In two weeks, I’ll be in Chicago, at the studio of bead artist NanC Meinhardt, participating in her workshop, “Artsticks. Or, I’m Not an Artist, I Can Only Draw Stick Figures.” Of course, one of the things I needed to do before I went to this workshop was to find a stick.

Finding a stick wasn’t easy, even though I live in the middle of the Adirondacks, surrounded by trees, forests, rivers and lots and lots and lots of sticks. I didn’t seriously embark on a stick search until well into the winter, when pretty much everything was covered by a four foot blanket of snow. And then there was the problem with getting out to actually look for the sticks – snowshoes were a big help, but I just couldn’t find something that I liked. I wanted to find a special stick.

So, the other day, when Tom took a day off from work because I was feeling lousy, he suddenly came into the dining room with a huge grin on his face and announced that HE had found the perfect stick for me! I was a little skeptical – but then he showed it to me:

I seriously didn’t know what to say.

Back around 1999, when I was planning my move to the Adirondacks, my friend Lauren and I went for a weekend visit to see Tom and Rosie. (Rosie was the husky dog that Tom and I found while hiking in Harriman State Park in downstate New York when we first started dating back in 1994.) The first morning that we were there, we woke up, had a great breakfast, and then drove over to the campus of Paul Smiths College where Tom was a student at the time. It was March, and St. Regis lake was still frozen, so we went for a walk across the lake. (Lauren was a little freaked out about the idea of walking across a lake, but she came with us anyway!) When we got to the other side, we sat on a picnic table, smoked some of those exotic clove cigarettes that we were into at the time (ssshhhyeah, can you picture that?!), and Lauren took pictures of me and Tom and Rosie. Then we all started scavenging along the lake shore, looking for sticks and rocks.

Tom found this stick, which had been tossed around in the water until it was worn smooth in most parts. The bark was completely gone when we found it. We thought that one end looked like a snakehead:

And Tom thought that he might try to carve the other end into a pipe for his smoking tobacco:

But, neither of things happened, as Tom graduated, I moved up from New Jersey and went back to school to finish my own bachelor’s degree, and then we got busy with the other things: finding a place to live, finding jobs, moving, getting married, buying a house, having a baby, etc.

When we bought our house in Jay back in 2003, we decided to turn the stone mantle over the fireplace into a sort of altar, and we decorated it with gourd baskets, significant mementos (like the alabaster owl I got from my grandmother’s house when she passed away), skins from rabbits and birds that Tom has brought home from hunting trips, and symbols of our new life together like this stick. We carried that stick with us wherever we went, and it finally wound up on the mantle as part of our little offering to the nature goddesses and gods.

So you can imagine why I was speechless when he suggested that I take this stick and bead around it for NanC’s workshop. I know it sounds crazy, but we’ve had that stick since we decided to make a life together. And now, he wants me to take it with me to what will probably be one of the defining moments of my entire artistic career. (No pressure, right?)

Later next week when I start packing up a box of supplies (and my stick) for the workshop, you better believe that I am going to wrap that stick as if my life depended on it. I’m already thinking about how many layers of bubble wrap I’m going to need to keep it safe on its journey from Jay to Chicago. Imagine – that little stick from St. Regis lake in Paul Smiths, New York is going to Chicago with me! It just makes me feel like I truly live in the most beautiful place on Earth…

So, this is what I had going on my work table today, not that I got very much work done.

The turquoise piece is a brass collar that I covered with leather, thinking that it was going to be a vehicle for a handmade ceramic cabochon by Marsha Hedrick. It was a learning experience in several ways. First, I learned that you cannot use a regular English beading needle with real leather – sure, they work great with Ultrasuede, but with this piece, I found myself re-enacting a scene out of a Cold War spy movie where the Russians stuck needles under your fingernails. After finding some Glover’s needles, I successfully finished the brick stitch edging around the piece, but found that the cabochon was absolutely the wrong shade of turquoise to go on the collar. Drat. So I chucked it in a drawer for a couple of weeks until I remembered the gorgeous pencil-shaped turquoise beads that I found at the Syracuse Gem & Mineral Show back in 2009. Eureka! They were almost the exact shade as the turquoise leather I used to cover the collar, so that was going to be their new home.

I hung them in what I thought were graceful curves from the top and bottom of the collar. When worn, they hang beautifully. When lying on a table, eh, not so much. I’m also thinking that I need to space them out a bit more, so I may end up nipping them all off and re-stringing the whole thing tomorrow.

