre "cool" colours caught my eye - again. I hadn't tried them before: the thing is, one never knows how to work with the glass that one has never used previously, and what to expect from it. But most importantly, these "cool" colours look so strange on the photos, that I'd been struggling with getting ideas for beads made out of this type of glass. However, this time it just dawned on me! So I bought some Fossil Dark and some Kiwi. It arrived today, and now I'm just waiting for the weather to improve, so that I can open the door and make my beads away! Check out the results! :)

Making a Rosary and Jane's Blog Prize Draw

2011-01-18T10:03:00.010Z

"Rosary" was a new word for me this morning when I asked Rod what it was in English. My brother had asked me some time ago to make him some beads for a rosary (he reads about meditation, numerology and things like that). It was a challenge to come up with a design which would be simple yet effective; I really wanted something quite special. His birthday was approaching too, so this was going to be my present. Where there is a will, there is always a way. It so happened that I started working with Double Helix Ekho, and I have to say, I love this glass. I couldn't get enought of it, I tried lots of things with it. But wrapping it around a black base covered in strips of silver leaf and then encasing it did the trick! The beads come out looking so warm and shiny, with lots of colour inside. They remind me of honey and warm summer days!

This is it - you know what I mean! They look gorgeous no matter what lighting you are using: the photo on the left was taken with the weak January sun out, the photo on the right - just in daylight. So simple, yet so beautiful!

I have made forty of them, that's what I was asked. Then I started reading about how to make a rosary, and I realised that I needed one special bead, maybe, a little bigger in size. So I thought I was going to make one with my "Angel" design, but this time not on the ivory base, but possibly also with Double Helix and encased, with the figure of the Angel coming up only at a certain angle of lighting. I'm still thinking about it though. Nothing is ever simple.

I've entered a prize draw on Jane Tyrrell's blog:

http://jane-janesjournal.blogspot.com/2011/01/new-year-and-my-1st-giveaway.html so I'm sitting here getting excited - you never know, I might just win! Those of you who haven't yet entered still have some time to do it!

Voucher from Tuffnell Glass and a Hoped-For Book Review!

2011-01-16T11:31:00.007Z

Some of you might have seen this design already, it was my entry into the "Beads & Beyond" Jewellery Maker of the Year competition. It was inspired by Van Gogh's famous painting, hence the name "Van Gogh: Sunflowers". I was very proud of it, as finally I was able to explore the "painting" possibilities of working with glass colours. And, of course, my favourite goldstone insertions as the middles of flowers are also present, and again, I think, they are very successful design-wise.

We were not allowed to mention or to show the pix anywhere so that the public would vote not knowing whose work it was. It was a very pleasant surprise when I received news that my beads were short-listed for the award. Never mind that I didn't get it in the end, after all, I was up against many very talented designers whose work I admire. But I was even more pleasantly surprised when yesterday I got in the post a £25.00 voucher for Tuffnell Glass products as my reward for being a runner-up! Yippee! So now I am very excited about spending it!!! I'll have to go through Tuffnell's website carefully, as this should be really a present to myself - any suggestions?

Also I had another piece of extremely great news: finally one lovely lady posted a very good review of my book on amazon.co.uk, giving it five stars! Here it is:

"***** Lovely lampwork book, 11th Jan 2011 by Jessica R. Mytum (Lees, UK)

The thing about lampworking is that there aren't that many books about it that don't have all the basics of how to make a round bead, a tube bead and so on. This was a great book for the lampworker who already knows a little bit about lampworking and is keen to make some more complex beads. The price means that it's great value for money compared to tutorials that can be bought from bead artists.

Each style of bead is demonstrated with plenty of pictures and then in the second section of the book is shown how to incorporate it or them into a lovely piece of jewellery.

Highly recommend."

Thank you so much, Jessica, for this lovely review!

Going to the Forbidden Planet for a Signing

2011-01-15T09:40:00.006Z

Yesterday was the Old Russian New Year, so my best wishes to everyone!

I've been busy helping Rod to promote his book, "The Demi-Monde: Winter", which involved going to London. I like London, it's always fun. I guess, I'm still a city girl at heart. Crowds, dust, traffic jams - brilliant. Rod had a signing at the Forbidden Planet, and it was interesting to meet the people who came to buy his book. He insisted that I do a little dedication in Russian from one of the main characters, Vanka Maykov, a dashing young conman. So I was busy too, not just opening the book on the right page and blotting Rod's signature at the end, but writing "With the very best wishes from Vanka Maykov" in Russian (and being very nervous not to make a mistake!).

Talking about blotting. Rod has had a special stamp made in the shape of three Valknuts - the emblem of the ForthRight Sector of the Demi-Monde - which also says "The Demi-Monde: Winter". He stamps this first volume of the Demi-Monde saga with it, plus he has a special numbering stamp, which he says he is going to use up to 999, and after that he'll be just putting his signature down. So there is a lot to dry out when you do many books altogether. I had to find a blotter - this old-fashioned piece of office and, for me especially, post office equipment, and it wasn't simple. But the good old ebay helped, as always. To be more precise, the company called "Lucky 7 Pens" (or lucky7pens as their ebay member name). They were terrific: I bought it late in the afternoon and wrote on my paypal payment that I'd love to have it posted asap. They came back to me immediately, so I explained that I needed it for London etc. They posted it specially that night, after their other things had already been despatched, so I got my blotter the following morning. This is what I call Service. Thank you so much, guys!

The Forbidden Planet also video-interviewed Rod for their website, and the three parts of this interview are now also on youtube ( http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xVyjxjeXpFM) - for those of you who are interested. :) I thought it went very well, considering that nobody had seen the questions of the interview beforehand.

We had dinner in a Greek restaurant with Rod's colleagues from Quercus Publishing, including Rod's new editor. That was great fun: some people just open up from a different angle when they are not in the office, and it was great to see that they all have such good sense of humour!

Overall, it was refreshing to go down to the capital, and we both enjoyed it very much.

2010-12-31T15:37:00.003Z

P.S. to the previous blog: since my blog of the mid-December Rod has had a couple of really excellent reviews of "The Demi-Monde: Winter", notably, in "SciFiNow" and on www.amazon.co.uk ! So, I suppose, I should delete my post and just be happy! :)

Happy New Year and Keep Lampworking!

2010-12-31T12:03:00.006Z

After a long sulking pause I'm back in the saddle! Lots of things have happened since my last blog, some of them excellent, some of them not so good, but the mood today, on the last day of 2010, is to go into the new year with a cheerful smile.

I always make the "Berry! Christmas" beads for Christmas. Today, however, I've decided to show one of my other "winter festive" beads. It was made on a pink dichroic base, which you can just about see on the close-up photo. There are some large melted-in transparent green dots encased into crystal clear. The rest is just the surface decoration. The branches were made with my favourite encased stringer, with Dark Silver Plum instead of black - it gives these lovely charcoal-silvery lines which catch the sun. There are blobs of transparent grass green, paddled, then pulled in the shape of a holly leaf and finally cut with the razor tool to give this "veiny" effect. When you look close, of course, especially in the sun, this cutting has given the leaves an almost marbled feel - brilliant! And, to finish off, a couple of red dots for berries: light red opaque as a base, covered with a dot of striking red - or even orange if you want a brighter colour.

