It's 3:40 in the morning and I can't sleep.  I'm wide awake and feeling excited - I had a great day yesterday, Jane and I went to the Carp Farmer's Market and met the nice folks from Reid's Beads.  They were demo-ing glass bead making and it was the first time I actually got to see someone make a bead.  Paul showed me their wonderful collection of beads from really talented artists, absolutely incredible!!!  I think my very favourite was the Dustin Tabor pendant, the precision in the dots was unbelievable.

Aside from getting to drool all over their collection and their own beads (figuratively, not literally ;o)  ), I got to make a bead on their big oxy propane torch.  Wow!  What a difference from my little hot head!  The flame felt so soft and gentle but hot at the same time - it comes gushing out of my hot head like water under pressure, this big torch was so quiet, a totally different experience.

Who else should show up but Evelyn, who I met at the Bridge St. Bazaar, I think she'd understand if I told you she's crazy about buttons!  I just happened to have my buttons on me so she got to see them up close and seemed to be delighted.  I have to get busy now so that I can get things annealed hopefully later this week or early next.

There was also a lady who made me feel wonderful when she commented on my necklace, she seemed genuinely impressed when I told her I had made the beads.  Then she let me know she was the treasurer of an Ottawa bead group, so I felt very happy!!  I'm still basking in the excitement of the whole morning!

Friday night was Miracle in Merrickville Night - on our street at least!  I made this bead, and I still can't believe I made it.  I haven't been able to replicate it yet, so if anyone reading this has any suggestions on how I can do it again please let me know.  Bear in mind I am on the hot head at the minute.  This bead has a base of reddish orange and swirls of copper green - I've never been able to get copper green to do this wonderful thing before but hopefully with perseverence I can get it to happen again.  I won't apologise for being a picture hog here, it's my blog and I LOVE this bead :o)

Spot the gooseberry!  I had an idea to make some fruity beads and would like to make more and possibly etch them and put together in a bracelet. The one with white and blue flowers is using millefiore.  
The little lady is another idea I'd like to persue maybe as Goddess beads.
the two purpley beads are using opal lavender (I think!), Gelly's Sty pink, and intense black.  The black webs with the pink but not the lavender.

The Carleton Place Bridge St. Bazaar is this coming Saturday so I've been busy getting necklaces and earrings together for it.  I just had an order of Swarovski crystals arrive and I plan on using them in a few things too.

I stopped by David Paterson's today and am delighted as two or three of my beads have sold!

Yesterday was fun at the torch!!  I am starting to understand how the size and placement of the dots can create different patterns - sounds obvious right?  Not so, my green and black bead in this picture has tiny white rectangles between the big dots, I was thrilled when this happened.  It's all about how the glass spreads and I can't wait to get back to try more things.

A couple of these have murrini in them, I want to have another go at that too, I melted it in a little too much, and placed clear over top of one of them, which I have decided I should have done at an earlier stage to make sure I covered the whole piece.

I also used some violet yesterday and got a silver reaction onthe top right bead that I'm having a hard time trying to replicate.

There are different types of glass used in beadmaking. Each glass has a different melting temperature. The most commonly used is soft/soda glass bought under the name of Moretti. Other brands are available too, but Moretti is the one with the most colours and most common.



Hard/Pyrex/Borocilicate glass has a higher melting temperature and requires special eye protection for artists who work with it. The rewards are many including the colours that are visible within the glass.


The difference between the two types has led many users of Moretti to try and emulate the look of borocilicate glass. To acheive the beauty without the extra equipment and knowledge.


This is what I was attempting with the beads below. When Iris Gold is combined with Straw Yellow, very pretty things happen! These beads are the result, I layed a twisty over different colours of transparent Moretti and then encased the beads to give the full effect.


I had several crack on me sadly, I was trying to figure out why, and it turns out that the Iris Gold is a different type of Glass to Moretti. It has a different COE (Co-efficient Of Expansion), and this is what the problem is -- too bad because they are quite beautiful when the light shines through them. There's an unwritten law that says don't add more than 5% of a different COE to your bead, so perhaps if the twisty was used very sparingly the beads wouldn't be so prone to cracking. Who'd-a-thunk making pretty things required all this Science????

Med blue transparent (I think) base

Dark amber base

Red transparent base
Uranium Yellow base

So, I'm not sure if I'll pursue these beads - the iris gold is quite expensive - too expensive to go into the cracked bead pot anyway! I did learn good things though and I'm starting to understand how to encase a bead. Previous attempts have been pretty futile, but I'm starting to get a feel for how the hot glass goes onto the bead to give a nice clear layer without disturbing the decorated layer below.

The glass is unwrapped, sorted and labelled and the fun has begun! I'm experimenting with reactions between the different colours or 'families' of glass. Some pretty cool things can happen if you know what you are doing - and sometimes even if you don't.



Here's the latest!

These use a twisty made of edp and turquoise laid down next to an opal yellow stripe on the bead, the twisty smooshes into the yellow and all kinds of cool colours happen. Then I tried encasing same twisty - a very different looking thing happens.

Bead Soup anyone? There are a couple in here with copper in them, my favourites are the big blue hollow and a surprising reaction I got with the transparent uranium yellow bead (see close up 'Today's Pick' in the right hand column).

Introducing South Sea Mary and Porcinea Ham (don't you think she looks a little pig-like??)

.. note the nifty knew tip for taking photos - regular table salt acts as a great background, it's easy to position beads at the angle you want -- Just make sure they're dry before you plop them in there!!

I finally spent my contest winnings! I had a big order of glass arrive on Friday, along with some silver leaf and dichroic glass. Lots of colours I haven't tried before, I'm excited to use it and get new combos and reactions.

Isn't it PRETTY! - You can click on this one for a bigger image.


I've been working with dark ivory and seeing what reactions happen with different colours. The little 'blue and white' bead came about from laying a twisty of copper green, intense black and white on an ivory base bead. The blue must be from the copper, it's very pretty, I'm calling it IO

These are some others, playing about with dots and stringers. I found the really sweet spot in the flame on Friday where I could lay the stringer just how I wanted it.