Window Ornament Swap

  And it's swap reveal blog hop time again! :-)
I love swaps, all the phases of it! It's all about expectation and creation (and chatting):

• first, you eagerly wait to know who you partner is;
• then it's time for the first contact with her (we are all women usually), some chatting to know more about each other, and a little web research to see more about her creations, preferences ...;
• after that is the creation phase - brainstorming, thinking, searching for ideas and creating the swap item, hoping that your partner would like it;
• in the meantime more chatting;
• and it's expectation time again - waiting for the packages to arrive to their final destination ... and wondering if your partner would like your creation and what will you receive;
• and finally, when the package arrives you feel like a child opening his/her Christmas gift ... :-D

  For the Window Ornament Swap (organized by Tina Holden in the Polymer Clay Swap Facebook group)  I was paired with Manon van Kempen, a lovely polymer artist living in Spain, but originally from Netherlans. She loves bright colours: orange, reds, yellow; she loves flowers and anything to do with nature; and she loves mixed media as well. Just like I do.  

  Here is what she sent to me:


One side of the ornament made by Manon van Kempen for me



    In the middle it is glass and all around polymer clay leaves, tiny flowers and butterflies. And the same on the other side. She had an injury of the right hand, but she managed to sent it in time ayway.



The other side of the ornament made by Manon van Kempen for me

   Isn't it BEAUTIFUL? I loooove it!!! And she also included some (not clay-) beads, kind of mini bead soup. Thank you, Manon, very much :-)

  
  Ok, let's see what have I made for Manon, now. She loves flowers, so let's be flowers! I wanted to make tulip-like petals and hang them upside down, so they could move when the wind blows trough the ornament. I hung them on a ring made from polymer clay. As the petals did not stay as I wanted, I needed to add another bigger ring under the middle part of the petals. Then I decided to combine it with macrame and arrange the ornament like a bell. In the macrame pattern I added some small yellow and orange round polymer clay beads and on the bottom part also 3 polymer flowers on a red wire.  

The window ornament I made for Manon van Kempen

  A closer look to the flowers:

Detail of the window ornament I made for Manon van Kempen

  As we both live near saltpans (Santa Pola - Spain for Manon and Secovlje - Slovenia for me ) I decided to include something salty, a specialty from our saltpans. You will never guess what .... Sweets!!!! More exactly Pralines with Fleur de Sel (pralines with different tastes like Fleur de Sel and Pistachio, with Fleur de Sel and Sweet Refosco, with Slovenian Honey, with Fleur the Sel and Persimmon Brandy).

  I hope Manon enjoyed this swap as much as I did.
  And I would be happy to read any of your comments :-)


  Here is the whole list of the other participants in the swap - with the links to the blog posts of those who blogged about the swap:

Manon van KEMPEN   http://www.manonvankempen.com/1/post/2012/09/window-ornament-swap.html
Tina HOLDEN   http://beadcomber.blogspot.ca/2012/08/window-ornament-swap.html

Kimberly IDALSKI   http://kimisjewelryandgifts.blogspot.ca/2012/08/artisan-polymer-clay-swap-window.html

Vanessa BETCHER   http://vanessasclayadventures.blogspot.ca/2012/08/window-ornament-swap.html

Leila BIDLER   http://www.lbidler.com/apps/blog/show/18400894-facebook-swap-organized-by-tina-holden

Anne RONCALLI   http://leboudoirdanne.canalblog.com/archives/2012/08/27/24975703.html

Nadia GENNARI   http://easywom.blogspot.it/2012/08/international-polymer-clay-swap-la-mia.html
Ilenia MORENI   http://leggendesegrete.blogspot.it/2012/09/international-swap.html

 

And for those participants who did not blog about the swap, you can find the whole gallery here: https://www.facebook.com/media/set/?set=oa.275844535849257&type=1

  Happy hoping!

Bead Soup Blog Party - 3rd Reveal

  The 6th Bead Soup Blog Party hosted by Lori Anderson is just having its "grand finale", the 3rd and final reveal.

  You can find the complete list of participants and their creations here.  

