Up and running- Re-stocked in the shop.

Hello friends!

Wow, 2 weeks seems like an eternity to not be making lampwork beads. It turns out that my element took awhile to get to the glass hive before getting shipped to me. I am so grateful to have my kiln fixed and up and running again.

I re-stocked  few things in the shop to tide you over until I can get to stocking and making some more new things this coming week.

Here is what is back in stock...

Spiral Earth Stones "Frosted Fiber".  I just love these! There is something about the texture and look to them. They would be gorgeous with some semi-precious stones,  beach glass, or something tribal. 

The SUPER popular "Bright Earth" Wing Dings. I can hardly keep these in stock. It seems like every time i stock them they sell out quickly. I just fell in LOVE with this palette and seems like you all did too. Especially wonderful for this time from summer into fall.  I got a really gorgeous batch of the terra cotta this time around too ;)

What else has been going on....

Here is a shot of my most recent glass order. Ahhhhh it feels so good to re-stock some glass colors! 

New glass, new kiln fiber blanket, new bead release, new kiln element! 

I have been doing some designing too. Some stuff is still waiting to be assembled, but this one worked up pretty quickly. A simple design from me! Crazy, right? I always get so complex. These beads just jumped together. The bicone is from MAKU Studio and the faces from from Wonderous Strange. 

Pretty sure I am OBSESSED with Staci's Loopty-Loops and swirl s clasps too. This time I had to make my own clasp since I ran out of hers ;)

I always love seeing jewelry worn. It just gives it such life. That is what I love about Staci's photos. She is always showing her jewelry on. Makes such a difference huh?

What you can look forward to. This is what I was working on before my kiln crapped out. Um.... yeah, pretty f*ing amazing if you ask me! >:D

Well I must be off, but have a happy Labor Day! 

See you soon!

xo Genea

Happiness in a box

Hello friends!

I sure do love getting mail! The other day was no exception! I received another wonderful box from my dear friend, Staci Smith! Wow the treasures that were inside my box!

 

So on the top of the box were our collab bead sets! I was SUPER excited to look at each and every one! I can't wait for us to reveal them to you! You are going to LOVE them!

So let's take a look inside my box!

Awww how sweet of Staci! Look! She sent me some beach glass, urchin spines and mop sticks in the bag on the left. She even sent me a little diamond bit for me to drill the glass! What a sweet girl!

Ooooo and look at all of these pretty semi-precious stone chunks and shell! So pretty!!

 

OMG! I LOVE these oils from Scent by the Sea ! How sweet of my hippy girl to send me some wonderful oils! I was so excited to receive these because when I was in high school I used to wear this oil by a company called Airs. They make the most wonderful smelling incense. Well, they had this oil called, China Moon that was my favorite! The moon bride made me think of it. Wow do these oils smell amazing! They wear really well too. I could smell the oil on myself throughout the day :D

 

Yay!! Sea glass! I just love this simple necklace and aqua blue!

 

Look at this amazing beachy goodness! She sent me some of her new "Sea Bones" head pins and one of her amazing connectors called "Poseidon's Fury"(I think that's what it was ;)! They are so gorgeous! I just LOVE the pendant she sent me from Marsha Neal Studio! Did you see the sweet stripey shells like the ones she used in her AIW necklace from our Curious Design Challenge?!

 

Isn't the necklace gorgeous! You can read Staci's post here incase you missed it ;)

 

OMG look how beautiful these beads are!! I just love every single one of them! I can't wait to design with them!

 

OMG and look at these!! I just love them!These batiked connectors are to die for!  The donut is BIG too! It must stretch across my palm! It's going to make such a cool focal in a necklace!

 

Awwww! Look she sent me earrings like hers!  Staci posted these gorgeous earrings that are going to go in her shop soon.I just raved and raved about them, maybe she thought I needed some too :D:D:D

 

Here are her earrings! Gorgeous huh?! I just LOVE them! She used my midnight jewel headpins for the drop.

