I hadn't been beading much (and my weaving is at a standstill). I picked up a new hobby and since it's hard because I'm learning to learn something totally new, my impulse is to go back to beading. It's easy and satisfying where learning electric bass guitar is currently like trying to pat my head and rub my tummy.
So I pulled some colors inspired by the "color of the season" that some of the titles of the emails I immediately delete say is burgundy. I started with a black, burgundy and champagne combination. Going back to just playing with color movement feels good.
As I worked in this color combo, I started thinking about Harley Quinn, my favorite Batman villain. I think about Harley a lot. This set made me think it might be something she'd wear in a formal ball setting. It's a little more elegant than her classic black and red. So I put her harlequin diamonds in one of the circlet earrings.
I don't know how much more or less beading I'll be doing leading up to November 8th, but that's the day of my only Holiday Pop-up sale in Ann Arbor with the Ann Arbor Fiberarts Guild. This set will be for sale there, and I look forward to seeing everyone at it! I had a wonderful time last year.
The AAFG Holiday show is at Zal Gaz Grotto, 2070 W. Stadium Blvd, Ann Arbor from 10am-4pm.
The top image is what I put together for my proposal for this class. I chose black and white beads in order to easily show the stitching in one neutral image. Leading up to the class I'll be creating sample bracelets to show students various design ideas and different types of seed beads that can be used.
The class kit only includes Dynamites. I like using these seed beads for classes because of size and consistency in shape without being too expensive. I know how falling in love with a new technique can lead to additional spending. ;)
We won't be able to finish a bracelet in the class time we have but I will be providing everyone with enough beads to do so (or to use however you wish). This is a sampler class just like when we do weaving samples. We'll spend enough time to get a feel for each stitch. Some you may fall in love with and others you may dislike. I know I have my favorites!
We won't be able to finish a bracelet in the class time we have but I will be providing everyone with enough beads to do so (or to use however you wish). This is a sampler class just like when we do weaving samples. We'll spend enough time to get a feel for each stitch. Some you may fall in love with and others you may dislike. I know I have my favorites!
I also like to talk about different types of beads, sizes, and can explain how I use beadwork in my jewelry and also as accents in my weaving/fiber work. This class is for all levels of knowledge, I only request that you are able to thread a needle, sometimes this is tricky with beading needles as they are thinner than what most people are used to using so a good base line is helpful (I'm happy to thread needles to keep you moving along though!).
This is the first opportunity I've had to teach beading with HGA so I'm really hoping for a good turnout. Please comment or reach out with any questions about the class!
In the past I suppose I'd considered myself on the outskirts of feminism. I never had a good grasp of it. I was raised being told the common misconceptions, like, feminism was trying to dismantle the "traditional" family structure and it was making it so women "had" to work instead of "finding a man to take care of you." These things never sat right with me first place, I didn't like the idea of trying to find a man to take care of me, nor was I impressed with the married-with-2.5-kids gig. I remember saying out loud for the first time on a family camping trip at 14 or 15 that I never wanted to have children. It's not that I didn't like kids, it only seemed like I had better things to do than raise a human that will likely be as angry and depressed as I was. Also, frankly, dating never felt like a long-term commitment. I struggled with maintaining any relationships, even friendships, I wasn't ever sure marriage was going to go well for me.
Fast forward to 28 years later, I have accidentally found myself on a feminist journey. It started with the book In Defense of Witches; The Legacy of the Witch Hunts and Why Women Are Still on Trial by Mona Chollet. I wasn't paying attention to the description in the book suggestions and thought I had stumbled upon another fantasy book and I needed a break from the self help books. What came through my ear buds via audio book was a description of how I have felt and been treated my whole life. When I've said I don't want to have kids (for as long as I can remember) I'm met with the response "you'll change your mind one day" or the assumption from men that I dated that obviously every woman wants [their] babies so I wasn't taken seriously. I too wanted to have the same rights as men and hated being treated like I I should want to be a mother/homemaker.
