New blog on ebook reviewing

I love reading how to ebooks on making it online as a jewelry artist, or just making it online, period. I've learned a lot by reading such ebooks, be it for free, or paid for. I did post the other day a small review on one of the free ebooks I've got on online marketing, but then while digesting what I took with me from that ebook, I realised that having a blog that deals online with ebooks for jewelry artists, and for anybody who wants to sell something online, be it a product, or a service, is what I want to do. It will be geared towards another audience than my jewelry blog, which is for customers of my jewelry. While I might not be as proficient in giving the tips out myself, by having read a bunch of books on the subject, and having talked about them with friends on various online forums, I can pretty much offer a good insight of what the book is all about, whether it's worth your time (and money if it's not free), or it will save you some by ignoring it safely.
Thus my new blog, How-to ebook reviews was born. I will add regularly reviews, so keep checking back, as it will be worthwhile.

Etsy bragging

Today I am doing some Etsy bragging and showing some fabulous people off!! Since being not only on Flickr, Twitter and Etsy I have made some wonderful friends and met some really talented artists. Freya of Tiger Burning Bright is just one of many but she included me in her delicious looking Treasury. Freya's work is so inspirational to me ~ and with it she is such a lovely friend ~ I can highly recommend her Pastiche earrings I am wearing mine now :)
A Treasury, for anyone who isn't 'up' on Etsy and all its going ons, is a place to promote artists and sellers you really like ~ (Not good to put yourself in) I've been a few now and I have to say I really should show more of them off ~ sadly my way of getting a screenshot isn't great.

Leading me on to another seller ~
Babecakes 1011's shop is looking soo delicious I may even go to America just to try them out!! This one is the Lemon with Limon frosting and wow!! I could go on about all the wonderful cupcakes she has in her store but I would only depress myself with not being able to buy any!! I do urge anyone who is in the US or has family over there to treat yourself or them ~ then let me have some delightfully in details feedback!!

Enjoy!!
Finishing with my new Styled heart earrings ~ I have about 5 pairs left ~ they seem to be popular :)

Google for beaded jewelry!

On October, 17th, I discovered that the Google search for "beaded jewelry" returned 2,340,000 websites with MyLovelyBeads.com on the first place. I could hardly believe that! I checked out the same search criteria next day, in a week, in two weeks, but my website is still on the first position. I'm pretty excited!

Celebrating Beads, the journey of... Bead Gala

Celebrating Beads, the journey of... First Annual International Juried Jewelry Design Competition is over, bead artists from over 14 countries and 33 states participated in the contest. The culmination of the competition was The Passion for Beads Gala held at the Naval Heritage Memorial Center in Washington, DC on Saturday, September 20th, 2008. There I met one of my readers - The Lone Beader, and I was happy! We talked a lot and we are like old friends now!


The Lone Beader, an extraordinary bead embroidery artist from Boston, MA, and me

It was really exciting event, where the contest winners were announced, and the World Premier of Diana Friedberg's final documentary in her award winning series World on a String, Part V: A Passion for Beads took place. This documentary features bead makers and jewelry designers from around the world and was the perfect touch for that evening Celebrating Beads and the designers who make and use them.


Rafael Matias, California, USA, a guest artist from the documentary

I met many wonderful people at the Gala: four of contest jurors, editors from two national beading magazines, and a lot of contest participants. It was my first such an event, and I can say that the entire experience was necessary, fun, and interesting.