 

Here is her whole set with her necklace she made with my "Ancient Pebble" focal as well! I just love the look with her cute hippy do rag!

 

Here are the earrings I made with my components from Staci! I assembled them and put them on right away when I went out Friday night :)

 

Here is the INCREDIBLE necklace she sent me as well! OMG, it is SOOOO PRETTY! It makes the most wonderful noise when you move around too. All those layers of metal and chain!Mmmm!

 

Here I am wearing my new jewelry :D

Thanks so much for stopping by to celebrate with me! 

Have a wonderful evening and see ya soon!

xo Genea

Fall walk at Waterfront park Portland, OR

Hello Friends!

It's that time of year again, FALL!  My very favorite season of all!  On Ricky and my days off together we enjoy doing things around the beautiful city of Portland, OR.  A few days ago we went down to Waterfront Park

to get some exercise and enjoy the beauty of the city with the leaves changing colors. 

We start our journey by public transportation.

 

Here is a view of the Trimet Rail System map(sorry for the blurry photo). This map shows you the different colored lines of the MAX(Metropolitan Area Xpress). This is our light rail/train(same thing) that takes all over the city along with buses. Since our move to our apartment we live right off a MAX line so we get to enjoy speedy transit through the city most places we go.

 

Here is a beautiful little free bike repair station. Portland has a bike map for the entire city of bike only routes! 

On our way to the bridge to get to the walking path.

 

Here is the Steel bridge .

Here is a view from on the bridge walking across.

 

It's a little hard to tell wha'ts going on in this photo, but there is a little portion of the bridge that raises for boats to go through unlike smaller bridges where the entire bridge opens to allow boats safe passage. We were lucky enough to get to see the bridge raise on our walk!

 

Here is the little guy that needed to get through. Funny enough it looks like the only thing that didn't clear the bridge was the antennas!

 

We saw these geese hungrily feeding in one of the parks open grassy areas. In Portland for summer events the grass gets so trampled they actually cage off grassy areas to allow them to re-grow over the winter !

 

Here is a view of the Convention Center from across the river. I really like the shape of the building.

 

There is art EVERYWHERE in Portland! This was a sculpture under the bridge along the path.

 

Here is one of those fountains that squirts up the little shoots of water.

 

Here is the Hawthorne Bridge.

 

Here is a much better shot a portion of the bridge raising for a boat. I don't know how we managed to arrive at the bridges as they were letting boats through that day, but it was really cool to see the bridges raise :)

 

Here is where people wait for the bridge to lower again to pass.

 

There was this cool boat museum on the water that you could check out. We didn't go inside, but it looked pretty cool.

 

More sculpture along the walk way. This one looks like a ball inside a net.

 

Here is part of the path that is on the water. It has these long rusty poles with white pointy tops. I like this view. It think it would be cool if a painting was on the poles where it made an image from this perspective! 

 

Here is another shot of that same walking area.

 

This was the end of that path. I love the curve of the street above, the brightly colored trees and the covered walk way :)

 

Another sweet sculpture made out of stained glass .It was all this gorgeous reddish orange color with an iridescent luster!

 

Doesn't this one look like a tree trunk and roots with the greenery above? I'm not sure what it was supposed to be, but it's some sort of rusty metal.

 

Some more metal sculptures.

 

A seagull just chillin out by the water.

 

The MAX that takes us home. The Blue line that goes to Gresham. This is a city just outside of Portland and the end of the line for this color train.

I hope you enjoyed seeing our river front walk!

IN OTHER NEWS.....

I just wanted to thank all of you that commented on my post about naming the jewelry side of my shop! You all are so wonderful to help me brain storm! I will keep you all posted as we get things sorted. This is also the reason I'm not doing listings today like I normally would. Don't worry though, I have some wonderful beads for the next shop update!

I would also like to share the wonderful post Staci Louise, of SLArtisan Accents did about our bead swap on the Love My Art Jewelry blog! I totally adore Staci and her work! Stay tuned for more about our swap and the beads we received!

See you soon!

xo Genea