Friday MIXER... well in glass ;) Shop Update.

Hello friends!

Happy Friday! Who doesn't love a mixer? Well normally you know that involves some nice frou frou drinks and unwinding after the work week. Well I have a little Mixer for you in my shop! I asked my Bead Babes if they thought anyone would be interested in some random sets of 3 headpins. You know a nice little sampling of this and that. They said yes, so I figured what the hell, right?! So there they are!

Mixer 1- Flowers- This set is a fun mix of 3 experimental designs. Just some fun I had making some glass, but never got around to making more. These are little cone flowers with a pod center and dotted center along with a bumply round. Fun!

Mixer 2- Dot, Pod, Swirl- A wonderful "Swirl pod," spiral round and bumply glittery round. 

Mixer 3- Rainbow Sand and Storm- Um... YUM! You can NEVER go wrong with a little raku, silver and some earthy tones. I just LOVE this wonderful sandy golden brown and this earthy brown gray! So pretty! This is another set of experimentals, oh and one from when I made these earrings for myself ;) 

Galaxy beads are by MAKU Studio and Paisley Cones are by Kristi Bowman Designs ;)

Mixer 4- Electric Lime Mini- Some wonderful stone finish, etched and shiny and shiny headpins. Some from a mix I made for MAKU and some from a mix made for Marsha Neal Studio.

Mixer 5- Rainbows and Galaxies- A little sampling from some headpins I made for MAKU and Karen Totten ;) Some shiny, and shiny and etched. Soooo pretty! 

WHAT ELSE IS NEW??

Well you remember me being at the end of my rope? Turns out it was just a small drop to get down ;) You should SEE what I created! I am just astounded that I not only got it to work, but just how INCREDIBLE the design is! That is all I can tell you for now. This work has a story to go along with is. Beauty often has it's troubles. So stay tuned next week to see the new work unveiled!

Have a wonderful weekend! 

See you soon!

xo Genea

End of the Rope.

Hello friends!

Have you ever gotten to the end of your rope? I think I am there. I don't know if you happened to catch the "death" that has been circulating, but I have. Ugh.. is it AWFUL! What happened to "normal" colds? You know the ones you would have for a few days and then they were gone? Well this one started out with a dry agitated spot on the back of your throat/nose area. It was proceeded by stuffy sinus' with no snot. You know, the horrible kind where you can't breathe out of either nostril and desperately breath through your mouth. The WORSE kind to have if you want to get sleep, the thing that actually cures being sick! Ugh.. so that turns into this NASTY head cold. Your ears are plugged, your nose is stuffed, and then it just DRIPS and you SNEEZE your brains out. You go through BOXES of tissue(now you see why they are selling them in 4 packs)! I think I dosed up on EVERYTHING. I started out holistic with my Emergen-C, my echinacea tea, Umcka drops, and then finally the generic ny-quil night and day pills. So after a few days you finally start to feel better. You can start to breathe out of your nose, but you still can't taste or hear anything. It's STILL like this. Ugh it's SO obnoxious! So yes, I made you suffer through the details of my cold just so you could understand what I was going through(and what to expect if you happen to be lucky enough to catch this one). 

So, of course I was behind schedule with production right? I had to get through a run of weeny dings which I just now finished. I wanted to make more so I could offer up more sets, but I just couldn't make ONE MORE. Not even ONE... I tried to push on through, and I finally gave up today. I added to many things to my list. I agonized and then I just said F* IT! I stopped what I was doing and just moved onto an idea that I had been waiting to get to. WOW, I can't hardly wait to open up the kiln door tonight and see my masterpiece! I was so mesmerized by my work that the world could have ended around me and I wouldn't have noticed(not that I could have heard it anyways with my ears STILL being plugged) ;) 

Do you do this to yourself? Give yourself some insane "To-do"list that not even the most organized and motivated person could EVER get through? I do this to myself all the time and how to I feel? Like absolute doo doo. It'a awful. So maybe you do this too and you can assure me I am not alone in this self sabotage. 