  Can you imagine that there were 400 participants from all over the world!!! And 3 from Slovenia amongst them: Kitty, Ana and me. Here's the map Lori made:

  I have to say I'm soo happy to have taken my courage in both hands as a total self-tought beginner in jewellery making and signed for the Bead Soup Blog Party for many reasons:

  - First (and I'm putting it on the first place not only because of the timeline, but for the importance it has for me), I met a wonderful person - a talented beadweaver and my partner in the bead soup party Amy Severino. We have so much in common and I'm sure our friendship will last. It's one of the things you just know. And maybe we can meet in person one day, America is not that far away ;-). We have just settle the timeline for a project in common, but I will keep it secret for some more time ...
  Well, it seems Lori has a special feeling (or intuition if you prefer) to match participants, because there are many of them that were paired with a similar soul - al least that's what I frequently read on the blogs;

  - Second, participating internationally was a huge motivation for my creativity and thinking "outside my confort zone", trying to push myself on the next level. My work was supposed to be seen all over the world and I did not want to disappoint Lori, Amy or any of the visitors of my blog reveal, and myself neither;

  - Third, it is a big platform for all the participants and their work;

  - Fourth, for me it was a big discovery of so many different techniques for making jewellery and materials used in many unusual ways. On several blogs my mouth remained open seeing such beauty and creativity!!! And I will absolutely try to learn some new techniques!

  - and maybe there are more things I'm not aware of in this moment.

  So, thank you Lori very much for your efforts and all the work you've done for this Bead Soup Blog Party! You're amazing!!

Flower power (#24/52 Earrings)

  I'm back! ... or better more regularly participating at the 52 earrings a year challenge. This is the 33 week of this year and the theme of the week was nothing else but FLOWER POWER.  
 
  My first idea was to use my millefiori flower canes (all the 3 of them), but then I came accros Elissa Powell's Translucent Chrysanthemum Cane© tutorial and a 25-watt light bulb appeared over my head ;-)

  For the cane I used white Premo, metallic perlmutt Fimo, transparent orange Fimo and some leftovers from a yellow-orange-red-white mokume gane. This is the result:

  It's a very simple cane to make, you can use your leftovers and the result is great, as you can see.

 The only problem I've had was the cracling of the white Premo. I like the snow white colour of Premo after curing and I had a half package left so I used it for the cane; I conditioned it well enough (about 20 times through the pasta machine on 4-5 different settings), just as other pieces, but after rolling the cane it begun to cracle ... I have to say I was quite dissapointed!!!

  Do any of you use Premo clay and do you have the same problems or it's just my package that was old?

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

  No, pa sem se le spet vrnila k rednemu sodelovanju v izzivu 52 earrings a year (52 uhanov na leto) z mojim 24. parom. Tema tekočega tedna je bila FLOWER POWER, zato sem seveda razmišljala "rožasto". Prva ideja je bila uporabiti (vse tri) moje cvetlične kačice, nato pa sem naletela na zelo zanimiv in preprost tutorial Elisse Powell Translucent Chrysantemum Cane© in žarnica nad mojo glavo je veselo zasvetila!

  Na zgornji sliki lahko vidite rezultat - uporabila pa sem bel Premo, metallic perlmutt Fimo, prozoren oranžen Fimo ter ostanke rumeno-oranžne-rdeče-bele mokume gane plahtice. Postopek je zelo enostaven, rezultat pa čudovit.

  Edino težavo, s katero sem se soočila pri zvijanju kačice, mi je povzročil bel Premo, ki je začel pokati. Glede na to, da sem ga vsaj 20-krat spustila skozi "pašta-mašino" na 4-5 različnih nastavitvah, se mi ne sanja, zakaj tako pokanje. Ni mi potrebno razlagati, da sem bila zeloooo razočarana in res ne vem, če ga bom še kupila ... čeprav mi je njegova snežno bela barva zelo všeč!!

 Imate kaj izkušenj s Premo? Se tudi vam dogaja enako ali je bil samo moj paketek star?   