To finish off, I part-etched the bead: the clear background has this soft glow perfectly offset by the frosty shine of the holly branches, leaves and berries.

May I wish you all a peaceful and prosperous New 2011 Year, with lots of happy and exciting things! Happy New Year! xx

2010-12-15T17:16:00.003Z

No, not very happy at all.

After lots of travelling lately today I was poorly and had to stay in bed until after lunch - this never happens. Then I got up only to discover that I didn't win anything in the Beads & Beyond competition this year - what's new. The only thing I can say is that my understanding of "original" differs a lot from the majority of the B&B readers and judges. I thought Becky Fairclough's Peacock was outstanding. But never mind.

The most horrendous thing though was the review of Rod's book "The Demi-Monde" in the SFX which came out today. It was just a pack of lies and made up crap written in the most malicious way. I couldn't believe what I was reading. As if the reviewer was envious that it wasn't himself who had come up with this brilliant idea for this brilliant love story - you see, they call it "steam punk", but in the end it is a beautiful novel about real love and real heroes. With lots of good humour and wit - so enjoyable!

It was very much like when they reviewed my album "Jazz Noir" in "Jazzwize"; I still remember the ending: "...And "The Boy From Ipanema"? - ouch!" - I am not pulling your leg, these are the very words that prat used!

This review thing made me so cross, I had to write it all down in my blog to calm down a bit. The book, according to this person, is so bad that he gave it three stars and said that it would keep you hooked. I just hope that all those people in Poland, Russia, Germany, Italy, the rest of Eastern Europe, who have bought the rights to the book and are now busily translating it, and, of course, guys in the US have seen something in this book that Mr Holt of SFX has failed to see - or, maybe, he got a bit jealous?

What Is Your Name?

2010-11-30T21:45:00.007Z

I've got this idea about these little creatures. They are beads, of course, (what else?), I've made several today. What to call them? The funny (or weird) thing is, it follows you with its eyes! The colours didn't come out very well because I've used a really awful lighting from a natural light bulb in the kitchen (hence the horrible bright blue background - sorry, not my choice of decor!), but you can see the eyes! I'm going to part-etch it as I always do with these: the sparkling dots and the blob of the face are going to be left shiny (together with the hearts, there are two of them - one on each side), the rest will be my fav matte. I don't think these are for sale. They are not terribly commercial, but then they were not intended to be. Just something that had to be got out. I'm sure you know what I mean! :)

Working Again! Yippee!!!

2010-11-26T18:43:00.006Z

Just as I was about to do a blog on how I bought myself a new table which was going to be my bench in Derby - mind you, that was probably not going to be terribly exciting! - which is picture 1, I actually had a very busy day yesterday.

The morning was so bright and sunny, the garden and the village looked so gorgeous in the sparkling winter sun, that I thought it would be a good idea to unpack all my bead making stuff. OK, it was cold. The conservatory I am in doesn't have any heating. Well, there is underfloor heating, but as we are renting this house, I am not sure how to programme it, so I just put on many-many layers of warm clothes. My Russian valenkis (felt boots) are handy too. So I managed to take everything out of boxes, Rod fixed the station on the wooden surface, and everything is working! (picture 2).

I've managed to make some beads today, and sadly the cold isn't the main problem. It's ventilation, as always! So now I'm thinking how I am going to fix my extractor fan. You see, I thought as it was a conservatory, the air would be floating in and out through the open windows. Nope, it doesn't. If I keep the door open it's more or less OK, but not perfect. I can still smell the gases, so tomorrow I'll try out some ideas.

Another quite upsetting thing is that I am soooooo out of practice :( . I tried to make my "Sparkling" beads, and putting those dots in a very precise pattern proved to be quite a challenge. You can see what I mean: dots are all over the place! It didn't help either that I picked out the wrong Double Helix - this is Clio, but it should have been, I think, Aurae. Never mind. As Ellen in "Gone With the Wind" used to say, tomorrow is another day! :)

Website Update and Other News

2010-11-25T09:03:00.004Z

The work on the updating of my website is going on. I haven't expected Nigel (http://www.nigelrobinson.com/), who we've been working with on the design and development of my website as well as the Demi-Monde website, to come up with all these ideas - last night!

This is a little preview of what my new opening page is going to look like. As Nigel very rightly commented, the bit in the middle of the stylised N is very important as it is the thing which sets this particular N from others. So he was reluctant to put the words "Nelli Rees Lampwork" across it, and now I know why. These four examples are very pretty, but again, as Nigel commented, although the big stylised N works, the lettering doesn't as it is too small and can't really be seen very well. So Nigel also prepared a couple of other options, and they are gorgeous. The problem is, one of them has lettering on the black background, and the other - on the cream one. So now I have this dilemma: black or white? Difficult.

I have finished work on the article for the Making Jewellery mag which should be in the April issue. They obviously want it to coincide with the release of my book in the States which is scheduled for the 5th of April 2011. It is actually good, because if I book a stall at the Flame Off on the 8th-9th of April 2011 it will give me something to display!

I've also finished my article for the GBUK Autumn-Winter Newsletter. It is called "Book or not 2 Book", but I am not sure if they decide to call it something different. Sabine Little, who sadly is not going to remain the Newsletter Editor, very kindly accepted it for the issue that she is going to put together before she leaves this post :( . I mean, :) for being accepted! I tried to make it funny, I hope it'll come through.

Visit to Yorkshire

2010-11-21T15:49:00.006Z

Friday was the loveliest day!

We had to go and see Nigel, who is a designer and who has designed both Rod's and my websites. He lives in Driffield, so we thought as we were going to drive all the way up North, we would take this opportunity and visit the Cooper Gallery in Barnsley where some of my jewellery is sold. This was a very good decision. Barnsley is only literally 5 min away from the M1, so one second you are on the motorway, and the next - you are in the town centre! Barnsley is a lovely place. The day, when we were leaving Derby, was foggy, cold and miserable. But as soon as we drove into Barnsley, the sun was shining, the air was crisp, and I even got too hot in my usual winter coat! And the Yorkshire accent! I think I miss it all.

We had a cup of coffee and a bacon roll in a pub and then found our way to the Gallery which was right in the centre. It is a great place, with lots of ceramics, silver, knitted things, framed photos - anything you like! The jewellery set which is going to be the top prize in the Friends' of the Cooper Gallery's Christmas event (www.barnsley.gov.uk/friends-of-the-cooper-gallery) is displayed right at the entrance together with a signed copy of my book. In fact, all jewellery by all artists is displayed really nicely, well done guys and girls in the Gallery! We bought a couple of lovely things for our daughters' Christmas stockings. After that we went around the town centre and did some more shopping (there are some very good shops there, including fashions for men which is always difficult to find). I even managed to buy this lovely purple wool for a sweater (I don't know when I'm going to have time to knit it!) plus some wool for decoration around the neck and on the ends of the sleeves, which is also purple but it has big fluffy blobs here and there, I've never seen anything like this before, so it will be a challenge to knit something out of it. In other words, if you've never been to Barnsley it is well worth a visit, and it's easy to get to!

