Treasures by Louise

Coordinating Jewelry for an outfit For a recent commission, I was asked to create a necklace and earrings inspired by a dress, to be worn for a friend's wedding in October. Inspiration for Jewelry The dress is as pictured, and I wanted to find "just that special bead" to compliment the pattern on the dress. I was fortunate that our Bead Guild's twice yearly bead show was happening in early October. I found the focal bead, accent beads and spacers at Small and Beautiful Beads, one of my favorite vendors. There's always a crowd at her booth, which is full of lovely colored beads as well as finished jewelry to inspire. The recipient received many compliments on her jewelry and enjoyed the beautiful wedding last month. Congratulations to Bride and Groom!

My necklace from Jeannie K. Dukic was a chain of beautiful semi-precious jade and faceted czech glass crystals. A long wire wrapped chain by Jeannie Dukic, jade and Czech crystals Coordinating Bracelet   Earrings to match I had a moment of hesitation as I cut into the beautiful chain of wire wrapped jade and crystals. The delicacy of the chain was not to be matched...at least by me. But I had a vision, so I went ahead. At first I planned to remove the crystals and go all "natural", I wanted to add a complementary color and some variety of shapes to the chain. The lovely chain became a lariat, as I decided to keep the ring part of the toggle, and I spliced in wire wrapped sections of red agate and sections of rust-tone Czech disc beads with the crystals. The crystals became a contrasting texture to the stones and disc beads. The decision on the focal came later, after auditioning a number of artisan beads I recently ordered. Auditioning some porcelain foca...

Jewelry Treasures by Louise is the new name. It's time to decide to do a fall craft show. There's no question really, it's at a great time of the year, and I need the practice. I joined last year, and it was a little slow, because it was a new venue and not strongly promoted. This year should be better as everyone learns the ropes! Hopefully it will also generate more traffic to my Etsy store. So I will be busy creating new designs and preparing my displays in the coming weeks...In preparation, I've decided to order official business cards, and wanted my blog to reflect the name I will be using going forward. Meanwhile here are some things I have been playing with, putting some new designs in [PicMonkey] collages. I love how these pictures came out: Chandelier Earrings in crystals and glass pearls   Bohemian Feather Necklace and Earrings The Bohemian Feather Necklace and Earrings has been claimed already and I will be making more of this style.

I have been trying out Kumihimo lately:       Kits and Kumihimo materials have been showing up in the local craft stores lately, so I picked up a loom to play around. Here are the results. This bracelet was the result of a happy accident in measuring incorrectly. I was frustrated it was too short, until I remembered I had the matching beads in my stash. This may be the beginning of a new series!      Here's a Tip : An easy way to remember is to cut your eight cords 3 X the length that you want your bracelet to be. So since I use four doubled cords, I would recommend cutting 4 cords 6 X the measurement of your wrist. (You can make it an inch shorter to accommodate the clasp.) Bracelet: Beaded with Kumihimo This necklace is made with red-orange, black and white rat-tail cord. The butterfly focal is dyed Howlite and is finished with bead cones and chain, which makes it adjustable at the back of the neck. I am finding that point i...

I hope you are enjoying your last-minute gift making and shopping for the Holidays! If you find anything in my Etsy site:  LilyAndJasmine on Etsy , I recommend the last day for first class shipping would be December 19, at the very latest. The USPS says December 20, so that would give me time to package, label and drop off at the post office on the way to work! Enjoy your days leading up to the holidays! December 21st note: My shop is on vacation, while I spend time baking cookies and enjoying family traditions. Hugs!

One of the fun things about swaps, is you get to see and work with beads that are unusual. The black glass disc beads with the silver carving here have a design that looks like a spider, but not enough that you could only use them seasonally for Halloween. I have been busy designing, with the spider beads that my partner Crystal sent me in our swap! Here is the first necklace. The amethyst seed beads and amethyst bicone crystals are from my stash. Necklace: Silver and Amethyst tones I had fun making this piece using a lark's head knot with seed beads strung on beading wire. I like the black, silver and purple colors. It's a bit different than colors I usually choose. I am very pleasantly surprised with the combination. Silver and Amethyst Surprise

Hello: I've been busy beading and creating and vacationing. I even took a bead weaving project on vacation and managed to teach myself from a Maria Rypan pattern. I'll share that necklace once I add the closure and weave in the ends. It was my first real attempt at fringe, but I'm hooked and inspired, so I think there will be several variations to come. I've also completed a bead swap necklace, tho I have more to create; to use up the beads I was sent. I've been working with the large green beads and copper tassels. I have one necklace that I just love, and another still on the design board. Here is the beautiful copper and green: There's copper ovals with wire and seed beads for connectors, and around the back, the same seed bead sequence is echoed with the braided strands of seed beads. The color combination just happened, based on the seed bead mix, but in the afterwards, I saw that the colors fit nicely into the Pantone colors for Spring 2013! Bear ...

23"  necklace with red enamel pendant: Swarovski crystals, sponge coral, seed bead mix and silver spacers. Red enamel and silver-tone pendant Here are a pair of coordinating earrings with pressed glass flower beads and silver spacers:  

Here are a few items used in the waterfall necklace for Lorelei's slider challenge blog hop: Included are Crystazzi 6mm Light Green Bicone crystals, green seed beads, brass spacers, crimps, jump rings and Beadalon gold plated 4mm crimp covers .