Been a loooooooong time...

So, I was going to start another blog to cover my spinning, weaving endeavors.  But, I decided I'm just going to roll all my adventures in art into this blog.  I am still beading...bead weaving and bead embroidery.  I started inkle weaving...weaving narrow strips on small inkle looms...a few months ago.  That lead to tablet weaving...using cards to weave more intricate designs on narrow strips.  Now I am spinning my own yarn with a drop spindle so I can weave that yarn on my peg looms.  

That's what you are going to see on this blog now.  I little bit of everything I do :)

Eye cabochons

For the couple of people who asked, I used the following tutorial to make my own eye cabochons: http://www.sunandmooncraftkits.com/tutorials

Look for the tutorial on making glass pendants.  I followed that but did not put on the bails.  You can find sheets of different eyes on Etsy.  Most are immediate downloads.  I use Sun and Moons glaze because it works better than regular glue, which I have tried, too.  Remember to use a laser printer so the ink will not run when you apply the glaze. If you only have an ink jet printer, you can seal the images by ironing the reverse side of the paper and leave overnight.  You can buy the glass cabochons from Sun and Moon or search Etsy for other suppliers.  There are lots of sources for them.

The eye cabochons are fun to make into earrings or pendants, too, without bead embroidery.

Happy New Year!

Well here it is: 2014.  Last year was a struggle for me personally, especially the last half.  Here's to a better time THIS year.  I'm not a resolutions person.  When I was I almost never kept them.  Why set yourself up for disappoint when you don't have to?  So, I have a few goals I'd like to work toward.  1. I want to learn how to use my new spinning wheel and spin beautiful yarn for weaving. 2. I want to learn to weave a fiber tapestry. 3. I want to work on more and varying bead patterns, most from my photographs or digital art.

My Etsy store did so much better than I anticipated!  Repeat customers were many and I had great conversations with so of my clients.  I am going to expand the number of bracelets I've woven and finished to start a line of finished jewelry from my patterns.

And so, I'm looking forward to a really great year.  Come join me on my journey!

Update October 2013

So, a bunch to update...the Red Victorian Lady is history...was never going to finish her.  I warped the 22" Mirrix loom she was on for two projects: a seahorse and a French coquette.  Pictures of those will be added later as they are on my laptop and I'm blogging on my iPad right now.  I'm going a to use my 32" Mirrix loom to weave a fiber tapestry...maybe with a few beads thrown in :) 

I'm also practicing spindling my own yarn to use in my weaving adventures.  If I keep at it. I may get myself a spinning wheel for Christmas :). That would be totally cool...spinning and weaving my own yarn.

Also, The Beaded Cat is now on Facebook.  I'll be posting the latest patterns and gadgets, techniques, tips as I go.

Sharing with your Pet

For the past week, I've been trying to get some bead weaving done.  BUT, I've had a problem because a certain black cat, whose name shall not be typed here so as to avoid conjuring him up from the depths of where ever he is now, has claimed the chair I use for bead weaving. He's a fickle little cat and claims favorite sleeping places at random.  He'll sleep in those spots for weeks and then abandon them to sleep somewhere else.  Last Tuesday, I planned to bead weave for a couple of hours as Bob was working late.  I walked from the living room to the kitchen thinking happily of spending time with my beads and thread.  On my way back to my beading space in the living room, a furry monster hurried past me and jumped into my beading chair, curled up and shut his eyes.  Little rat fink!  

I think there will be a lot less "first come, first served" in this house given a certain fur person's lack of sharing skills!

Oh, and in my last post, I said I might not finish the Red Victorian Lady.  Well, after staring at my progress and thinking of all the time and material that has gone into her so far...I am going to finish her.  Just not very soon...

 

Caesar's Forum Update

I restarted my Caesar's Forum project.  I decreased the number of colors of beads that I am using and the result is MUCH better.  And the best thing is that in less than a week, I was able to put in 9 rows. There are 135 rows in this one.  It's only 170 beads wide which is about 8.5".  It's about 9" tall.  

Here is what it looks like now:

Here's what it WILL look like when it is finished:

 So, you can see that the bottom shadows are well under way in my bead weaving.  Looking forward to working on this one.  I can do 2 rows in 45 mins, so this should go pretty fast.  

And sad news about the Red Victorian Lady....I think I am not going to finish her.  12" wide is too much for me to deal with.  I have to make too many changes on the fly.  It's going to take me forever to finish her and I'm not enjoying it very much.  

I'll find something else to work on besides the three off loom projects I have.


 

Caesar's Forum Tapestry Bites the Dust

My Caesar's Forum tapestry is biting the dust and I'm starting over.   That pattern was one of the the first photographs of a location that I made.  Since then I've learned a lot about designing patterns from those kinds of photographs.  I think there were too many different colors all scattered around which muddies the outlines of the buildings and makes the shapes unrecognizable.  
SO, I went back to the drawing board and redesigned the pattern.  I'm going to restart the weaving process.