When life gives you left-handed lemons...

 I'm the kind of person who tries my hardest to always look on the bright side of things, but the last few weeks have been rather challenging. I've dislocated my right shoulder, twice. I'm right handed. Thankfully I've been able to pop my shoulder back into place myself both times, so I've avoided a lot of trauma. But still, I've been keeping my right arm in a sling for the last few weeks.  For those of you who are curious, I'm hypermobile, I managed to dislocate my shoulder by turning over in bed.

Not only do I need my right hand for work and life in general, obviously, I need it to bead! My best beading friend, the fabulous editor of Bead and Jewellery magazine, Vicky Roberts asks me to test-bead and proof read a lot of her patterns/tutorials, and when I told her I'd dislocated my shoulder, we agreed I should learn to bead left handed. I think she was actually joking, as she was rather stunned when later that day I sent her a picture of a bezelled cushion stone. I'm sorry I can't share that picture with you, but it's for a top-secret project. 

Instead, here's a piece of modified right angle weave I've done left-handed. This will make up part of the chain part of a necklace designed by Heather Kingsley-Heath - the design is called Katia. I'll blog about it once I've finished it. 

It has made me think though, about how easily I adapted to beading with my left hand. Obviously, I was slower, my tension wasn't quite as tight, but that's not necessarily a bad thing as my usual beading tension can only be designed as fierce! With my right arm in a sling, I can hold the beadwork just fine, so it's just like swapping everything over. 

Usually (right handed), I like to bead in an anti-clockwise direction, but left handed, I seem to prefer clockwise. I also feel like I prefer a longer needle in my left hand, but a shorter one in my right, but it may be too soon to tell on that one really. 

It definitely is much easier to bead left handed than it is to write left handed. I've just about got the hang of using a mouse left handed, and typing with just one hand is slow, and involves a lot of proof-reading (I tend to forget capital letters and apostrophes). 

Months ago, I signed up to do a Zoom workshop with Sabine Lippert for her Fields of Gold necklace which is just beautiful. The workshop is tomorrow, and I still have to keep my right arm in a sling. Normally, I'm a speedy beader, but I I'm definitely going to be one of the slower ones tomorrow. At least I have a really good excuse! 

Little Robin Red-Breast

I admit it... I'm a doodler!  
Especially during meetings.  Usually, I draw all kinds of geometric things, but during a teleconference a couple of weeks ago, I drew a little bird on a green post-it.  Then I was struck with inspiration... this would make a really nice design for a bead embroidered robin!

I'm still relatively new to bead embroidery, I've only made a few pieces in the past, so this felt like it was quite ambitious to me.  I spend a couple of weeks thinking about it, and on Sunday evening, I decided to give it a go!

The ladies of my favourite facebook group gave my little Robin such a friendly welcome into the world, that I thought I'd write up how I made him (ok, so I had kind of planned to do this any way, hence all the step-by-step photos!)  At points, I got carried away, and forgot to stop to take photos... so if things jump about a bit... I apologise.

First off, I drew the outline of the bird onto my stiff-stuff, and glued the 17 x 10 mm black cherry mother of pearl oval in place, and in back-stitch, I sewed a row of metallic bronze size 11 beads around the oval.  

Next, I started on the wing.  I used a mix of matt and metallic finish beads in shades of brown, red and gold iris, working along the outline of the wing, then building up inside the wing to fill it in.  I've heard this described as 'painting with beads' and I think that's a beautiful description!

  

 The next step was to start filling in the body of the bird.  I really wanted to do this in a way that would give an idea of the the different parts of the bird... like I wanted the wing to look different to the body, and I wanted the tail to look like a tail, so this is how I built it up, initially by back-stitching another row around the shell oval.

 And then a third row, so the body met the wing.

 I then moved on to the tail, working in back stitch, two beads at a time

 Next, I decided to move to the head, and used a 3mm petrol Swarovski pearl for the eye, and  copper-lined crystal size 15 delicas for the beak

 I then continued to bead the outline of the head, and fill in the rest of the empty space.  There were a few little spaces where the size 11 beads didn't quite fit together as nicely as I would have liked, mainly because the rows were all worked in different directions, so I filled these in with some size 15 seed beads in light brown AB.

 Once the beading was finished, I trimmed around the beadwork leaving a very tiny edge of stiff-stuff all the way around.

 The next bit actually gave me a headache... but that was due to the smell of the glue!  E6000 is a favourite of bead embroiderers, but it really smells... I used it to glue the embroidery onto some ultra-suede backing.  I then cut around the beadwork, leaving about 1mm of ultra-suede all the way around the edge.

 Then, to finish it all off nicely, I used the size 15 light brown AB beads to sew a brick-stitch edge all the way round.

I am going to turn this into a hair clip... or a brooch... I'm not sure which.  I think I'd wear it more as a hair clip.

A member of the facebook group I mentioned earlier suggested that I tried making some other British birds... which led to a great deal of hilarity.... and a conversation which I shan't repeat on here.

I'd like to say a big thank you to all the lovely ladies from OTTBS who have really made my evening, and who make beading, and tacking my stash great fun!

Am I good enough?

I have been a beader for just over 4 years now, and I have to say, I am completely hooked... I'm a bead addict. I love the way that the little seed beads fit together to make so many different shapes, and how all the different stitches feel, and how they work together.  Up until now, I have been a self-taught beader - learning from books, tutorials, the internet etc.  I even class myself as a novice designer - coming up with a few original designs of my own - I've even sold a few tutorials online, and had one of my designs published in a magazine.

The more I bead, the more I want to get into designing properly, and I want to start taking some classes, and more than anything, I'd like to meet some other beaders!

There are some pro beaders out there that I really admire, I am even honoured enough to have a few of them as 'friends' on facebook.  One beader whose work I admire a lot is Laura McCabe, she is renowned for her seed-beading around rivolis, highly faceted Swarovski crystals.  Rivolis have no holes, they have a flat-ish front, and a pointed back.  They have such depth to them, and they come in an amazing array of colours, shapes and sizes, they are truly stunning.  The reason I'm talking about Laura McCabe today is that I am contemplating taking one of her 'master-class' classes, designing and making beaded sculpture - it's being taught at Stitchncraft, in Dorset, which will become one of my local bead shops when I move later this month.

There were two things putting me off going to this work shop... the first is a lame reason - I didn't really want to go on my own, and the second is what this blog is about - am I good enough?

Regarding going on my own, I now know two people from one of the groups I belong to on facebook who are going, so I won't be on my own, but the second bothers me more.  To help me decide if I am good enough, I've bought one of Laura's tutorials - to make the ultimate beaded bead.  I've found some vintage square rivolis online, and ordered them... pretty much everything else is going to come from my stash...

This is what the ultimate beaded bead looks like - photo courtesy of Laura McCabes website.

Mine will not be this colour - it will be a multitude of greys and blacks, with several different bead finishes.  If I find I get on with this pattern, and can follow it, then I'll book the workshop... I'll blog with my progress, as I'm sure it'll take me a while to make - especially as I'm going to be moving house in a few weeks!