Bead Soup Blog Party - (2nd) Reveal

  Here we are!!! It's finally time for the second round - that is also my reveal of the 6th Bead Soup Blog Party (BSBP), hosted by Lori Anderson. First I would like to thank Lori for such a wonderful work and this opportunity to artistically grow and meet other artists.

  My partner in this party is Amy Severino from USA and she sent me an interesting bead soup - just to remember here it is:

  As I've explained in my first BSBP post, the biggest challenge for me was working with such small beads. I've created jewellery mostly from polymer clay until now, and never tried beadweaving ...
 
  I've done some sketches few days after receiving the bead soup, but have begun to really work on the pieces only last weekend. In the meantime all the work was proceeding in my mind ...

  I knew I want to use the focal and the Mother-of Pearl disc beads for a necklace, but I wanted to add some brightness with a touch of orange (do you remember that little seed bead that accidentally fell into the package?) I still have no experience with simple stringing and I prefered some wire work ... But let's see the first piece!

  I didn't want to leave the focal as it was so I made a ring from czech fire polish beads and added three blue dyed Mother-of Pearl rice beads:

  The rest of blue rice beads were used for a "flower" that changes its shape every time the necklace is worn as the beads are moving and turning in different positions:

  I wanted the necklace to be asymmetric and to use a ribbon - and guess what - I was so lucky to find a fabric with the exactly the same shade of blue as the focal is!!! On one end I made a simple knot, on the other I waved around it some wire with an orange bead on each side. I'm not sure this is the arrangemet I like most, so it might happen to change something later:

  This is a totally "out of my comfort zone" piece and I was enjoying the creation process very much!!! Hope you like the final result.

  The second piece is a bracelet - yes, exactly that one from the teaser of my previous post. The brass imprinted beads (with small suns) are surrounded with textured polymer clay rings made by me. The texture on the rings represent the sun rays spreading from the inner sun-beads. I added also some orange seed beads inside the rings and the brown glass pearls from my soup outside of them. The clasp is made by two eye-pins wire-wrapped together. Well, this was pure improvisation - I made a clasp from polymer clay, but while assembling the beads together and trying it on my wrist I realized it won't work ... As I did not have any bronze wire, I played a little with the eye-pins ...

  I love orange and this bracelet is totally me!!!

  A little closer look:

  Yes, I've used that same eye-pins also to assemble the beads together :-)

  As I was left with two more polymer rings I made also a matching a pair of earrings  (my third piece):

 

  From the soup I received I've used the focal, the clasp and all different type of beads, but not all of them. Some of the brass imprinted beads, brown glass pearls and czech fire polish beads will be waiting in my stash for the next occasion.

  This is all from me, but please check first what my partner Amy made with the bead soup I sent to her. And if you still have some free time and are curious (as I absolutely am) about the creations of the other artists participating in the 2nd reveal of the Bead Soup Blog Partly you can find all the contacts on Lori's blog here.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

  Čas kar beži in že je prišel čas za drugi krog Bead Soup Blog Party-ja, ki ga že šestič po vrsti organizira Lori Anderson. V tem krogu sodelujem tudi jaz s svojimi izdelki, ki jih lahko vidite zgoraj:

 - Prvi izdelek je ogrlica, za katero sem uporabila obesek, zaponko in večino perl, ki sem jih dobila v "župci" od Amy. Dodala sem še oranžne perlice, da s kančkom modri kontrastne barve popestrim izdelek, in trak v istem odtenku, kot je obesek. Ta izdelek je povsem izven mojega "območja udobja", torej nekaj, kar običajno ne delam, tako da je zame glavni izziv tega party-ja.

- Drugi izdelek je zapestnica, v kateri sem uporabila male perle z vtisnjenimi sončki, ki sem jih obdala z rinkami iz polimerne gline, ki sem jih sama izdelala. Tekstura na rinkah predstavlja sončne žarke, ki se širijo iz sredinske perle.  Znotraj rink so še oranžne, izven rink pa rjave perlice, skupaj so povezane z bronasto žico, iz katere je izdelana tudi zaponka. Oranžn barvo obožujem, zato je ta zapestnica prav v mojem stilu!!