I wanted to have the piece finished in time for a special gathering of friends this weekend in Vermont. I just so happen to have a comfy turquoise t-shirt that is the same exact shade as the collar and the beads… It’s like the piece was absolutely meant for me. I don’t think I’ll be selling this one, it’ll be added to my personal collection. At least until I can find another source for those pencil-shaped beads…

The other piece that you see in the picture at the top of the post is going to be my entry into the Bead Mavens’ “Vernal Visions” challenge. It’s been a long time since I entered a contest with a piece, and I think this one might just be perfect for the challenge. It’s a piece of bead embroidery that I started, oh, back in 2006, before I was even thinking about having a kid. (Ha!) I had this idea for a piece for the Bead Dreams competition, but once I finished the initial piece of embroidery, the thing just sat there on my table.

This piece has a very special focal component, which I won’t show you right now. It came from someone who gave me a huge bag of jewelry repairs to do, and in the bottom of the bag was another bag, full of “leftover” pieces that were meant for me to keep and tear apart to use for other things. Well, this one just hit me straight away. It was so whimsical that I knew I wanted to create a knockout piece of beadwork to showcase it.

So, once I finish this piece for the Vernal Visions challenge, I just might have my entry into Bead Dreams this year…

On that note, it’s getting late, and I am absolutely exhausted from running around after my little man today. We went outside and played in the snow, we played cars, we did the dishes and the laundry and had lunch together and cleaned up the house a little bit, and then I made dinner while he went out and took care of the chickens with Daddy. I had been hoping that he would go down for a nap this afternoon, since I was up until well past midnight last night to meet a deadline, but no such luck. So now that everyone else is asleep, it’s my turn!

We went to Target on Saturday to pick up some essentials before “the big storm” hit on Sunday. And wouldn’t ya know it – there, in the shoe aisles, were rows and rows of summer sandals and flip-flops. Not very nice to show someone who’s wearing sixteen layers of clothes and a fleece hat.

So the forecast for the storm originally called for anywhere from 6-10 inches of snow. And this is what our street looked like Monday morning at 10:00 a.m., after nearly 24 hours of continuous hard snow:

When all was said and done, it seems that we got nearly 31 inches of snow between Sunday morning and Monday afternoon. Colden and I stayed in our jammies pretty much all day yesterday, except for when we layered up to go outside and get some wood for the fire.

We tried to get into the back part of the yard, but the snow was nearly up to my hips and up to Colden’s armpits. So we turned around and spent the rest of the day playing trains and cars.

I’ve got about a hundred projects on my work table this morning. Need to get cracking on those and take some pictures.

Oh, and I got an email from NanC yesterday that detailed our schedule for the upcoming workshop in Chicago! I’m so incredibly excited about this, I can barely stand it. I haven’t taken a class or a workshop in years, probably not since I went to Bead Fest Philly for the first time back in 2003, and I’ve certainly never taken one with an artist of NanC’s magnitude. And we’re taking a bead shopping field trip to City Beads on Sunday – which means I need to get a move on and list some tutorials in my Etsy shop so I have some spending money!

So, look for a few new tutorials in my Etsy shop this weekend. I’ll have all the details and links here on the blog, too!

This week went by way too fast. The days always seem to do that when I have a jillion things stacked up on my to-do list, waiting for me to get to them. But this week was very special…

This is the only photo I had time to snap while teaching this week at North Country School in Lake Placid. This is the third year that I’ve done a week-long teaching gig there, working with students during their Intersession enrichment week. This year, I had eight students between the ages of 11 and 14, and this is the first year that they were all girls. It was an amazing week as I watched these kids get more involved in the creative process that I’ve come to love so much myself in the last ten years. We did glass bead making, glass fusing with microwave kilns, paper bead making, earring making, and of course, off-loom bead weaving.

The first day, we started them off with a flat even count peyote stitch bracelet. There were a few kids that really struggled with it, and it took a lot of coaching to get them going. But the biggest reward for me was watching one student, Olivia, who was almost ready to give up. I sat down with her for a few minutes, and I walked her through each row, and how to add each bead. Suddenly, the look on her face changed totally – I could see the light bulb going off in her head! And once she got the hang of it, she was unstoppable – she made three bracelets before the week was over, and even figured out how to make a two-color pattern in the beads!

That picture above is my student Lucy showing another student, Eum Bi, how to finish her peyote stitch bracelet. Lucy was one of the ones who caught on quickly, and she was the first to finish her peyote stitch bracelet. Addie, another student, also picked up peyote like she had been doing it her whole life.

It was a little sad when I packed up my kiln and supplies on Friday, and I got hugs from the students this year. We had such a great time playing with fire, playing with beads, and making all kinds of beautiful wearable art!

This week is going to be a week of playing catch up and starting new projects, as I’m seriously behind on my writing for About.com and have a couple of new projects that I need to start this week. Stay tuned to the Love My Art Jewelry Blog for an exciting new project – we’re going to be doing a fundraiser sometime in April, and we’re going to get started this week!