So here I am, learning about 1970's feminism in my 40s, not the bullshit 1990's "girl power" I grew up with. Now I'm angry that these ideas have been around my whole life and I just didn't know about it or have access to it. This all would have made so much sense to 15-year-old-me and it would have been helpful to hear other women talking and writing about being independent and doing whatever they wanted or needed to do with their lives despite social expectations. I listened to In Defense of Witches a second time. Then Gloria Steinem's book My Life on the Road then the compilation book of 50 Years Of Ms. I subscribed to Ms. magazine and ordered 2 past magazines (Ms. has past prints available) that would have come out when I was in high school to help out teenage-me. I have found that I am definitely a feminist and I'm playing catch up.
Feminism is the blanket I've been wrapping myself in lately, it's mixing in well with my angry-punk mode. I decided the next Statement Bangle once I finished Resistwould be Feminist. I've rejected the color pink off and on throughout my life due to what it represented. Ms. magazine uses a bright pink and lot, I decided it was the best start as far as color choices. I matched it with gunmetal for pop but also to keep the statement bold along with an assertive font.
I didn't know how much I'd be drawn to wearing it, the answer is, all the time. I'm wearing it as often as I wear my Golden Boundary bangle. The vibe is pretty interchangeable these days.
Feminist Bangle with the 1990's Ms. magazines I ordered.
I've felt a bit...overwhelmed and lost lately. I haven't gotten to my next weaving on my big loom because I need to dye for it. I have a weave structure that I want to play with on my little loom but I don't have specific imagery in mind for it...I need a bit more direction to get motivated for that weaving. So. Beading checkers. Talking out the weaving issue with my husband led me to the fact I probably need to just start with checkers on the little loom too. Checkers are my default.
Meanwhile I've been wearing my various colored checker huggie earrings a lot. They're lightweight, easy and out of the way, I've made a few more in different colors. Above is the yellow and champagne checkers, below I was inspired to bead with 24K gold plated seed beads. I did a spray finish to help with the plated finish but these should not be rubbed or exposed to much water, if any.
I thought that the gold with white would be a classy neutral, I made those first (below). One of the clothing additions to my collection is an olive green midi skirt that I'm leaning towards accessorizing with gold, thus olive green and gold checkers was the next obvious stitching (above).
And last, checker circlet earrings. I don't lean towards red much, especially wearing it, but, some of my favorite ska band tees are red and I had the red, white and black beads out already for the Resist Bangle. So these large circlet earrings also came to be.
I took checkers to the next personal level adding them to my slowly growing tattoo collection. I have wanted a checker arm band tattoo since my late teens, early 20's. Back then I thought it'd go on my upper arm, but in my 40s...well, thank goodness I waited because upper arms can get weird (mine included) and they may have not looked as even 20 years later. I decided instead to have them tattooed below the elbow of right arm. I went with my friend (for her first tattoo!) we decided to do a walk-in and I ended up with Mo (@mo.mo.tattoos on Instagram) who did an amazing job lining up a very straight, linear design on a very not-straight part of my body. The idea for my checkers probably started with ska music, but they also satisfy my attraction to even numbers, multiples of 2 and 4, things fitting together in a certain way, and a way in which I am constantly using to express myself in my artwork. Checkers just always feel right.
I think this bangle speaks for itself. My artwork, or me for that matter, haven't had a tendency to be political. I work with words that I need to release, that I'm pondering, journaling, struggling with. Lately my words, emotions, fears and sadness have very much revolved around the current political landscape. (I just moved a lot of ranting to my journal rather than posting it here...).
Sticking to speaking technically, I'm thrilled at how well this font translated into my bangle form. I am even more thrilled at how much the shadow added to the design. I was searching for color ideas relating to "resist" and the drop shadow showed up in a few fists-up resist images so I added it in to my design.
Red seemed like the obvious starting point for this first Resist bangle, I believe there will be more and other colors to come.
I toyed with how much of the red I should fill in the top over the "R" and up to the dot on the "i." Ultimately I just kept beading until I got really bored of stitching red beads and checked with Bryan to see if he thought the little bit of the dot in the i looked OK sticking up. I like it, it's just a little blip up, short enough that it won't catch on things making it much easier to wear.
I've been escaping into color lately, anything that draws me in and sticks with me. Ally's mohawk is half bright dark pink and half bright orange right now and whenever I see her selfie posts I can't stop thinking about the color combo and how much joy it gives me. So I decided to mix it in with checkers since I know her from the Michigan Ska Scene, and well, checkers are part of that.
