4 Pod Earrings for Brave New World Reception

Sometimes I miss planning outfits for work and I definitely miss the automatic jewelry design and color inspiration that comes with thinking about what I should wear to dress up for work or something important. Now that my day job has me happily at a "working warehouse" I no longer have to make sure I'm wearing and looking a certain "brand." So I was excited about going through my closet to put together something for this important exhibit reception. I hadn't showed this many pieces in one place in a very long time and I was honored to be invited to show with this noteworthy group of fiber artists.

 The first step for this outfit was the shoes that I had finally decided to bite the bullet and purchase. I had been looking at them for months. I love John Fluevog shoes but I rarely have a reason to get dressed up anymore, still, I needed the Daisy Monster Mash in my collection when they went on sale. These were perfect for the "Brave New World: Fiber Art in the 21st Century" exhibit that I had a number of pieces showing at. The shoes got lots of attention along with the art.

Then do I wear a skirt or pants? The reception was over an hour away and was going to be an all day event so I opted for dress pants leftover from my days at Talbots and a favorite lavender tank with pattern details that went well with the pants from White House Black Market. I always prefer to have a tank or tee on and then I can layer it with a sweater/cardigan/zip hoodie if it gets cold.  The reception was on a warmish day and we had so many people attend that it got hot in the gallery.

So I had about a week to create a "statement" piece of jewelry. Only enough time for earrings, but at the very least big earrings I decided I should be able to put together. Besides, I didn't have a set of triple pod earrings in this color range yet. 

As I started beading pods, I let them talk to me as to how they wanted to be organized. Only three pods didn't seem to be suiting the layout with my chosen beads so a fourth pod was added to create an earring that flares nicely at the bottom half of the design.  These are currently, as of this post, available on my website for sale HERE.

Neutral Green with Fuchsia Pop Jewelry Grouping

I like to change up the colors that I'm using a few times a year.  I knew I needed a change but to break away I turned to Pinterest to get inspired by new colors. I still dabble in tracking current fashion so among my "pins" for 2023 a lovely blend of neutral greens with a pop of bright fuchsias called to me. It's not a big shift for me because I'm using my favorite greens, but it's a nice big break from navy blues and purples.

Tiny Pod Earrings for sale HERE

Tiny Pod Earrings 2 for sale HERE

I wear the tiny pod earrings at work all the time, so I seem to start there with my color play these days. I found a movement variation that I liked and made a simple St. Petersburg Chain bracelet with that same color flow. 

St. Petersburg Chain Simple Fade Bracelet for sale HERE

Medium Open Pod Earrings for sale HERE

Then on to leaves. I might still be playing with these colors but I wanted to get these posted and up for sale on my website. I'm getting very nice responses on my social media about this set, why let people wait? 

Leaf Clasp Bracelet for sale HERE

Metallic Pink and Black Jewelry

After I made myself some jewelry options with metallic pink, black and white checkers for NYE I couldn't seem to put away the extra shiny pink 15/0 seed beads. I wanted to use them in a gift for a friend, then I just kept going. I made a few pairs of earrings and then felt like the pink needed to be a "stripe" in a netting bracelet. Above is the base set that I feel goes together.

Lately I've been saying that jewelry just kind-of falls out of me and that's what happened with these.  My attraction to these metallic pink beads mixed with blacks just needed more attention. I keep saying that I'm trying to focus my time on my larger woven pieces but I always end up making some jewelry in between. I bead while winding down watching TV at night with Bryan  

I hadn't made a netting bracelet in a while and one of the cool things about this design is that it can be adjustable to whatever length I make it and smaller.  The loops for the design are also the loops for how it clasps.

My tiny pod earrings have been popular with both sales and I'm wearing them at work a lot.  They have a little bit of pop but don't get in the way of the masks, and they don't fight with patterns in outfits.  I love how these tiny beads allow for every stitch to look so delicate.  

I started thinking about stitches that I have used over the years...all the way back to the very first stitch I taught myself; the Daisy Chain. I recall grabbing a "how to" tear-off paper in the bead section at Frank's Nursery (remember that store chain?).  I was always attracted to beads and I was stuck on a thing I had stitched on a bead loom.  Not knowing how to get my first beaded piece off the loom I just kept playing with the beads I had.  I was in elementary school when I started teaching myself beads stitches.  I always recall the daisy chain to be simple because it was the first one I learned. I later tried to teach it to some girl scout groups and it wasn't as easy for them. Now that I really get into the stitch again, it's not that simple.  In this little stitch I learned a lot about the importance of bead and thread direction.  It turns out that stitching tons of daisy chains as a young person gave me this amazing base for my ongoing beadwork.  