Then we drove on to Malton near York to get our "Yorkshire Pot" from Derek Fox the butchers. It has been several years now that we have Yorkshire Pot for Christmas, even though now we don't live in Scarborough, and it takes us some time to go and get it. Mr Fox was his usual grumpy self, noting that I should have picked the Pot up the day before etc, etc. (I wonder who is the customer here!). But I was determined to be pleasant and happy, so I just missed what he was saying!

Then to Driffield. Nigel had moved into a new house, and it was great to see them all there. We had a few things to discuss. As I am becoming better known in the lampworking and jewellery making community, my website needs to be updated. It has been dormant for some time now, as I find it easier to sell beads from ebay. One of the reasons is that it takes me time to put stuff on the website, especially the formatting of the photos. So this needed to be addressed. Also I had to think long and hard about a new image and my new logo. I love my little heart in the logo, but the decision was taken that it would be better to have just one image, which needs to be strong and easily recognisable. Of course, I've always had my special N which I designed out of two Nordic runes: "laguz" and "laguz" reversed. This was decided to become the main image from now on. I will also be incorporating it into my jewellery, as I have always planned. I have to investigate how much it would cost to make it into clasps for bracelets and necklaces. The cost of the silver Art Clay is ferocious, so possibly I could make it out of copper clay. There are other possibilities as well, but I need time to look into every one of them. I think it will be really cute to have my N on a clasp or even as a simple charm. So... lovely day, but lots to do!

Winter is Here! (And It's Only November - What to Expect Next?!)

2010-11-16T19:55:00.007Z

Winter has officially arrived in Derbyshire! I took these pictures yesterday morning, and it was even worse today! -3.

But I found out that my book was No. 24 in the 100 best-selling books on Amazon yesterday (in Books > Home and Garden > Crafts > Jewellery and Beadwork) and No. 51 today! This was really extremely good news indeed! To make the top 100 is unbelievable! Especially that I am competing with such popular things like metal clay and beading. So I was very chuffed!

I also treated myself to buying one of the beads by Michou Pascale Anderson. She lives in Germany and makes colourful designs. There isn't a lot of depth, but the colour combinations are lovely. When I received the bead in the post together with a little leaflet about the designer I learnt that she is half-French and half-Jamaican, which could explain the designs she favours. We all must have some sort of a pre-memory in our brain - is it all pre-programmed? When Diana East saw me wearing those beads I made on the last bead-making day in Norfolk, she thought they looked "very Russian"!

Going back to my topic on photography, I was a little disappointed to see that the bead I fell in love with from a picture wasn't quite as bright in real life after all... Ahh, there is still a LOT to explore with glass colours!

Realistic or Pretty?

2010-11-14T09:22:00.011Z

Sunday morning... Usually there is lots to do, and I never get to the computer until about 11 o'clock, but yesterday it was my daughter's eighteenth birthday party, and Rod and I went away; now we are back, but people aren't up yet, so what a perfect chance to do one's blog!

I've always wanted to write about photography. Everybody knows how important it is, especially to show your beads to people who want to buy them. The beads should look good but realistic. A lot of bead artists use very strong lighting for their shots, or take photos with a flash. What I found is that all this changes the colours a lot - or is it just my camera? So I usually opt for either very soft and "peaceful" (as I call them) shots of beads on my window sill, or in the sunlight - for a much stronger sparkly effect.

For example, when I was preparing this shot for my book, which in the end didn't make it, I laid out this "Mermaids' Eyes" bracelet on the window sill and just had to wait for the right light. It happened in the end, but this was one of the most difficult shots I'd ever taken. The reduced Double Helix Triton dots have a lot of colour in them, and it changes depending on the angle at which you look at them. It was important to capture this incredible change.

This other photo shows more amazing colours you can get from Double Helix. It was taken in the open, but not in the sun, as I was worried about "overcooking" the colours - you can get a whole rainbow effect from these, but I always leave this to the customer: when they open the parcel and discover beads which look even better in real life than on the photo, I should imagine they are going to be very pleased!

Etching, Etching

2010-11-12T09:06:00.012Z

As I have been unable to make beads, I have been looking at the ones I made long ago. The truth is, I love etching. The effect of this unusual matte finish on glass fascinates me. Of course, you can "get rid" of the shine and sparkle if you put some baking soda on your creation at the end, but while I'm making a bead I never actually know exactly what I'd like it to be. So there is always a choice when you get them out of the kiln: to etch or not to etch.

Full etching is easy. But, of course, now I like the idea of combining the matte and the shine, and this is where it becomes extremely time consuming. I remember, several years ago, when I was only starting, Clare Scott wrote about a set on her website how it took her ages to create this effect covering the dots with nail varnish and etching the background. Now not only I cover things, then, when they dry, I go round with a magnifying glass (no, not really, only kidding!), inspecting all the areas I want etched, cleaning the bits which were accidentally covered with varnish, or adding more nail varnish on the tiny spots and lines if I want them left shiny. Ridiculous, I say to myself. But what can I do - I'm addicted to it!

This bead is only just over an inch long (28mm), with Effetre Cobalt Blue transparent base and various stringers and twisties made with Double Helix Triton (I believe, as I made it literally ages ago!). Not a difficult bead to make, just takes time to prepare :) The "ribbon" effect in the middle is a simple twistie of white and Periwinkle Blue. I liked the "ribbon" being uneven, it adds a certain character to this pattern, it also echoes the asymmetrical effect the mirrored Triton twisties turned into. Here is a close-up. I have to say I am very pleased with the result.

I've got this very dotty bead which I now decided to etch too, so I'll show what happened later!

Becky's Blog, 111 stars and Taking Photos in the Rain :)

2010-11-04T11:07:00.006Z

Becky Fairclough of Chameleon Designs, being an amazing glass artist and making amazingly beautiful beads and things, also is a truly beautiful person. Whenever I see her at fairs and meetings, she always smiles, always happy, always has a chat with her numerous friends and acquaintances. I was really happy when she told me that she ordered my book; now she received it and wrote a whole blog about it! :) You can read it on http://www.chameleonsdesigns.blogspot.com/ . I am feeling so fluffy inside! :) :) :)

Yesterday I realized that now I have 111 feedback stars on ebay! I thought it was a pretty cool number. It shows that you are not a novice, and you have sold a considerable amount of stuff, and that customers care to leave a nice feedback about what they bought from you. I always thought that once I have over a hundred of these stars I will be very pleased indeed (you see, some customers don't leave anything, and it isn't because they are dissatisfied, but they might forget or be busy). But now, of course, I am dreaming of, say, 500 stars! I don't know if I'll ever be able to produce as much as feedbacks for a 1000 items! But you never know...

Also yesterday I was very clever and I took photos of the beads I was going to put on ebay in advance. I usually list items on Friday, and usually Friday is a very hectic day: choosing and additionally inspecting beads (lots of noise, I tell you!), cleaning (for a 10th time) and polishing (for a 20th time) the beads which would be ready to be photographed, taking photos, choosing photos, tagging and naming them, ooooh! busy. Then the actual writing of the descriptions, measuring etc. When I woke up I saw a lovely sunrise, which was surprising as all night it was raining. Remembering where we live now (it rained a LOT LESS in Norfolk) I used the sunshine for these great photos of my beads. Here's one. I should have called the beads something like "Lunaglow", but this great thought only came to me this morning, so they'll just have to be simply "Lentils"!

