Category — General

The “unspeakable muse” jewelry finding included in my kit for the Use the Muse IV contest inspired a piece of art featuring a design similar to a stained glass rose window, which I used as the backdrop for a black-haired dragonfly fairy.

Unless I change my mind, the plan is to transfer this piece of art to a polymer clay shield pendant piece and incorporate some copper clay dragonflies with all the other components in the Use the Muse kit. If I get brave, I may even try my hand at enameling those copper clay dragonflies I want to make. Until then, here’s the artwork. The color scheme is a warmer blend of pastels that should go with the beads in the kit.

I also recently joined a blog called Art Cards 365, where all the art featured by members is in the collectible art card size of 2.5″ X 3.5″. I thought participating in this blog would inspire me to keep working on my art and get back into practice. Maybe if I did that, black hair–or hair in general–wouldn’t be so difficult for me to paint! The original of this piece is 5″ X 7″, which resizes perfectly to ACEO size, so I think I’m going to use this piece as a limited edition ACEO. Now I just need to think of a title!

Artbeads.com is celebrating ten years of business. Would you like to help them celebrate by taking a chance to win a $1000 shopping spree? Then hurry, because the Artbeads 10^th Anniversary Sweepstakes will be ending Thursday, March 4, 2010 at 11:59pm (PST).

Here’s a picture of the kit contents for Use the Muse IV contest sponsored by Scarlett Lanson and Artbeads.com. It’s always so much fun to see what different designers come up with using the same materials. In addition to what you see here, each kit contains one special piece called the “muse,” of which there is no photo. That is half the fun of entering the contest–you don’t know what the special muse piece is until you receive your kit. It’s always a challenge, but I’m starting to put together ideas. Since we’re going into spring and summer, I think I will lighten things up with some turquoise and maybe some other color.  Still thinking . . .

It seems as though this winter has been longer than usual, so when Artbeads.com offered me the chance to blog about “The Beauty of Spring,” and to choose my own items related to the topic from their vast array of jewelry making supplies, the first thing I thought of was “butterflies.” I love butterflies, so that’s what I went in search of at the Artbeads.com site.

I found some beautiful porcelain butterfly wing beads in a variety of shapes and sizes in the “All Creatures Great and Small” section of the website. The beads are pretty online, but even prettier in person. I ordered the 36 mm Porcelain Disk Butterfly #3, which is royal blue and peridot green outlined in black, with just a hint of salmon and red. The glossy glaze on the porcelain butterfly bead I received has a beautiful luminescence that really enhances the vivid colors.

My only concern was that these large 36 mm porcelain beads seem a bit pricey, but these are handmade art beads, and the quality is fantastic.  As it turns out, there’s not only a President’s Sale going on until February 18, 2010 at Artbeads.com, there’s also a sale on many of these porcelain beads themselves, so be sure to visit the site and look for the codes!

To go with my porcelain butterfly bead, I chose some Swarovski Crystal Beads in sapphire and peridot, and I also chose to use some cashmere crystal yarn in the beautiful salmon-pink “padparadscha” color, which I found in the Swarovski Crystal Yarn section.

To finish the design, I used some blue silk fairy ribbon which I had bought at Artbeads.com several months ago but couldn’t find a way to use because it hadn’t really matched anything I made. But when I put it next to the porcelain butterfly wing bead, I knew what it had been waiting for. I was so happy with the bold blend of colors; they certainly awaken the hibernating visual senses!

Now, bring on the butterflies! I can’t wait until spring officially arrives. I’ll be ready.

Disclosure Notice: The porcelain butterfly wing focal bead, the padparadscha Swarovski crystal yarn, the sapphaire Swarovski crystal beads, and the peridot Swarovski crystal beads used in this piece were provided free of charge by Artbeads.com for my participation in the Artbeads.com blogging program. I have not received any payment from Artbeads.com, and this post represents only my personal opinion.