Slide show: The Passion for Beads Gala

Reiki and making jewelry

I've been asked the other day how can I have so very different type of hobbies, spirituality and jewelry making. One is 'otherworldy' as people put it, and the other is something that you make with your hands, materialistic.
Well, I've never really thought about it until now, as for me these two major parts of my life go well hand in hand.
For one, when I create jewelry, I enter a sort of - well trance is really a strong word for it - meditative state, which allows my creative 'juices' to flow. I'm simply somewhere else at that time.
While making jewelry of any kind, I like to have meditative music on, starting from Llewellyin's reiki music (have tons of their CDs at home), to Aeoliah, and other artists and groups.
When the jewelry piece is done, sometimes I'm looking surprised at the result, it's as if I see it for the first time and discover all sorts of small things on it that I don't remember having decided to use or add to my piece :)
Also some of my friends here locally who know that I am working with reiki constantly ask me when buying my jewellery to charge their piece with healing Reiki. I have level 2 Usui Reiki attunment, and as I've benefited myself from the healing properties of this technique, I like to give this for free to everybody else around me or who gets in touch with my jewellery as well. So when you buy my jewelry, you can let me know if you'd like me to charge it with reiki, I'll do it gladly and for free.
I have held a few Reiki sessions with my mom, and with friends, and everybody felt the difference between before and after. Reiki really works. So it's a natural extension for me to use reiki in my creative arts as well, it's like breathing without focusing your thoughts on it :)

A Potpourri of Pieces

For the most part, there is no rhyme or reason to the group of jewelry pieces that you see here although two were an experiment with colour (or perhaps the lack of it). I have been working on some custom orders and every now and then have to break from the gemstones and pearls I'm working with and use a completely different set of components. I don't use jade very often and since I don't I have an overflowing supply of some kinds of jade, so I truned to some rarely used colours for a change of pace. Above and below are a jade bracelet and a pair of jade earrings done with what is sometimes referred to as "candy jade." I had these wonderful lampwork beads by Suzette Celestin (I love the way that she combines colours and often has beads with a translucent effect in the middle of opaque) in colours that matched beautifully. I'm quite happy with the result - a bit too happy; I've already thought of two outfits I have at home that these would look great with!

I was intrigued with the lampwork beads, below, once again that mixture of translucent and opaque, this time in greens and aquas, and decided to mate them with faceted aquamarine rondelles. I really like these large genuine aquamarine rondelles; they have interesting faceting and colours; some are opaque and some a bit translucent, and because of their size they look great with lampwork beads, creating a very "even" aquamarine bracelet. The large gemstone bead is a banded agate that grounds the bracelet and picks up the taupe colour in some of the beads.

Below are two cloisonne bracelets I made for a real change. The first has cloisonee beads with a dark yellow background that I combined with vermeil and, happily, citrine nuggets. I really like this one! The one below is made with sodalite beads; these are a dark blue, almost reminiscent of lapis, but without the golden pyrite that one finds in lapis. This bracelet has especially good vermeil that I just received straight from Bali - very high quality.

Above is a lariat necklace made with pretty purple suede and the largest chunky amethyst nuggets that I've ever had on the ends. These nuggets have white banding on one side and then translucent amethyst on the other; I just love them! Below, two bracelets experimenting with all black with touches of white, and black and white and red. The bracelet with red has very shiny red lampwork beads laced with silver (by Robin Weber), black onyx, and white quartz. The bottom bracelet is double-stranded; one strand is an imprinted chain from the Thai Karen Hill Tribes; the major strand has banded agate (black and white) and some of my favorite matte-finished lampwork beads, and pretty Bali sterling.

Tomorrow may be a day of rest for some, but I think I'm probably going to spend the afternoon in the studio unless something unexpected comes up. Believe it or not, Christmas is looming close on the horizon!

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Cluny Grey Jewelry

Turkish Lace Pendant

I made last week this pendant, however as I've just changed my computer, I didn't have the camera software installed on the new one, so I could not transfer the pictures to my pc.

As I like to support the wire wrapping community by purchasing the tutorials of those who can make them well, I bought this tutorial from Abby and losely following it, I made this pendant.
A grand flashy pendant , for those who like to really show of their jewelry.
4 gorgeous iolite briolettes woven into intricate lace motifs surrounding a lapis bead and yellow agate cubes make up this round Turkish Lace. Measurements are 4.5 cm x 7 cm, including the bail. It comes, as usual, on a silver chain and free shipping is also included along with a silver cleaning pad.

30.47 Euros