New Hearts on my Website

Here is a picture of some of the hearts I have made lately. Some are now on my website store and some are on Etsy and some of them went to the Beads-of-Clay bead swap. And some didn't make it into the picture.
When I look at this picture it helps me remember that Spring is not that far away, despite the big snow storm we had two days ago. Soon I will be ordering seeds for our vegetable garden. Just yesterday it felt almost warm out and I didn't freeze walking to my studio. Hurry up Spring we are waiting for you.

January ABS Submission

Here is a photo of my ART BEAD SCENE January submission. This month the challenge is to create a piece of jewelry based on the Van Gogh painting Irises. My color palette is a natural for this challenge. This is a freeform peyote beaded bracelet featuring my handmade raku fired ceramic bead focals as seen in the picture. This is a highly detailed bracelet that captures many of the peyote stitches and decorative detail that I love to use.
I am often inspired by paintings. I am especially interested in the colors used by the Canadian Group of Seven and Frida Kahlo.

We Have A Visitor

Flat Stanley arrived in the mail a couple of days ago. He is part of a project at my 7 year old grandson's 2nd grade class. He will stay with us for a week and I will write a Journal about his visit. It is a project based on the book Flat Stanley by Jeff Brown. Stanley is flat because a bulletin board fell on him. But luckily he can travel easily in an envelope. He and his cohort Flat Stella have been sent out to many places by the students in the class. When the Journals come back the students will have many interesting educational activities to pursue.

Below is Flat Stanley viewing my studio as I prepare a class for a student to learn glass fusing.

Beads Of Clay/Ceramics Arts Forum Bead Swap

This is a photo of the Hearts in Winter pendants I sent in for the Beads-of-Clay Yahoo Group/Ceramics Arts Forum Bead Exchange/swap/ I also have several new hearts on my Etsy Shop. I enjoyed making these and trying out some new colors and designs. Yeah for swaps!! They always get me trying new things.

The New Year

I am thinking about Blessings as I start the New Year. I am planning on staying positive despite the many changes and difficulties in the world.

I have been working on my expression of Blessings from the bead/charm exchange I participated in recently with:

Lorelei Eurto
Gaea,
Lynn Davis
Erin Siegel
Heather Powers
Cristi Clothier (2ifbysea)
(Lucid Moon Studio). Lisa Harrington

The photo above is the necklace I created with the art work we exchanged. I am choosing to wear them as a group on a necklace so that I can feel the power of these blessings and be more aware of what I am grateful for. It will be an important part of this year 2009. warmer climate.

You can read more about this bead/charm exchange here.

My 100th Blog Post

Fittingly, my 100th blog post is of my favorite art museum which I visited yesterday, The National Gallery of Art in Ottawa, Canada.

It was an incredible exhibit of Bernini's marble sculptures--there were a few bronze ones as well. Hard to imagine how he could get such detail. Apparently he was already an accomplished sculptor while still in his teens.

And as a special treat, I purchased a book of tree paintings by Tom Thomson.

Great way to end the year and get inspired for the next one.

Scenes from Ottawa, Canada

Looking out of the National Gallery of Art in Ottawa at Parliament and the National Library.

Wow!! Such a beautiful city.

Last Christmas Tree for the Year

Happy New Year.

Fun Zoo

Here is a great shot of the zoo we visited over Christmas.

Art at Christmas

While away for Christmas we visited the Burchfield-Penny Art Center which recently openned( Nov. 22, 2008). We have been watching it develop over the last several of years and were so pleased to be inside. It is very beautiful. Wonderful exhibition space. And I love Burchfield's paintings. If I were a painter I would paint like him and Thom Thomson.There was also a nice acoustic effect that somehow muffled the sound of the other visitors and gave me the sense of being one on one with Burchfield. There was also a very interesting exhibit of Western New York artists. And a very intimate view into Burchfield's studio.

Across the street-Elmwood Ave.-- is another wonderful art museum--the Albright-Knox Art Gallery .

Today to finish off our Christmas art visits, we are going to the National Gallery of Canada in Ottawa to see the Bernini exhibit.

Happy Holidays

I wish you all Happy Holidays and a wonderful New Year filled with joy, good health, mindfulness and creativity.