I got to see Ally yesterday at the Splish Splash Bash and her hair was still these colors, it was nice to see her and her hair in person. Despite the heat it was a really fun show with lots of awesome bands, some we know and have seen before, some totally new to us.
While I recuperate from yesterday's long day outside I'm actually getting everything properly photographed and posted. You can shop the bangle on my website HERE and the earrings on my website HERE.
For those of you who follow along on my personal social media...Bryan's car became no longer repairable and, somehow, his dream car was within our price range in AWD. It's a 2023 Dodge Challenger in a custom pearlescent blue. We're both very color oriented and didn't think the blue was great until we saw it in person. So now whenever we peruse online shopping we compare it to see if it matches the car. I've missed having a fun car to drive, but I personally need something I can fit doors and looms in, so I'm glad we have a fun one now too! I suspect my next color influence will be towards this blue:
(And yes, he was pulled over less than 24 hours after we purchased it for no real reason)
When I don't have an outfit or a specific inspiration it's sometimes difficult for me to come up with what colors I want to play with. Green and purple tend to be my go-tos, but, apparently I keep gravitating towards bright pink/fuchsia combined with green also. I did this a few years ago, which I forgot about until I started beading this combo.
Life has been...a lot lately. So not thinking too hard about my beading, just letting the colors play is both satisfying and relaxing. When I pulled these 4 bead colors I thought I was going to do checkers but I hadn't done stripes in a while and they seemed to suit these colors better.
The brightest pink bead in these is a stunning galvanized pink color that feels very summery. I had a difficult time getting the color with my cell phone but the light box and better camera does it justice.
I actually finished this set just in time to wear out to the show we're going to tonight, we managed to get tickets to another sold out show at the Pyramid Scheme in Grand Rapids which will be fun and hopefully not too hot in there. We're looking forward to seeing IDKHOW (But They Found Me) live. I'll pop it up on my website shop soon too.
Lets face it, in my circles, rainbows are IN. I've always loved using rainbows for things so it's an easy way to play with tons of different bead colors. Putting something in rainbow color order may be one of the most satisfying things in the world to me. Rainbows mean so many things and above all, joy. I think we could use more joy lately.
I created a "vintage rainbow" earring and bangle set that went up north to the Crooked Tree Art Center in Traverse City, MI and I think the set sold in the first month. It was one of those sales that felt bittersweet, I know it will be loved but I already missed having it in my stash. So I started beading another one since the beads were still pulled out. I posted it on my social media and someone asked how much and then if I could make one with purple. We're purple people, purple is no problem for me. The "vintage rainbow" color grouping came from my obsession with the colors in the movie Joker: Folie à Deux. I needed to pull some slightly different colors to incorporate purple and then I couldn't decide between a plum-purple or a royal-purple, so I used both.
Then I had some beads break while I was working on this one. This is somewhat common, particularly with the matte seed beads. The thread from the broken bead didn't want to be stitched in (without possibly breaking more beads) so I decided if I was shipping something off without the customer seeing it in person first I'd feel bad if they noticed this flaw. So I made a second one for them. I, personally, don't mind a few flaws and threads showing on the interior of my work. It happens, and it shows that it's made by hand and not by a machine, but I also pride myself in high quality work so it's bug me if I was shipping off something with that little black thread showing! Consequently, it looks like I'll see them at a ska show coming up, so I have an extra now at least. I am still not bored of beading rainbows so it works out fine.
Back to the beginning of this post...organizing things in rainbow color order...I was recently gifted an entire stash of impeccably organized Delica seed beads from someone who's family member had passed and left lots of supplies behind. They were all organized by number order though. Delicas seem to be assigned a number as they come out in new color batches (I'm not 100% sure on that, so don't quote me). The low numbers like 10 are your basic opaque black which has been around since the beginning of Delicas but the numbers go up into the thousands. The number organization was really cool to see because it showed a clear pattern of say, the 12 galvanized pale colors that came out together that are clearly a group number order. I took photos of each organized box but my art-brain doesn't work that way. I lean into colors when ideas are culminating and I need to see, say, all the blues together at one time to find the right options. So I spent days keeping the numbers in order but grouping them into drawers by color. Looking a the side of the drawer system that these came in is now so very satisfying.
