Color studies, goodies and more...

Hello Friends!

I thought you might like to read a separate entry about the color stuff so my one entry wasn't a bagillion million lines long!

Here is Kim's set about which I was talking a few days ago. I did a lot of different color layering to make new colors for her set.Here is one bead in particular that didn't work, but I thought it was intersting and wanted to talk with you about it. Doesn't it look like spores or something you would see under a microscope? I found out a little trick about EDP that was super helpful to me. In this instance it DIDN'T work. The EDP actually boiled over onto the surface of the transparent and caused a ring of scum bubbles around each dot.

Here is one bead that successfully did the color thing I wanted. Excuse the texture appearance of this bead. It was cropped from a larger picture and appears all textury and yucky. It is infact smooth. Moving on.... To get this lovely purple with blushes of pink you will do a series of heating and cooling. I think most people freak out when EDP devits the first time and put it back in their glass stash. These results are from a Nortel minor with propane and a 5lpm concentrator. I work in a slightly oxidizing flame. I make my heart like I would make any heart. As you are doing this you will notice white chalky scale form on the bead. Just ignore this and continue making your heart into it's final shape. Add your decoration and melt in. In this instance I used just simple dots. When you are done with your final shape re-heat the entire bead to molten. You will notice that the white chalk scale disappears when the bead is re-heated back to all molten. When you are finished doing this take your bead out of the flame and blow onto it. The cooling action will make the darker orchids pop. Put the bead into your kiln and you are done! Pretty amazing huh? You can go back any time you are making your bead and re-heat it to molten to rid yourself of the yucky white if you wish.
I think most people didn't realize that EDP isn't a one shot deal. You can still get lovely pinks and orchids out of EDP and they are just as dark as when you first start out. This also works when you press your beads into a brass press. Try it out and see what you think! I am so excited to have figured out how to work this glass so I can add it to my color palette :D:D:D



My friend Kim loves my beads but always asks me "Can you do this, but bigger?". Well here it is!! Pretty sweet huh?!I made all of those skull flower buttons and when I got some beads back from another one of my stores I thought this one might like to accompany a matching button for the show ;)Look at all of my goodies!! Ricky and I went to Florilegium the other day and sat up there to sell some beads. Her shop is full of wonderful things from fine fibers to make scarves and the like to beads and other fancies.

I got some more waxed linel and leaves to make some flower earrings like the my Daisy Vine design above :D

I actually have one pair already made and am working on another. I thought about making a few more daisy pairs to make into earrings for the show. I will post pics of those as I complete them.

Well I hope this blog was worth the wait and I hope you enjoyed learning some new things :D

Much love,

Genea