 - Na koncu sta mi ostali še dve oranžni rinki, ki sem jih seveda uporabila za par uhanov, ki se ujemajo z zapestnico.

 

  Zdaj pa si lahko ogledate še, kaj je naredila Amy  iz "župce", ki jo je dobila od mene; in seveda tudi, kaj so ustvarile vse ostale priden roke sodelujočih v tem izzivu. Kozarec sveže pijače v roko in malo virtuanega sprehoda - seznam s povezavami dobite tukaj.

Bead Soup Blog Party - a Little Teaser and 1st Reveal

  I'm one of the 400 lucky participants of the 6th Bead Soup Blog Party, hosted by Lori Anderson, that is split in 3 separated reveals, because of so many participants. You will see my creations on August 11th (2nd Reveal), but I wanted to give you a sneak peek at my sketches ... Well, I'm not going to show you everything, just a little part of it :-)

  As my pieces are still not finished, I'm not sure at all this is the final appearance ... So just come back next Saturday (August 11th) and take a look at my final results.

  In the meantime you can check the creations of the 1st Reveal of July 28th - the list will be available clicking here. there are so many beautiful pieces of jewellery there ... I still haven't manage to check all the blogs, I've just reached the names that begin with K.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

  Hitro se bližamo 11. avgustu, ko bo prišel čas za predstavitev mojih izdelkov iz "župce", ki mo jo je poslala Amy. Seveda govorim o mojem sodelovanju v Bead Soup Blog Party-ju, ki ga gosti Lori Anderson. Da vas malo podražim, sem zgoraj objavila izsek iz moje skice - vendar pa je moje delo še v teku, tako da bo končni rezultat lahko popolnoma drugačen ;-)

  Medtem pa se lahko pozabavate z ogledom kreacij drugih sodelujočih, ki so jih razkrili v prvem krogu, 28. julija. Povezavo na njihove bloge lahko najdete tukaj. Uživajte!





Summer circular swap / Poletni krožni swap

  V slovenščini lahko prispevek preberete tukaj.

  I enjoy very much participating in swaps. The first of all was the February 2012 swap Valentine's heart, organized by a Slovenian team of 4 polymer clayers Izdelovalnica malih umetnin and then every month followed a new one. For the summer months they organized a Summer circular swap.

  Let me first briefly summarize the rules of this swap: the 4 organizers (from Izdelovalnica) have collected the initial set of 40 polymer clay pearls, focals and other pieces made by themselves. They have sent the package to the first participant that had to take 5 to 8 pieces out and put the same number of pieces (made by her) in. She had one week time to make something from the pieces she had taken out, but not more than two pieces of jewellery. Then she had to send the "renewed" set of polymer pieces to the next participant and so on.

  I was the fourth one in the line and my reveal was scheduled on June 16th. Here is the set I have received: 
 

   Happy as a child I was changing the position of the pieces, combining them in different sets, chosing some of them, then changing my decision again and again ... fortunately there was a deadline for sending the package out to the next participant, and I made this final decision

   There were mainly two criteria I adopted: first, the coordinated colours (as there was a limit of two pieces); and second, I wanted to take the pieces that differ from what I have made until now. The pumpkins were made by Flo; the golden pieces in the middle by Metuljcica and the bottom pearls were made by Roberta.

  For the golden pieces Metuljcica got the inspiration from the Buddhist prayer mills, what recolled to me the red colour (that happens to be also one of my favourites) and the golden tassels as a kind of threads of life ... resulting in this pair of earrings:

  This is also my #22 pair of 52 pairs of earrings a year. 


  The rest of the pieces in matching colours I immediately imagined as a part of a necklace. My starting point were the colours in both Roberta's pearls, but there was no way to achive just the same shades as she did ... so I decided to make a skinner blend from yellow to dark blue and use it to make small pearls from each shade. To break the symmetry and expose the pumpkins a little more I decided to insert between them some wire. I'm quite happy with the final result, what about you?

  The creatins of the other swappers are posted here - well, all the texts are in Slovene language, but you can always admire the pictures :-) You can always use the online translators, but they usually create quite a fun translation ...

  Have fun,
  Alenka