What an Exciting Day! Mood: Busy

2010-11-03T13:39:00.011Z

Yesterday was an amazing day!

First of all, the day before I received a message from this lovely guy, Kevin Clark, who got my book, which apparently arrived at his place last Saturday (wow! - 10 out of 10 to the GMC for organising themselves on time!), and he wrote a lovely note to me about it! But yesterday he allowed me to put it on my blog, so here it is:

"I received your book through Amazon on Saturday, love it. It's really well laid out and for a newbie in the lampworking field (well 4 months) makes a lot of sense. Love the fact that you can make a bead then for the jewellery makers carry on and make your piece."

Wheeee!!!!! I was thrilled!

Then all of a sudden the Making Jewellery team came back and said that they would publish this "10 Questions" thing about me in their Issue 25. Hooray, at last! One would think that as GMC Publications own the Making Jewellery mag, there would be a lot more connection between the editorial teams - well, not so! I've been nagging for ages about an article, so yes! yes! yes!!! OK, issue 25 is a long way away, it's the April issue, if I can count correctly, and this 10 Questions feature is a bit boring - the questions are all the same for everybody, they don't really fit very well with a lampworker, but never mind, this is the format - what can you do? I'm just so glad that they'll do it! So a sneaky preview of one of the photos I'm gonna use in there:

These are my "Gaillardia" beads, I make them from time to time, I just love the goldstone middles, and this green background is also one of my favourite greens. I start with white (any white really) then encase it into my favourite transparent emerald green which, I think, is now sold as "mid dark green" - I just love this shade! - so it comes out this lovely bright green with the added bonus of the following: if you decorate the surface, then you can see the shadows on the white, so it looks extra mysterious!

Next I received the actual 10 questions so I can now buckle down, which I have done actually. I sat at my computer all day, dilidently choosing the photos - only max 8. It's a real pity that I can't do any lampworking at the mo, as I've got soooo many ideas, so I'll have to use the old pix of the stuff I made in the summer. Hey! never mind! :) :) :)

Then I also approached the GBUK Newsletter team, and Sabine Little came back and said "yes" to my plan of writing a piece on how I did it with the book etc, so this was just really great news too! You never know how people might treat your contacting them: they might think that you are too pushy. But the book is out there, and I need to promote it somehow - you know what I mean!

It was raining yesterday, but I didn't notice - I was soooooo busy! Lovely-jubbly! xxx

Holiday!!! in Hurghada :)

2010-11-02T17:00:00.014Z

Ahhh, we went on holiday!!!!!!!

This is the Alps!

Not that I've never been to Switzerland, but, let's say, it was some time ago, so even seeing it like this, from the window of an airplane, was very exciting.

We went to Egypt, to this interesting place called Hurghada. One of the activities was to go snorkelling to a beautiful island the name of which escapes me, but you can see our Flotilla (well, just about!), sorry the photos have to be small!

Here you can just see lots of people snorkelling. I love the colour of the sea! So much like my beloved Effetre Light Turquoise Transparent!

Rod said that this way of snorkelling wasn't very fun. There were too many people coming from too many boats, so all the wildlife, whatever had survived the noise from the boats' engines, had hidden away.

I tried some snorkelling too. Now you have to remember, that I am not a natural swimmer, but if Rod says I can do it, I will at least try! This was the scariest of my experiences in life! Even when I was going to have a baby, this wasn't so scary. I just couldn't master this "breath through the mouth" thing at all. I think, you either can do it, or you can't. Luckily for me, Rod was nearby. We had been promised dolphins, but it wasn't a dolphin who saved my life, it was my husband! I don't have a pic of me snorkelling, the children got too worried about me to take pix!

This is a happier situation - Nelli Rees is relaxing in a lovely Asian restaurant (at the resort) with a glass of wine! This was on Saturday. It was very nice indeed!

I love the sea! When we lived in Scarborough, we would often go for a walk on the seafront. People used to say, we take it for granted, but I never did. If you are born in Moscow, or, I should imagine, in any other enormously big city, with heat, and dust, and millions of cars, you never take the sea, or hills, or forests, or fields for granted. You just know how special they are.

This sea, Red, was very warm.

Up to about the day when we had to go back to England. All of a sudden a fresh wind started blowing from the sea, and everything changed. This photo was taken on our last day there, and you can see there aren't a lot of people swimming. (Lots of them were swimming in the pool, but I am not a great fan of pools - sorry!). :)

And this is the last picture of my Egyptian adventure - check out those skies!

This is "Sunrise Mamlouk Palace", booked through Thomas Cook.

The best part of it was the rooms. They were huge and, most importantly, ABSOLUTELY sound proof! I've never been at a resort with that level of sound-proofing.

We got what we wanted: to be away, in the sun, near a warm sea, to get tanned. There were some minor things, but overall it was great! This was our first holiday in five years.

Packaging

2010-10-15T09:11:00.004+01:00

Whether one likes it or not, packaging is very important. I remember getting a parcel from my good friend Michelle of http://www.hmbm.co.uk/ (Hand Made By Me) - she makes lovely pieces from polymer clay beads - which was a bright pink shiny envelope, and getting so excited and happy just from the look of it! I, of course, like to re-cycle, so I often re-use the envelopes I get from other people: my jewellery bits and pieces, books etc. But I do pay a lot of attention to what and how I put inside. Well, of course, one doesn't want to go mental and spend lots of money on the stuff that will end up in a bin anyway, but your product has to be presentable.

I have been using these dark green boxy-things, made out of tough paper, you can open and close them on both sides. They were quite good, but not ideal: apparently, they wouldn't go through a letter-box, which is an important consideration for a lot of customers: when they are not at home, who is going to take the parcel from the postman? I'd wrap up my beads into white tissue paper, then into bubble-wrap, put them inside the green thing, wrap around some fuschia ribbon with a little dangly bit at the front - done!

But I have now run out of these. I went to Noblepac website, and the buggers have put their prices up! They obviously don't want to deal with little customers like me: if your order is less than £50.00, there is a £6.50 handling charge on top of everything else. OK, they can do without me then. So I found an alternative: http://www.bagnboxman.co.uk/, they do these little boxes which take about .1sec to put together and which look very smart!

So this is how my beads look now when they arrive: all wrapped up in white tissue paper, bubble wrap, inside a smart little box with my little Bead Mon Amour sticker on, with fuschia ribbon. I am very pleased, especially that these boxes are cheaper than the Noble ones were. AND they go through a letter-box!

This just reminds me that I need to spend some time thinking about my new logo for my new name: it's Nelli Rees Glass Art.

Making New Things Out Of Old Things

2010-10-14T11:06:00.011+01:00

I had to fill out my "interests" section on Facebook, and this was one of my favourite things to do. Here is an example. Never throw anything out! I don't, that's why moving house is such a difficult job, I have so many things! Anyway, my daughter likes this bracelet very much, and I don't blame her: it is shiny and sparkly. Unfortunately, it was made in China, out of some very crappy material - I guess, some plastic, which later on was covered in a layer of shiny paint, so it looks like it is real silver (typical). It broke the other day, and there were tears. But don't you worry, mum is here! With her jewellery-making tools! AND her brain with bright ideas. I took a piece of sterling silver wire, attached it to one end of the links of the bracelet, put a big 8mm Swarovski on it, then connected the end to the other link. Voila! The only thing was my daughter didn't want any of my beads put into the bracelet :( Never mind, I'm used to it! :)

Lampwork Open Day in Leicester

2010-10-10T19:37:00.006+01:00

What a lovely date, so I had to write a blog today!