Where, despite my best efforts, I’m having a hard time seeing the good and the positive things around me. I have friends who are struggling with employment issues, health problems, and financial problems. Most of these friends, unfortunately, live a long way away from me, so there’s not much I can do except listen on the phone and in emails and just be as supportive as I can from afar. The ones that do live close are easier to support, but I still feel helpless as I watch them struggle, wondering who will be next, and how my own family will fare as things progress.

Next week, I have a difficult item on my to-do list that is going to require a big bottle of wine and result in many tears. I have to write a letter to be entered into the record of the court at the sentencing of the man who killed my uncle back in 1999. Unfortunately, the best that the prosecutor could do under the circumstances 11 years later was to propose a plea bargain for aggravated burglary which carries a rather lenient sentence of prison time. While I’m relieved that there is no chance that there will be a trial that would most likely end in an acquittal, it just doesn’t seem like “justice” to me. My uncle, a peaceful man who loved his family and served as a layperson at his church for almost his entire life, was violently murdered in his home in Irvington, New Jersey in August of 1999. Because there were no witnesses, it was a sheer miracle that they even arrested the murderer through a DNA match.

Because I can’t attend the sentencing, the prosecutor in the case has suggested that my sister and I, along with other family members, write letters that will be read at the sentencing and entered into the record. So while this is a very important thing for me to do to gain some sense of closure in this, I know it’s not going to be easy.

So, while I get caught up on my blogging and plan the rest of my day and my weekend, I’m going to listen to some sad Steve Tannen music and let myself wallow for a little while.

I usually love the winter, and I know I’ve been complaining about our lack of snow the last few years, but this year, March 1st is making me very happy. It means that we’ve made it through the hardest (and coldest) part of the winter. It means that the days are noticeably longer. It means I’m that much closer to being able to wear my summer skirts and getting outside to do my summer farmers’ markets and craft shows… And this month, it means 29 days until I leave for Chicago and my workshop with NanC Meinhardt and a chance to finally meet so many of the beading friends I’ve made through Etsy and Facebook!

And speaking of beading friends, my good friend and very talented beader Carol Dean Sharpe is having another giveaway! This time, it’s to celebrate 5 successful years selling her gorgeous patterns and amazing finished beadwork on Etsy. And THIS is what she’s giving away as the grand prize!

To win this gorgeous creation, all you have to do is check out Carol’s Etsy shop, and then leave a comment telling her what you would buy with a $50 gift certificate. (She’s giving away a bunch of those, too!)

You can Tweet, blog and FB about this giveaway, too, all for extra chances to win! Good luck, and congratulations to Carol for her 5 years on Etsy!

Well, today’s the day! Unfortunately, I’ve been having some technical difficulties – with my LIFE. Things like getting ready to teach next week (the one week a year when I actually leave the house to work!) and then having a sick kid, getting sick with what the sick kid had… Those of you with kids, you know the drill.

That said, I’ll have my Bead Soup Blog Party piece ready and posted later today! In the meantime, take a look at Lori Anderson’s blog to see all of the amazing creations by the participants in this round of the Bead Soup Blog Party!

Oh, and make sure you take a peek at my swap partner’s blog – I sent Linda a big, fat package of beads, and not only did she make a whole bunch of amazing, gorgeous pieces with it, she’s having a giveaway with the leftovers!

That happens to be the name of one of my favorite movies (starring David Duchovny, Orlando Jones, Sean William Scott and Julianne Moore and directed by Ivan Reitman – check it out!), and it also happens to be what’s been on my mind lately with The Book.

It started out as a fairly simple concept, or so I thought. I thought I was going to write a three volume set of instructional series all about how to create beaded amulets. I managed to knock out all the text and step by step pictures for what I thought was Volume 1. And then I sat down to put it all together.

Wow. I realized that probably no one was going to buy this volume, because it was so…well…incomplete.

And then I realized that I had left so much out of Volume 1! Only covering one type of beaded bezel?! What was I, insane?! There are SO MANY ways to stitch a beaded bezel…why would I stop at just one?

Which led to another thought… While I was at it, I should cover more basic embroidery techniques, in case someone wants to make a completely embroidered amulet.

Then a good friend gave me some suggestions… Some really GOOD suggestions, which I followed up on, and BING! That little light bulb went off over my head. And that was when I realized that I have a long, long, long way to go with The Book.

So, for now, the plan is to get a series of “little” tutorials up and posted on the Etsy shop, peppered with a few projects here and there.

Meanwhile, the brainstorming and daydreaming and writing will continue…

I had my “big” dental appointment this morning. All the fillings done across my front teeth, except for two near the back, because the dentist didn’t want to torture me too much in one morning. 3 hours, 3 shots of novocaine, two stainless steel posts and $800. (And that’s after our insurance company paid their share.) But my teeth look about a hundred times better than they did at 7:30 this morning, and now I can cuddle up in bed and sleep for a little while before I have to head back into town to pick up Tom after work…

So, to get myself warmed up for working on the final layout for my first eBook (which should be in my Etsy store and for sale on the website here before the end of the week!), I’m going to do a little beadwork showcase for you.