So you know if you scrap your "to-do" list you have to come up with some other solution, right?  So what's mine? Well I made all of this stuff right, it's just not the sets I had planned on making, right. You all did tell me that you like mixed sets and things, right? So I figured that I would just get together random sets of goodies and put those in my shop! Brilliant, right? Right. So that is exactly what I am going to do. 

I got together some sets of 3 fancy headpins to put in mixed sets. So I will work on getting those done over the next few days. Then onto some weeny ding mixed sets, I think. It sounded good in my head anyways... lol.

Well off to work!

See you soon!

xo Genea

LIMITED EDITION COLLAB RELEASE AT MIDNIGHT!

Hello friends!

It is FINALLY HERE!!  The release of our LIMITED EDITION COLLABORATION SETS! I will be listing them in my shop at Midnight tonight(US central time)!

 Ugh.. I am SICK. I got this nasty cold, but I pushed on through today getting the listings all ready to do. It's amazing what a cup of coffee and some ibuprofen will do! 

So to pick up your sets you will need to visit BOTH STACI AND MY SHOPS. Yep, that's right.. all 25 sets are DIFFERENT and we each have different sets in our shop! Are you ready to see what is in store for you??? I thought you might! Here is your SNEAK PEEK before they go LIVE!

See you at MIDNIGHT!

xo Genea

PRE-SALE for LIMITED EDITION COLLAB SETS ON CBC(Creative Bead Chat)!

Hello friends! 

It's just around the corner for our LIMITED EDITION COLLABORATION RELEASE, but we decided to offer up 5 of our AMAZING sets for PRE-SALE on Creative Bead Chat!  Not a member? Just hop on in and join! 

Here is what we have up for pre-sale!  To find out how to claim your set, click on the photo in the CBC gallery of the set you would like and follow the instructions. 

We hope you find something you can't live without!

xo Genea

Our LUCKY WINNER of the first LIMITED EDITION COLLABORATION SET!

Hello friends!

Want to know who our lucky winner was?? Stop on over to our Inspiration & Collaboration blog to find out! 

Congratulations to our lucky winner! We can't wait to see what you create!

xo Genea

The Cost of Quality- Why are Lampwork Beads so "Expensive"?

Hello friends!

People always want to know why lampwork beads are so "expensive" so I thought I would do a post on the reasons why my beads are priced the way they are. So what you may know or not know is that I only sell my first quality beads. I do NOT sell "seconds"(beads that have imperfections). I do this because I believe in excellent quality lampwork beads.

As I was cleaning my recent run of "Weeny Dings" it occured  to me that I should show you the process that my beads go through before they are up in the shop for sale. 

So let's take a look at some "Wing Dings" and "Weeny Dings" to see the process.....

Here you can see the different sizes of "Weeny Dings" and "Wing Dings".

When I go to make Weeny Dings I need to make MANY of them just to get a few that are the right size. Each glass has a different viscosity(the softness or stiffness of the glass). So some glasses are very difficult to get even due to their texture. So say I want at least 2 passing beads in the standard Weeny Ding size. I will have to make about 15 beads to make sure to cover that amount. That is pretty crazy odds! Each Weeny Ding and Wing Ding are hand shaped and too much or too little pressure can be disastrous!

So first the beads are removed from the mandrels to be cleaned. You can see here that this Weeny Ding broke off the mandrel even before cleaning. When I make them I make 3 beads on a mandrel at a time, so sometimes they cool too quickly and break off as I am working on them.

Next the are put in a bowl of water and cleaned with my electric dremmel to remove the bead release from inside of the hole. You can see the bead release in the photo above of the broken Weeny Ding.

After the beads are cleaned they are put into piles by color. 

 EVERY ONE of my beads is "Break Checked". This means that I actually try to break my beads. In this blurry photo you can see that I check my wing dings by grasping them on either side of the wings and then put force on them to see if I can crack them apart. If they stay together they "pass" their first test. Most do, but some don't.