But I won't bore you with my thoughts about 10.10.10 - too much has happened since my last blog, and I won't even be able to write it all out tonight. But this is a great excuse to do it tomorrow!

I suppose, the main event has to be the open studio of Diana East in Leicester. We went there on Friday. Of course, as Diana mentioned a marquee on Facebook, I had put on several layers of warm clothes - these murky October days in England, especially if you have to be outside. But it was quite warm - surprisingly - so we considered ourselves to be lucky. I met Astrid Riedel, a south african lampwork artist. She was petite, almost elfine-like, and very very pretty. She demonstrated how to make a couple of beads, which was a big success. I also met other bead and jewellery makers, and a lot of people bought my book, a big Thank you to them! I was trying to take pictures, but as it was my first experience in being a "photographer" of the event, I got shy - as usual - and only managed to take three pix! They are on my Facebook as a separate album. After that we went to a lovely restaurant "Little Tokyo" - if you ever happen to be in Leicester, you have to check it out, it's worth it - and had a great meal. So the whole day went really very well!

After the Rain

2010-10-01T20:02:00.008+01:00

So what's new? Yesterday was the day of Faith, Hope and Love (this is the Russian variant of the name translated into English). I love that day: 30th of September in Moscow would usually be quiet, no wind, with golden leaves and that special autumn sunshine - soft and kind of meaningless...

Today it was raining ALL day. I even posted a pic on Facebook - nobody commented! I think everybody was a little annoyed with me, stating the obvious. So I have posted these pix here! The thing is, in Norfolk it isn't actually as wet as in Derbyshire. But after all that rain this beautiful rainbow came. It was huge, double or even triple, with many layers which, unfortunately, can't be seen on the photo. It was here only for about half an hour, but it changed everything: the light of the sky, the air, my mood. I forgave and forgot the rain. It was lovely.

I must sort out my torch. Otherwise I am having too much spare time, doing absolutely nothing. Who cares about unpacking anyway? It's boring, it was very boring packing, I only did it because I had to. Tomorrow. Definitely. I'll do it.

Autumn Bargain

2010-09-29T12:59:00.004+01:00

I can't make beads - so what! No problemo, I have been de-stashing the beads I made ages ago. I've never sold beads which were made at the beginning of my carreer. Actually, not at the very beginning, they are more of a "thought-in-process" assortment, as there are lots of florals, including on a dichroic base which is quite complicated (for me, anyway) to handle. I haven't been selling them before because, first of all, they are all my friends. It might sound really weird, but that's how I used to treat them, I just couldn't bring myself to looking at them as a "product" which would be sold. I have been somehow "attached" to them. That's also why I don't sell a lot, I seem to keep them for myself! But the time has come, I think, when they should go to new homes. So they are all going to be on ebay as from today for 10 days. This will also help me to keep my "beadboxes" under control - otherwise they have been breeding here!

My goodness, it is hard work to string 100 beads! That's what I've been doing all morning, I can't believe it! But now they are all ready, sitting prettily on a very strange piece of ribbon - another new thing, I usually use plain white ribbon: before we moved, I went to the little craft shop in Downham to buy my usual string, and they informed me that they wouldn't be getting anymore of this type, it had been discontinued :(. Ah, just as well... New place, new house, new string!

The Demi-Monde Adventures

2010-09-28T19:08:00.004+01:00

It was a travel day today! I like travelling, especially looking out of the window of the car, that is possibly why I still don't drive! Can you imagine - driving and at the same time trying to look around - probably not a good idea. Anyway, we went to North Cave which is in Yorkshire, almost on the M62 towards Hull. We met Nigel Robinson, Rod's colleague regarding "The Demi-Monde"'s website, in this lovely hotel/restaurant which we just bumped into! It was called "Rudstone Walk" (in fact, technically speaking it is in South Cave: South Cave, Brough HU15 2AH tel: 01430 422230) and it was truly pretty, the staff were so friendly, and the meal (and the wine!) was gorgeous! If you are ever around in that area this place is strongly recommended!

Then we went to the studios where some time ago I had copies of my disc made, but this time we talked to the guys there regarding making a teaser for "The Demi-Monde" to be put on Amazon together with the book description. It was really exciting! I will be "the voice of ABBA" and I will have to be filmed too. Though it is only going to be 30 seconds at the most, there is going to be a lot of work done, Rod is alrealy starting on the script, and I have to dig out my hats! (the feel is going to be Victorian-esque).

Also Nigel brought a poster - it looks amazing! Unfornately, as it always happens with us, we accidentally left it in the restaurant, so I can't show you a pic. BUT instead here is a pic of the leaflet for "The Demi-Monde" which is also the cover of the book.

2010-09-27T15:19:00.006+01:00

Last week, thanks to Dominique, I received the first big and important parcel to the new house - my book. This was the first time I saw the new cover and the actual book. Mixed feelings... It is great to see something that you've sweated for in your hands, having taken on a real shape and form. The trouble is, when I "flick through" it I remember all those days of hard work - not even a year ago! But it looks very pretty, and I do hope there is a lot of good advice in it for people like myself.
One critisism: if it were entirely me, I would have had more pictures of the final finished jewellery pieces - after all, they are the end product, and those pictures were the most difficult part of it all. For example, the shot of the "Mermaids' Eyes" Bracelet took me nearly two months to get right: the shape of it, and the lighting seemed for ever not quite right, but in the end it was cropped - had I known, I would have produced something similar without so much sweat.
Anyway, the work is done, and the book (hopefully) will be on the shelves as from 7th November (Great October Revolution day in Russia!), so... happy shopping and lampworking and jewellery making!

No Beads, BUT New Nails and Exercising!

2010-09-23T20:40:00.003+01:00

Now while I can't make beads, there are other things that I've been doing. First of all, I realised how unfit I was (big unhappy face!). So I found my old exercise thingy, I am not even sure what it is called, but I call it my "Ladybird" (it is in the pix) and I recommend this to anyone who is thinking about improving one's stomach and other muscles, this little thing is absolutely terrific! The greatest thing about it is that you don't have to spend hours exercising: all you do - but you need to do it every day - you do 60-65 moves on it (it sounds really stupid!), which would normally amount to about five (FIVE!) minutes of your time per day! Of course, when I was a singer, I used to do it easily and quickly, I even managed to increase the number a bit within the same 5 minutes. Now I started with 45 moves, and this has been a real pain. But I will persevere.