It feels good creating and spreading rainbows, like a low-key Lisa Frank. I'm putting the bangle with the thread showing on the interior up on my shop HERE.
Now that I've given these to our friends at their shower I can post about them! I usually knit a baby blanket for friends who are expecting but Jenn is a knitter and I figured she'd have things that she wanted to knit so I offered her to pick something for me to knit for her. She sent me the Ravelry link to this adorable Converse baby bootie pattern.
It's like 8 pages of directions but I couldn't seem to knit just one pair. So they got three. I would definitely knit these again, and it's easy to find and use stash yarn for these, so no need to go hunt down specific yarn (at least not in my world).
I didn't expect to start beading and finish this bangle on our short trip to Chicago at the beginning of this month but it was done in like 2 days. That doesn't include the designing and picking out beads but that's still a really quick turnover for me on a bangle this size whos pattern doesn't repeat. A 4 hour train ride and quiet, comfortable hotel can do wonders for my production.
After creating my "nope." (Golden Boundary) bangle last year I realized it's time to start putting my word themes into my beaded jewelry. Then it dawned on me...statement bangles....why it took me 20 years to put that one together...
I've been called resilient repeatedly in the past 7ish years. It finally started to sink in. The more things thrown my way, the better I bounce back stronger both mentally and physically. I'm in a good place these days (thanks to my golden boundary and sobriety). Resilience has become a clear theme for me. So I created a big bold Bauhaus version of this bangle.
I think the font translated well. I find playing with fonts in all of my work to be really fun. When I was thinking of what colors to use I thought maybe greens was a good starting point and when I asked Bryan what color he thought of when he thinks of Resilience, he said green too which solidified the color direction for this first bangle. I already feel like making another one in different colors, probably a rainbow direction.
Bryan and I in Chicago
I Voted for Kodos, Cobra Lounge, Chicago
This bangle was finished just before a test in our resilience. It's been a crazy 3ish weeks. It started with a short trip to Chicago for 3 days for an I Voted for Kodos show, a fun little getaway. We stayed in the West Loop and liked the Sonder hotel set up so much that we also booked it for Riot Fest in September. I managed to come home drained and super sick, so on Thursday after getting what I needed to get done in my department I left work early to sleep. Bryan woke me up around 10:30pm to see if I wanted to eat and while we were eating a yummy marinated grilled chicken that he had made a weather warning and tornado sirens started. Before we really got going to grab cats and get to the basement, a HUGE boom and crash happened. I was so sick and out of it that I didn't realize at first that a tree had come through our dining room window. Like 8 feet from where we were sitting on the couch. Lois shot down into the basement and we had to go find the boys (kitties). My impulse was to start dealing with the tree situation but I made myself go to the basement to wait out whatever damage was going to happen.
Tree in our dining room window
Tree from the outside the next day
When the warnings stopped we kept the cats in the basement and started to figure out what to do next. We had a tree come through the window and a tree next to it come down on our cars. I got on the phone (on hold for forever) with our insurance company while we cleaned up the window, glass and cut back the tree. Our insurance company set us up with ServPro for disaster relief, they were over first thing in the morning looking everything over and getting approval to have the immediate issues taken care of. The tree company made it out in the afternoon and removed the tree from the window and off our cars. Miraculously our cars were mostly unscathed and working. The tree guy took a peek at our back yard and said he hadn't seen anything that bad since 2023. With the privacy fence (and yes, all my doors) crushed and fallen, we've met our next door neighbors (they've only been there 2 years) and are sorting out what to do next.
So many trees and branches down...
I'm thankful everything was triaged quick enough to make sure our cars were good and we made it to the Devin Townsend and Tesseract show in Detroit that we've had tickets for since December. We were tired, but it was VERY worth making it to this concert.
We have a long way to go to get the back yard cleaned up and figure out what insurance will be taking care of and getting our own quotes to put the house and back yard together. Just one more project, which is turning into a bit of a creative project. The problem with two creatives trying to clean up a fallen forest of a large yard is there's a lot of "look at how cool this log ended up with the bark peeled off" and "check out this cool stick!"...there is a cool stick pile and cool log pile started. I'm sure there will be more to come on that.