A Charming Exchange

A Charming Exchange by Kelly Snelling and Ruth Rae

I first became aware of this wonderful book because I was participating in a charm exchange organized by Lynn Davis ( see December 1, 2008 post). I checked it out on Amazon and now it is in my ever growing library of jewelry making books. The theme of this book is collaboration, a theme that embodies much of my life. I love the energy and creativity that collaboration can ignite. And so it is always with enthusiasm that I join in on collaborative ventures. As the book points out, you don't need to live in an artistic community to have opportunities to collaborate with other artists: the internet has many online art groups for you to join, with many different media to choose from. Ah! And the best part of collaborations is that you find new talents and new ideas inside of yourself that you might have never discovered otherwise. The authors refer to this as "creating fearlessly."
What has really endeared me to this book is the wide range of techniques that have come together in such unusual ways. Although the book is not a step-by-step instruction manual to the projects described, it does highlight some of the unusual techniques the artists have used to combine disparate objects into jewelry. Since I am always looking for ways to make non-jewelry objects into linkable entities for jewelry, this book has been a treasure trove of ideas for me. Some of the unusual links they give detailed instructions for that really intrigued me are : coiled jump rings, capacitator charms ( I had some of these lying around, i.e. the capacitators), making a wire basket, eye of god links ,wrapped stone links, bar loop links, baby swing links, decorative swirl links, wire orb links, and I promise you, many more that I haven't mentioned.

Below is a photo of some of the charms that I created especially for the Blessings Charm exchange that I have been participating in. I had never made hand built ceramic charms before so I am so pleased that I dared to "create fearlessly" and came up with these.

You can purchase A Charming Exchange at Amazon.com or Barnes and Noble. You will love it I am sure.

Counting Blessings

I received my amulet bag from Lynn Davis of Expedition D and am so excited to receive such a wonderful collection of charms. The theme is counting blessings which has been so important this year. I will be making a piece of jewelry with all of the lovelies that I received. Here is a photo and names of those who sent me their blessings.

Blessings have been sent by

Lorelei Eurto

Gaea,

Lynn Davis

Erin Siegel

Heather Powers

Cristi Clothier (2ifbysea)

(Lucid Moon Studio). Lisa Harrington

Heartfelt thanks to all of you.

Colorful Yarn

Yesterday I took a yarn dyeing class at the St. Lawrence County Arts Council. I have never done this before and went on the invite of a friend. What fun. I thought my yarn came out beautifully. I hope my beginning knitting skills improve quickly so that I can make something worthy of this lovely yarn.

Scenes from my Studio Tour

Here are some of my displays for The St. Lawrence County Artists' Studio Tour. You can see our pastures outside through the window. My studio is in a renovated barn that was originally built in about 1850. There are many of the large hand hewn beams still to be seen.

Here is a close up from the photo above featuring two strung necklaces and two of my felted flowers brooches.

This photo captures several of my free form peyote bracelets and two peyote stitch necklaces.
It was a wonderful time for all. Many people came and tried out fused glass and ceramic bead making. Everyone who came was very supportive of my work and I thank all for making my studio tour this year such a success.

Later this week I will post some of my guests' creative work in glass and ceramic beads.

New Jewelry

This is a close up shot of one of my new Peyote Stitch necklaces to be unveiled at the Artists' Studio Tour.
Here is a picture of some new chunky pendants on the new and stylish rubber cord with sterling silver clasps. The middle pendant has a Sterling Silver bail. These pendants are all made from earthenware ceramic clay. They depict wild plants that grow in the pastures surrounding my home and studio.


These are some new fused glass pendants and two bracelets of fused glass cabs.



All of these pieces will be on display at my studio during the Artists' Studio Tour next weekend.

Toggle Collaboration

Bev Szaton asked me to make a toggle stick for her stunning Red Jasper donut. We did all this through email. I felt very honored to be asked by her to do this. Here is her creation which I think came out beautifully.

Australian Beading Magazine

I just heard from Lisa Kan, fabulous lampwork bead artist and author of Bead Romantique, that her article about me has been published in Australian Beading. Wow!! She did a wonderful write up. Thank you so much Lisa.

Close up of one of my pendants in the magazine article

Looks Like Spring Kinda

The garden picture is from yesterday. I am experiementing with a winter garden this year. And it kinda looks like Spring except for the dried Maple leaves lying around. And the beads they kinda look like Spring too. We hardly had a summer so I must be fast forwarding.

I was tagged and I have been so slow handling it that most of my fellow bloggers have been tagged too. This is a first for me and being a bit on the shy side it is not easy for me to do this. I will give it a try--hopefully by the end of the week.

Gorgeous Dichro

Gorgeous Dichro that I used with students in my fused glass workshop this week. They were a great group and very creative.
And I have been Tagged. I will get to that probably tomorrow. I am working on a special order today and urgent deadline for planting next year's garlic.