The other thing is I have invented a new fashion for nails. Seriously. Look at the picture. What you do is you put your first layer of nail varnish on (in my case it is my favourite silver), dry it, then distress it a bit around the edges or even in the middle - whatever you like really - then cover it with a layer of a different colour (in my case, again, it is some funny dark red, I don't even know where or why I bought it in the first place), and voila!: your nails look like they have been covered in shards! That's what I call "Bead Maker's Manicure"! I hope you'll like it! I am wearing mine to the GBUK AGM this Saturday! See you there! xx

2010-09-20T11:01:00.008+01:00

How long has it been since I last came to my blog? The move is over, but the boxes are still there to unpack! Thank goodness, we have internet now, it's taken about two weeks. I've got some pix for you to see: the entrance to the house we now live in (pansies - I just adore them!), the fuscias I brought with me from Norfolk (these are my very favourite, and you can see behind them the lovely little statue/candle holder called "The Circle of Friends" which we bought when we lived in Yorkshire) and a very content Fat Cat who now lives near the big blue flower pots at the back entrance.

The only small problem is that I am currently unable to make beads. :(

2010-08-17T20:40:00.005+01:00

And these are the last beads I made in Norfolk before I packed up all the bead making equipment:

I am pleased they look so bright and happy - we had a very busy time living here, I started my new carrier as a bead artist in the shed in the garden, and these beads are a lovely conclusion to this part of my life.

I won't be posting any blogs for the next couple of weeks, but I'll be back.

So... Goodbye, Downham! Hello, something else!

MOVING ON

2010-08-17T20:37:00.003+01:00

Yes, yes, yes! Finally we are moving! We've been packing and everything, you can see the pix!

Tiny Spacers

2010-08-12T13:28:00.004+01:00

Who knows a nice and easy way of making these tiny spacers? The ones on the pic are about 4mm thick and 7mm in diameter. They seem to be so popular all of a sudden, but they are such a pain to make! I find it tricky to balance a tiny amount of glass on my mandrel, keeping the wound glass in the way that it doesn't collapse on itself. Of course, as always, the place in the flame is important, i.e., temperature control, but also I now use industrially produced stringer instead of a whole thick rod, this seems to have helped. But then there is also the cleaning of the holes, which is fun: they are so small, and holding them simultaneously with drilling is a nightmare. BUT they do look cute in a finished jewellery piece, so... back to work!

Murrini Making Part II

2010-08-11T09:04:00.006+01:00

I had a white rod for the middle, encased it into clear, cut little "grooves", filled them with some coral, encased it all into clear again, then encased it with acid yellow. Heat, heat, attach the punty, more heat, pull. Lots of fun and excitement! You can see what came out on the pic. These are tiny. So conclusion No 1: don't do "subtle".

Then, of course, I needed to put them into my bead. As I mentioned before, everything needs practice. I started paddling them, and they just collapsed! I had to decorate these bright yellow blobs with a strange middle, so I put some tiny black dots on each of them: now they looked like little footprints of a little furry animal. Conclusion No 2: paddle only very gently, if at all.

Seeing my lovely tiny murrini being reduced to dots looking like animal paws, I decided not to paddle them at all. This was risky, but I had to think fast: remember all this was happening while I was making a bead. Just melting these murrini very slowly, watching them making sure that they don't collapse on themselves did the trick: you can see them on the bead, even the teeny-tiny coral lines are noticeable - JUST - under a microscope. It didn't come out 100%, but hey, conclusion No 3: while making one thing, you usually stumble on a new idea which you wouldn't have if you didn't do this one thing in the first place.

Now I know how I can make lovely hollyhocks inside the bead. I have been puzzled by the long middle part of this flower, not quite knowing how to deal with it. The answer is simple: murrini in pink with encased in clear yellow middles!

This particular bead needs more working on it: I put the yellow dots too close to the middle, they started touching the turquoise and now I have tiny black lines there - not good for a perfectionist (which I am not). And, of course, this murrini will do well in my "big, bright and bold" beads, so see you on ebay soon!

Murrini Making Part I

2010-08-11T08:33:00.004+01:00

I haven't made murrini for a very long time, probably too long after I actually learnt and practised how to make it. Partially it was due to the absence of a very important tool - the rod cutters, which I couldn't buy. Last winter, when I was in Moscow, my brother took me to an amazing shop where one could buy anything one wanted: glass, mica, tools of any kind and any desctiption - a glass beadmaker's paradise! So I bought these lovely cutters there (pictured) and forgot all about them when I came back.

Everybody is making their own murrini, so yesterday I remembered about the cutters and thought I should make some murrini too. Now there is one important part in murrini making: preparing a good punty. I was quite proud of mine - and you can see it on the pic next to the cutters. The other pic shows another of my recent purchases - these beautiful golden glass scissors: I just had to show them off! I haven't used them yet, they are so shiny, I just look at them admiringly.

Busy-Busy Uploading on Flickr

2010-08-10T10:15:00.006+01:00

What a morning! I'm sitting here uploading lots of photos on Flickr. Just the beads at the mo, jewellery will be coming soon too. Unfortunately, I am still unable to create "galleries", as the instructions are so poor. I've tried and tried, again and again, but the "Add to a Gallery" still doesn't come up, apparently, because of some security settings - well, these are my pics and I haven't set anything private or whatever, but it isn't happening. Does anyone know what I'm doing wrong? Anyway, I can't waste any more of my time, especially as I'm going to try out some new ideas, so... Flickr will have to wait!

Glass, glass, glass!

2010-08-09T08:52:00.009+01:00

New glass arrived. Have a look: on the left is a rod of Opal Yellow that I've had before, on the right - what I got now. This is the reason for when we are asked if we can make the same beads like the ones that the customer has seen or has bought from us before, we can only reply: "I'll do my best." Batches of glass vary, and this is just one example. I hope it will behave, though, in the same way, otherwise... :(

But I want to finish on a happy note, that being that I've got all my mandrels ready and I'm just about to "dive" into my studio! Another exciting thing is that I've also bought some special mandrels for blowing beads: I haven't got any idea about how to use them. I remember seeing how these blown beads were made some time ago, and then it seemed pretty straight forward, but now, looking at these strange mandrels, I'm thinking about taking a lesson! :)

2010-08-07T09:58:00.003+01:00

It was easier to make another post with these photos of the Minoan necklace than to upload them in the way I wanted them to be published! Here they are (I really don't know why they can't be on the same line!):

Making Jewellery Week

2010-08-07T09:26:00.007+01:00

I haven't realised that a week passed since my last blog! Well, there hasn't been much of bead making this week, but more of jewellery making. I needed to make pieces for galleries, and you can see examples of what I made on the photos. Typically, when I upload pix they always get in the wrong order - oh well, the first one is a bracelet with my "Celtic" beads, the other one is a "Minoan" necklace, the beads having goldstone insertions. Since I bought some goldstone about a month ago I can't stop using it! I've got so many new designs with it, and I just love the finished look, especially when light catches it.

Of course, the initial temptation was to make the "Minoan" set with copper beads and findings - they pick up the "copperness" of the goldstone beautifully, but I also had these lovely big (8mm!) fluted sterling silver beads that I bought specifically for this set, so my copper hearts had to wait till next time! If there is ever going to be a next time - almost always I only make one piece of a particular design.

I was going to write about dots... it has to be in the next blog now!

Weekend - Doing Nothing!

2010-08-02T12:38:00.003+01:00

Hi! Saturday and Sunday were just a couple of lazy days! We went to Cambridge to see Toy Story 3 which was surprisingly good, and we also had a barbeque, which was... even better! (Sorry I like to eat nice food!). So not much bead making, I'm afraid!