Contrary to what many people believe, I do not absolutely love every single piece I make. Really. Sometimes, a piece just doesn’t work for me. But that doesn’t mean that other people won’t like it. Some of the pieces that I’ve sold at the farmers’ market are pieces that I had convinced myself would be in my inventory for many, many years!

And of course, I think like any artist, I look at the work of other artists with a mixture of admiration and envy. (Mostly admiration, mixed with a little bit of, “Why didn’t I think of that?!”)

So, for your viewing pleasure today, I’m going to show you some of my favorite bead artists from the Etsy Beadweavers’ Team. Be warned: some of these pieces will knock your socks off.

This beautiful piece, featuring a smoke-fired ceramic bead by Kristie Roeder of Artisan Clay, was created by artist MaryLou Holvenstot. I love the simplicity of the piece, but at the same time, I feel that it definitely makes a statement. Maybe I’m just drawn towards the colors and the unusual shape of the ceramic smoke-fired bead. Whatever it is that draws me to it, I find it a very inspiring piece that shows just how beautiful even an uncomplicated piece of beadwork can be.

And while I’m talking about my favorite bead artists, I have to mention Carol Dean Sharpe of Sand Fibers. I recently made one of her Corrugated Mixed Metals cuffs from her kit, and it’s easily one of my favorite pieces of jewelry. I love the way Carol has used triangle-shaped seed beads mixed with the Delica cylinder beads to create this amazing texture that feels a little bit like silk, a little bit like snakeskin. The colors are just right, too – it goes with pretty much every pair of earrings that I own, and the metallic finish on the beads gives me a little bit of shine without being sparkly. As I was making this bracelet, I had to stop every few rows and just run my fingers over it to feel the texture. Yummy!

Now, you wanna see some absolutely drop-dead gorgeous bead embroidery? Look at the pieces in Sedona Skye’s shop on Etsy. This Squash Blossom necklace is, I think, just as beautiful and intricate as the original pieces made by Native Americans using sterling silver and semi-precious gemstones. When I saw this piece, I just about swooned in front of my computer. Silver! Labradorite! Bead embroidery to die for! She certainly did an amazing job balancing the piece and making it look like a “real” squash blossom necklace. This is one of those pieces that looks like it belongs in a museum collection, and it makes me want to sit and practice my bead embroidery until my fingers bleed.

Nancy Dale is another bead artist who’s work I greatly admire. While Nancy also does some absolutely killer bead embroidery, I found myself looking at this piece of hers, Vineyard, and trying not to drool on the computer. What Nancy has done here is take a gorgeous handmade lampwork focal bead and created a stunning beaded rope to provide a support for the piece. These lampwork beads can be quite heavy, and I think Nancy did a spectacular job creating an aesthetically pleasing and functional support for that lampwork bead. Wowza. It actually gives me an idea for a lampwork glass bead that I bought at a bead show a few years ago that has been languishing in my focals drawer for the last two years…

And speaking of interesting structures, check out this pendant using Tila beads by Smadar Grossman of Smadars Treasures. I thought I had come up with some cool ways to use Tila beads, but this pendant blows me out of the water. Smadar’s use of a monochromatic color palette combined with her clean lines makes me think that this pendant wouldn’t look out of place hanging around the neck of an ancient Greek statue. But I think it would also look just as good hanging around the neck of a pouty-mouthed model, walking the catwalk at a fashion show during New York Fashion Week.

And, just so you don’t think I have anything but self-loathing for my own work, I’ll include my favorite piece currently in my inventory. This is my “Who’s Getting Married?” bead embroidered collar, and it was one of those pieces that just sort of came together all by itself. I really felt as thought I was watching the beads and the Ultrasuede and the fringe assemble itself as I worked, and while I worked, I watched movies like “The Brothers Grimm” (directed by Terry Gilliam, of course!) to try to give it a little bit of a gothic, gritty feel, despite the colors and flowery mother of pearl shells. This is one of those pieces that people can’t help but pick up and try on when I put it out on display, and I love seeing the way it looks when it’s worn. With all this fuss over the Royal Wedding coming up of Kate Middleton and Prince William, don’t you think she ought to be wearing something like this with her designer wedding gown?

All of these pieces are another reminder to myself of why I fell in love with beading in the first place. It just amazes me what can be done with just a few beads, a needle and thread. No two artists are going to create pieces that are exactly alike, because the beads allow for just such a variety of interpretations. And unlike other art forms, it’s easy to carry these around with you – just put on a t-shirt and your favorite bracelet or necklace, and you’re a walking art gallery!

Happy weekend, everybody!