January Pretty Palettes Challenge

I'm officially hooked on this challenge! I am so enjoying seeing the inspiration picture and the beads that Erin Prais-Hintz posts on the Halcraft Pretty Palettes site. For January, Erin chose this picture featuring the Pantone color of the year, Marsala.

These colors are gorgeous together, and so, off to Michaels I went, in search of that lovely rich color. However, the selection at our local M's was very limited and I was hard pressed to find anything in the right color family. From the beginning, that beautiful purple gray succulent in the bouquet had caught my eye and when I found these beads below in that color range, I went off on a tangent.

Here are the beads that were used:
94760 Amethyst Glass Mix
91560 Amethyst Czech glass 6mm rondelles
80286 Amethyst stone Nugget Lustre

I added some 26 gauge Artistic Wire, threw in a little wire crochet, and here's the result:

Purple Mountain Majesty

    

                               

   

 I'm a February baby, so amethyst is my birthstone. Maybe that's why it called my name? At any rate I love the end result.

Hop on over to the January Reveal post to see what Erin and her guest, Sarah Ostriyznick, created, and links to the other contributors as well.

Hope your day is filled with just a little more joy and grace after seeing all the pretties!

Christie

Bead Soup Blog Party

It's official! I'm paired with Dana James for the BSBP. She's the first on my list of blogs that I follow, and I'm ( take your pick) thrilled, awed, a little intimidated , very challenged , but oh! so excited to be partnered with her.I'm going to take pictures of the wonderful beads she sent to me and post them tomorrow. She's an accomplished beader/teacher/jewelry maker and it's a privilege to be linked to her. There's a total of 362 people from around the world participating in the Bead Soup Blog Party this time.The big reveal will be September 17th. Time to put on the creativity hat and see where it leads.

School starts Monday- back to routine. Daughter #1 remains in Orlando ( go Knights), daughter #2 is safely in Tallahassee (go 'Noles) and daughter #3 begins her junior year in high school(go Brahmans). No more carpooling, no more drop offs/pick ups and I'll have 2 afternoons plus one whole day for things I need want to do.  There's no telling the thousands of miles  and hours I've logged with children in the car- this begins a whole new era. I've scheduled several classes to teach at Michaels for September. I taught Wire Crochet today to 3 women who are interested in learning new techniques and had a ball.They were delighted with their creations, and said they'll be coming back to learn more. I chose to get certified through Michaels because when I was learning how to make jewelry it was so hard to find classes that were local. Now there's only one independent bead store left and they don't offer instruction. The classes offer me a chance to give back and teach something I love doing.  If I ever make it to Seattle, however, I'm hunting down Dana for a class at Shipwreck Beads! I'm also in the process of moving into the new bead space, and while it's a lot of work and far from finished, I'm so enjoying working /organizing/ and making it my own. 

So, pictures to follow- so much to learn about this blogging thing, but I'm going to be like the Little Engine that could, and say "I think I can, I think I can"!

Hoping that today brings you a splash of grace and a dash of joy!