So I decided to make a daisy chain from this bead combination and I'm in love all over again.  In the 15/0 seed beads it is much more delicate and will layer nicely with other bracelets and bangles.

Metallic pink earrings! These beads just look so wonderful stitched together.  I wanted some silver accent beads to go with them and the above and below pairs of came about.  I am always attracted to interesting-shaped polka-dot beads. In the above earrings I think the pink frames the center beads nicely.

Below I found these white and silver disc beads which I hadn't ever used. I started stitching around them thinking that the pink band of beads would hang vertically around the disc but it looked much better when I rotated it to have the pink band horizontal around the disc bead.  This was harder to bead then I thought it would be but I really like how they turned out.

I think I'm about ready to change up my evening beading to some other colors, but I have to say after taking the photos of this set today I may keep the pink out a bit longer and see what else comes about. 

Triple Pod Earrings and Open Leaf Snap Bracelet

The triple pod earrings are some of my favorites right now, I decided they would fit well with my holiday dress this year.  I was just going to do a black and white combo of the pods, but then I was looking closer at my dress and I realized that the white lace portion had black outlines in it.  So I chose to make the pods all white and silver with black edging. 

White based earrings pop against my darkish brown hair, especially when I wear it down.  The silver sparkle looked really lovely at the bottoms of these earrings and gave some extra glitter. 

This bracelet was inspired by the white with black edging of the earrings, but I wanted it to be more simple.  This is the second bracelet I've ever made with this snap closure that helps make the bracelet look like it has no clasp at all.   This first type of this bracelet can be seen HERE.

I was on a roll, so I made these thin dangle earrings too.  I wore one of these in my second piercing on my one ear along side the triple pod earrings, you can see them worn together below.  I love the look of all the beads together.  Of course, it's what I do. :)

Jax dress lace detail.

Layered earring look.

Bryan and I at his office holiday party.  <3 p="">

Mini Earrings and Bangles for Bridgefest and Beyond

I decided I should probably post a blog, I've been distracted with the changing of jobs and interviews, lawnmower drama, and wanting to fix things and tinker on the house rather than create.  Well, the tinkering and fixing is creative problem solving for me, so I guess it counts, but that's not what this blog is about, I suppose I need to get back to jennyandbryan.com for that.

ANYWAY.  I have been trying to make some smaller items for the artist's village booth I'm doing at Bridgefest on June 21st.  My more expensive pieces don't tend to sell at free concert events and I like playing with color so that's what I'm doing with these tiny bangles and earrings. 

This is this week's productions. I even got them post on my Shopify page (which I still need to get that sorted out but I don't want to sit at a computer any more than required these days).  If they don't sell online, they'll be at Bridgefest since it's my next pop-up type event.  After that, Convergence®! 

This event was so fun last year, I'm glad to be part of it this year!

Available for purchase HERE.

Available for purchase HERE.

Available for purchase HERE.

Available for purchase HERE.

Available for purchase HERE.

Available for purchase HERE.

Available or purchase HERE.

Available for purchase HERE.

Available for purchase HERE.

Available for purchase HERE.

Cleavage

Well, to start, this piece was inspired by the variation I started doing on the triple pod earring.  I created the first set to go with an outfit I was wearing for the Art Council's Holiday Gala, it sold that week. I made another set and just delivered it to the Lansing Art Gallery last month.  As I was making the earrings, I wanted to keep adding pods.  The shapes and varying textures in the different beads were calling to me.

I decided that if I got my latest weaving ready to hang, I'd allow myself to start in on this idea. That was the kick in the pants I needed to finish my latest Lake Superior weaving for submission to a Call for Art.  This piece was also finished in time for that submission.

I took a few photos while the threads were still on this piece, I had every intention of continuing to add pods, but I was so happy with the initial pictures I stopped myself.  There is such a thing as over-doing it when creating artwork, these photos let me know I was at a good stopping point.

Finally, the title....I tend to think of names for pieces either at the very beginning of a piece when I'm working conceptually or as I am working on them. This piece kept making me think of forms and writings I was working on in college.  The cleaving of things.  When something is being pushed together and split apart at the same time.  This is the first of an idea of cleavage, cloven, cleavers in my own work.