Pink and Green

2010-07-31T10:07:00.006+01:00

Hi everybody! Sorry I have been ignoring my blog, then I realised just how diligent Rod has been with his, so here I am again!

I thought that if I just post photos with my beads it would be a bit boring, as most of the people who would come across my blog would be able to make them anyway! But if I chat about things that I find difficult while making my beads, this would possibly be more interesting, AND people might want to leave comments, as they might have encountered the same.

So... I have been working on some new designs recently. I've managed to forget about my usual desire to make things deep, symmetrical and perfect, and for a change I tried some "surface painting" as I call it. I've also tried to use different colours to the ones I usually use. So these beads have a double-colour base of pink and green (212). Pink - Tuffnell have soooo many: Light Pink, Baby Pink, Powder Pink, Angel Pink, and some time ago I decided to try them all out. For some reason - by mistake! - I bought loads of Light Pink, possibly because I'd mixed it up with Baby Pink which is more expensive. So naturally this was the choice for the new colour combination - I am like this, totally pragmatic: if you've got lots of something, use it! (Even if you hate it!). The green started "leaking" into the pink, of course, BUT only at the beginning. Soon enough I twigged that I must not heat it too much, and it's better to have less green compared to the amount of pink. This is what I've managed to produce (the photos have been taken outside with no sun, it's really cloudy here today!). I'm still thinking about the name. First inclination was something like "Playground" accompanied by the ringing tone of the same title. I don't think I'll sell a lot though with this kind of name!

Next time: all these dots on the surface - they ain't as easy as they look!

2010-05-19T21:02:00.002+01:00

Spring has come - at last, even to Norfolk!

Been busy editing the book, so no beads!

Enjoy the lovely wether!

2010-05-08T09:59:00.002+01:00

I have been getting tired of something that just wouldn't come out the way I want it, so I decided to make something completely different. And this is what became a new bead: I still don't know how to call it, maybe something connected with space, but I am very pleased with the result. All it is is silverleaf on black base wrapped in Double Helix and then thickly encased. Easy-peasy, really. I obviously need to get bored more often!

2010-05-02T09:37:00.002+01:00

Today started with me checking my ebay auctions - even if I say to myself that I must not go there (it always takes an enormous amount of time as I start looking at other people's work, admiring colours and ideas, so it never ends!) that's what happens when I have some beads for sale. Anyway, today, after looking at other people's auctions, I decided to try to upload some pix on my Me page - guess what, today it happened!!! After months of trying I wasn't prepared for this sort of good luck! So now I have a couple of pix there too, like all other normal people. So... what to do now? The weather in Norfolk is so awful that I won't be able to work in the garden as planned all week - really I HAVE TO spend some time there to tidy up etc, weeds are everywhere! - excellent as I would really like to go and melt glass!

Lots of things have happened: Flame Off came and gone, I only managed to come for a couple of hours this year and only on one day, but I saw lots of people including my dear friends Marlene, Gay, Becky, and Teresa and Diana, it was good to see them doing well. The most amazing thing was that Ray Skene (yes, the Ray Skene!) commended my beads in the Flame Off competition! I was ab-so-lute-ly thrilled; the only thing is, as I have never won anything and I was completely unprepared for such great luck, I don't even have a pic of these beads. Never mind, the good GBUK organisers have got one, so if you are interested you can view it on www.gbuk.org.

2010-03-30T11:47:00.002+01:00

Hi everybody, I'm back!!! I have been writing my book, the last part of which was posted to the editors yesterday - yippee! I've been so busy that I have become some kind of a hermit, only replying to very urgent e-mails: I don't even remember when was the last time that I went to the pictures! Anyway, hopefully it'll be easier now.

On the bead front I've got lots of ideas which I am going to work on starting with almost now. Every Sunday for the last half a year we've been going to Derby. As you are on A50 driving away from the M1, there is one place there, which gave me a lot of inspiration for this bead: it will have green for the ground, and then pink and blue and yellow for the sky. The view is fabulous, I hope I'll be able to catch it in glass. It's gotta be called "Derby" or something like that. You can't call a bead "The A50", can you? I'll have to give it a little thought!

2010-01-19T09:51:00.002Z

I have never known that moving house is actually a full time job. The problem is, you don't get a lot of time experimenting with glass. But I've managed to run away into my own world yesterday; this design has been torturing me (in my head!) and I had to get it tried out. So what do you think? I really like them, and more to follow!

2010-01-14T23:09:00.003Z

It's been boring - raining cats and dogs! Luckily, only in Downham, so I hope all of you still have the lovely white snow. Today is the Old Russian New Year - yes, it is a very Russian thing, thirteen days after the normal new year here it comes! We have to put all the Christmas decorations away like everybody else, but I keep a branch of fur tree somewhere for this day: so the new 2010 has now officially begun (apart from the Chinese New Year, of course!). Happy New Year! xxxxxxxxx

Merry Christmas!

2009-12-26T12:38:00.004Z

Hello at last! We have all been busy, and I have managed to ignore my own blog for over a month! I have been participating in fairs, meeting lovely people - this is my favourite thing about going to fairs. I went to Moscow and saw my family. I have been making beads and selling them on e-bay - this is something completely new for me, and I have been really excited about it. The thing is, I have been so pernickety and I did not think my beads are good enough. So hurray, people buy and they are happy! Thank you to all my lovely customers! I went to Scarborough. I went to London. Now I've got a minute and I would like to say:

MERRY CHRISTMAS!

HAVE A GREAT 2010 and may all your wishes come true!

Till next time... xxx

Wirework

2009-11-11T21:00:00.002Z

I am getting better and better at it! Look at the pics - pay special attention to all those wonderful loops and wraps that I've managed to achieve, I am very proud of that. I think, the main thing is not to be afraid, so I just keep saying to myself: "Do it, go for it, it's going to be great!".

Not much bead making though. Selling bits on ebay. I am so happy that people like what I make. And hopefully tomorrow it will be sunny!

2009-10-21T17:45:00.001+01:00

And this is some of Marlene's work:

You can see more on:

glassygear.etsy.com

glassygear@yahoo.com

I'm sure you'll like what you see!

The Winning Bracelet

2009-10-21T17:19:00.011+01:00

The Big Bead Awards was a success for Ellie, who has won the 2nd Prize in the Under 16' category with this "Night and Day" bracelet featuring my glass beads! The idea was Kit's, and she had to show Ellie how to attach clasps etc, but the result is great! Well done, girls!!!

We had a lovely time: we saw and had a chat with Jean Power, editor of Bead Magazine, then we had the Presentations, then we had to go for lunch, after which we came back and had more chatting with my friend Marlene, who is a talented and very knowledgeable beader, bead maker and jewellery designer, and you can see more of her work on glassygear.etsy.com. We also had a chat with Sarah Downton, and we bought two lovely beads from her, Kit loves her blue fish, she's already put it on a string. This was not all: we bought some cabochons (a rip off - I spent £100 and the man charged me for the bails on top of that as well!), but never mind. But never again.

So it was a great day out, of course, we bought some gold leaf from Tuffnell, and I already managed to make some horrible beads with it (the photo is NOT attached!).