Next each one is inspected by looking at the bead on the front side, and back side to see if the wings are even. As you can see in this photo the wings are uneven. One side is larger and the other side is smaller.

Here you can see the piles of Weeny Dings that passed and failed. Crazy odds huh? Almost equal passes and fails. At the moment the "passes" mean the wing dings wings are even.

Next the "passing" Weeny Dings are put into lines by size from smallest to largest for their next test.

This next test they are separated into "standard" sized Weeny Dings. Some are too small "micro dings" and some are larger than Weeny Dings, but smaller than Wing Dings. These are separated out and put into a pile for later. When I accumulate enough I will sell them in BIG discounted lots. I did my first sale like this just a week or so ago on my facebook fan page.

Next the passing Weeny Dings are arranged into a set all similar in size. The beads are then tied up and tagged ready for sale.

 I hope this post has helped you to understand some of the process of quality control in lampwork beads and given you a better appreciation of the art form. 

Thanks so much for stopping by.

xo Genea

Spoils from Diana Ptaszynski of Suburban Girl Studio

Hello friends!

I am excited to show you all of my goodies from my swap with Diana! I received my package just the other day and didn't get out until today to snap some photos!

My goodies came carefully and beautifully wrapped! Yay it was even wrapped like a present! :D

My bubble wrapped package revealed this pretty bag with her super sweet mini cards with beadies wrapped inside!

Yay! I even got a card with my name written on it :)

Inside was one of Diana's pretty Victorian style pendants in a blueberry glaze. This was one of my little extra goody beads ;)

I don't know what it is about sea urchins, but they make the PRETTIEST patterns! I am totally OBSESSED with them lately. Have you noticed that they seem to be showing up EVERYWHERE lately? Pretty sweet! Love these cool raku blue ones. I guess this color happened because of these beads position in the kiln. One of the glazes fumed on top of them making them this unique color.

Some more of her goodies. I LOVE these black sided gears with this rusty red raku on the sides. Some pretty blueish rounds, blue with pink blushed rain drops and some bumply textured drops :)

Mmmmmm Ammonites!! Why am I obsessed with these too right now, not really sure, but it is probably Staci rubbing off on me. Aren't they amazing?! I especially LOVE the blue one! All of these beads have a wonderful red rusty done to them.

Yay!! More urchins! Here is another rusty reddish collection.

So pretty and so perfect just as fall approaches. These are stoneware clay with a leaf pattern and and a dandelion!

Here are some pistachio rings and root beer rings. Aren't they awesome?! I am not sure what I will do with them yet, but I, of course, LOVE the negative space :D

Thanks so much for stopping by!

xo Genea

GIVEAWAY starts TODAY for our LIMITED EDITION SETS on our COLLAB BLOG!

Hello friends!

Just a quick "peek" of our Collaboration set we are GIVING AWAY on our blog Inspiration & Collaboration; The Social Artist! For the complete rules please VISIT OUR OTHER BLOG.

Here is the GORGEOUS set we are giving away! The LUCKY winner will receive this special set BEFORE  they are released to the general public!

Now run on over to find out the details and WIN! 

Good luck!

xo Genea

The talented women behind Creative Bead Chat

Hello friends!

Today we are recognizing the hard work of the ladies that run the Creative Bead Chat. If you aren't familiar with this wonderful group of beady peeps I would encourage you to check it out! 

So who are the ladies behind the beads?

Meet Melinda Orr, She does some gorgeous metals and mixes them with leather! You may better recognize her by her work below.

Meet Marla James, she does some beautiful works of clay! You may recognize her by her voluptuous women.

Meet one of my very good friends, Karen Totten who does the most incredibly detailed tiny clay masterpieces! You might recognize her by her wonderful little star beads.

Meet Marla Gibson, she rocks the seed beads! Here you can see some of her very detailed works.

Meet Kiersten Giles, she makes some incredible jewelry! Just check out how she rocks these buttons!

Thanks for stopping by and checking out our amazing gals!

Have a great weekend!

xo Genea