My latest kick--making big hole beads to mount on bottle openers to sell at an event in March. OK, I haven't booked the merchant space yet, although I did request time off from the day job. Of course, I haven't got Joe to make the bottle openers to mount these on, or even seen if my design for the openers will work. I'd say some extensive field testing is in order. After that the rest will fall into line. Build it and they will come....The light bulb bead is one that I saw online on dragonjools blog and just had to make one of my own. It's not a big hole bead, but it will work as a pin for work.
Some awesome (and some awful) beads have arisen out of this. I won't say I'm borrowing others' ideas. I'm being inspired by them. I have learned a few key lessons. CIM peacock green is prone to crack down the middle, especially if mixed with another glass and pressed too thin. On a related note, Krazy Glue may hold a cracked bead together to photograph, but it won't hold it together to use. I need a good press, preferably a TP masher with interchangeable graphite discs. While I'm at it, how about a Red Rider BB gun. OK, skip the gun, just the press, please, Santa? How about more toys?...I mean tools? I don't know, since I saw a guy in a tutorial making a really decent bead with nothing to shape it with but a kitchen knife.
Another lesson I've learned is that I suck at making pulled cane. Twisties and stringer I'm OK with, but rose cane and complex stringer I'm pathetic at. I look at the ribbon cane and rose beads that otyhers are making and I eat my heart out. Yeah, they've been doing it for years and I've been doing it since October, but really, four months. I should be an expert by now. I'm not a girlie girl anyway and the hearts and flowers have never been a part of my life that I can recall, oh OK there was the '80s, but aside from that, the beads are pretty. Maybe making a butch rose bead, like with guy colors, like black and white and metallics and stuff. Better file this idea. It may seem like a good one in a few months, or it may not.
Something else that seemed like a good idea at the time was silver glass. I just have to face the conclusion that while I can get the DH Triton to go neat colors and metallic, that is the best I'll be able to do with the HH torch. Aion2 just went amber opalescent. Not a hint of blue, green or pink, but I did manage a thin greasy grey line on the yellow bead on the right in the left picture. It looks like a glob of snot from a bad sinus infection.
Some awesome (and some awful) beads have arisen out of this. I won't say I'm borrowing others' ideas. I'm being inspired by them. I have learned a few key lessons. CIM peacock green is prone to crack down the middle, especially if mixed with another glass and pressed too thin. On a related note, Krazy Glue may hold a cracked bead together to photograph, but it won't hold it together to use. I need a good press, preferably a TP masher with interchangeable graphite discs. While I'm at it, how about a Red Rider BB gun. OK, skip the gun, just the press, please, Santa? How about more toys?...I mean tools? I don't know, since I saw a guy in a tutorial making a really decent bead with nothing to shape it with but a kitchen knife.
Another lesson I've learned is that I suck at making pulled cane. Twisties and stringer I'm OK with, but rose cane and complex stringer I'm pathetic at. I look at the ribbon cane and rose beads that otyhers are making and I eat my heart out. Yeah, they've been doing it for years and I've been doing it since October, but really, four months. I should be an expert by now. I'm not a girlie girl anyway and the hearts and flowers have never been a part of my life that I can recall, oh OK there was the '80s, but aside from that, the beads are pretty. Maybe making a butch rose bead, like with guy colors, like black and white and metallics and stuff. Better file this idea. It may seem like a good one in a few months, or it may not.
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