I've just discovered that I need to make a different post in order to put some more pix!

The Big Bead Show

2009-10-18T12:37:00.003+01:00

Yesterday we went to the Big Bead Show. It was great: Ellie's bracelet won a 2nd prize in the under 16s' category - well done! We saw lots of familiar faces and had chats with all our glass/bead friends, the photos are to follow shortly! It's a bliss to have my computer back after all the de-bugging!

Staffordshire Hoard

2009-10-06T09:34:00.002+01:00

If you have not been to Birmingham Museum and Art Gallery yet - you've got to go! Well done, Mr Herbert! The beauty of the pieces exhibited is unsurpassed, you won't be disappointed. It was a shame that those beautiful gold pieces weren't washed, as I came to look at the motifs, they remind me of so many things, this could be a book! And we only queued for 1&1/2 hours, the wait was worth it! I do hope it all will be left somewhere local, we made a little donation towards that. Now I am waiting for a proper book with photos, alas, this would take a couple of years, I guess. And we must come back to see the amazing trompe l'oeil of Patrick Hughes too.
No time to make beads!

2009-09-16T20:06:00.005+01:00

The tablecloth is ready!

I actually went out this morning (not counting the boring 1/2hr drive to King's Lynn, because our local fabrics shop was closed - Wednesday, remember old days??!!) and bought a lovely new piece of amazingly lovely fabric. I had to do the end bits on the sewing machine - how nice that my Mum can't see them, she would definitely tell me off for those kinds of stitches! Anyway, you can see it for yourselves: these are just some shots of the sexy tablecloth that I am going to have on Saturday in Northamptonshire - it's GBUK AGM, after all, and I've got a stall. So you can come by and say hi!

2009-09-14T18:13:00.004+01:00

I have bought some gorgeous beads from Beverley Hicklin, check her website out - www.beverleyhicklin.co.uk. Actually, when you think about it, it was probably these amazing beads that made me order this lentil press! It's been busy, I've been going mad with this press (I don't know how it has not yet disintegrated!) - alas, the poor poor beads have not been coming out perfect to be sold! Never mind, I need more practice, but one day I'll be fine!

Of course, I need to get ready for the Saturday AGM of GBUK as I have a stall there. I have planned to "revamp" my tablecloth, so lots of sewing is coming into my life. Sorry but no photos today - I ought to take one of the new lentils but it is raining so possibly 2mrw!

What's This?

2009-09-11T14:48:00.002+01:00

This is what I thought looking out of the kitchen's window. I never planted any flowers near that brick garage wall, so what is it? I had to go out and inspect that tiny bright pink patch - it must have been a little seed that came in with the wind from somewhere, and I did not notice it and did not pick it out with weeds simply because I have been away for such a long time! And who said that flowers do not grow near walls, look at this one, it has never even been watered by me!

By the way, on the left is our Fat Cat. I think he is really proud to have been included into this special picture.

But yes, I am back at last. Some exciting things have happened, and I received this morning some new presses from the States. I am off to try them out!

2009-06-26T22:09:00.003+01:00

Hi!

I have been making lots of beads and lots of other stuff, but no photos today - too busy! I am going away soon, so talk to you when i come back - probably, in August now! Have a good summer, and may the sun shine on you every day! xxx N

2009-06-11T20:40:00.003+01:00

I just bought some goldstone - beautiful, beautiful, beautiful! I do not know why I have not used it before - it is not that expensive, I have just been worried that I am not good enough (typical!) to use it. Anyway, this is the result! I am pleased with it, not too bad for the very first bead with aventurine! Difficult to photograph, but hey, when is it easy to photograph beads?

New Tonbodama "Ying and Yang"

2009-06-07T12:51:00.002+01:00

Hello, you have probably been wondering what I've been up to: I've been making some new tonbodama recently together with putting more stuff on e-bay. This is my take on Ying and Yang - you see these little sparkly dots which kind of contribute to the outlining of a circle? Well, that's my taste for you: sparkles, sparkles forever!

2009-05-26T20:11:00.002+01:00

Oh dear, I have kind of forgotten to check my e-bay shop, and guess what, my beads have been sold for five quid! Never mind, I would have to be clever next time. The problem is, it all takes up so much time, all the checking and re-checking, and registering and etc. Every time i come up to the computer - half an hour has gone! when am i going to make beads!

2009-05-20T14:20:00.003+01:00

It's been hectic: I have listed some of my beads on e-bay: check it out, my user name is n4princessbead - do not ask why! The e-bay auction is for my "White Flowers", but the "Russalka" ones are currently on Etsy.com, and that's under Beadmonamour. So yes, I've been very very busy!

2009-05-08T21:02:00.003+01:00

It's been a hectic couple of days. Actually, more than a week. I have not been making any beads, but I've got photos of the ones I made about 2 weeks ago. Here they are. I hope you'll like them!

Shades of Pink

2009-05-06T07:33:00.002+01:00

Just wanted to upload some of the pix I took yesterday, hope you'll enjoy them!

2009-04-30T11:26:00.002+01:00

It was hard at the Dulwich Glass Fair. We ended up just sitting around, watching the visitors, drinking lots and lots of coffee - from which I became hyper and had to go to the loo almost every 15 mins! It was good though as on my way I had to pass by the beautiful beads of Beverley Hicklin! As I was too shy to come up to her every time I passed I turned my eyes in a strange and funny way towards her stall just to get a glimpse of her amazing beads, I hope she did not notice this! But then I did come up, and we had a great chat about glass, and beads, and beadmaking. I also met Jo of GlassTales, she had a great stall, I just loved her tiered displays. And the beads! I wish I could buy some, but as I did not make any money I had to postpone this pleasure till future events, only in the hope that one day I would get to be again in the company of such immensely talented people.

Then I have been experimenting with Luna (D.Helix), and this has not been going very well. Does anybody know anybody who gives lessons on all this reduction, striking etc?

Daffodils!

2009-04-10T14:52:00.002+01:00

Isn't it a lovely day today! I can see all these daffodils moving in the wind - it is actually just a light breeze really - so I thought I'd make some just like the ones in the garden. I think they came out quite well!

Eyes

2009-03-31T22:24:00.002+01:00

Hey, I've made some beads today and now everybody's said they look like eyes. How disgusting is this! especially that they are not supposed to look like eyes! I must photograph them, but I'm quite upset now!

Anyway, there was one bead that everybody was happy with, and this is gonna be part of a new bracelet! it's gonna be called "Night and Day".

No Music!?!

2009-03-11T20:02:00.001Z

Can you believe this, in the section of "Industry" there is no music!!! How come? So I'll have to make do with "Arts".

2009-03-11T19:57:00.003Z

Not bad for a beginner, I thought. Unfortunately, the photo of the bead appeared in my profile, not in the text on the right, but never mind, I'll get there. This bead is not the one I was making today. This one is just a floral, and this particular photo is good because you can just see the lovely layers inside, which are numerous! It is really very pretty.

2009-03-11T10:02:00.001Z

Hi! It is a lovely sunny day today in Norfolk, temperaturewise - a bit chilly, for this time of year, anyway, only +3 C! I am off to make some beads in a mo, so... talk to you later!