I'm still make and sell angelbeads to save money for Duchenne. From every angel sold (price for one angel to be delivered abroad is $20,95) of which € 5,00 (which is about $ 6.75) will be donated to Duchenne Parent Project. Shipment is included and the angels will arrive packed in a handmade origami box.

All angels will have an ivory bodice and according to your wish can be made either with blond, brown, reddish or black hair (with or without ponytail / pigtails) and of course it is also possible to order angels with dark or other skin colours. The colours used to decorate the dress can be determined in consultation, however the method of decoration is determined by myself during the making of the particular angel.

So if you are interested in buying an angelbead, please send me an e-mail (at mailme at mariekuniek dot com). The order will take one week to be made and the angel will only be sent out after I received payment.

Ik maak en verkoop nog steeds glazen engeltjes voor Duchenne. Van ieder verkocht engeltje (prijs voor één engeltje is €14,50) zal € 5,00 gedoneerd worden aan Duchenne Parent Project. De prijs is inclusief verzendkosten en de engeltjes komen verpakt in een handgemaakt origami doosje.

Bovenstaande voorbeelden zijn engeltjes die ik afgelopen week gemaakt heb naar aanleiding van een bestelling. De engeltjes hebben een ivoorkleurig lijfje en kunnen al naar gelang met blond, bruin, rossig en zwart haar gemaakt worden (met of zonder staartje/staartjes) en natuurlijk is het ook mogelijk om een engeltje met een getinte huid te bestellen. De gebruikte kleuren voor de versiering van het jurkje kunnen in overleg bepaald worden, de wijze van versiering wordt echter door mijzelf tijdens het maken van het engeltje bepaald.

Bestellen kan per e-mail (mailme at mariekuniek.com), de besteltijd is een week en het engeltje wordt pas verzonden nadat ik de betaling ontvangen heb.

My studio isn't exactly "winter proof", particularly the last couple of weeks it really has been too cold even, with the heater on the highest level. But you should honor agreements and since I swapped with someone, I braved the cold and made this set.

Mijn atelier is niet echt "winterproof", echt zeker de laatste weken is het veel te koud en dat trekt mijn kacheltje niet. Maar ja afspraken moet je nakomen en aangezien ik met iemand een swap/ruil had, heb ik toch de kou maar getrotseerd en dit setje gemaakt.

I've been making some new necklace lately using beads in different shapes, silver beadcaps, ceramic and/or swarovski beads and silk ribbons. I like the way this one turned out, it really makes a wonderful eyecather.

De laatste tijd heb ik een aantal kettingen gemaakt waarbij ik verschillende vormen kralen gecombineerd heb met zilveren kralenkappen en keramische- en/of swarovski-kralen in combinatie met zijden linten. Ik ben heel tevreden met bovenstaand resultaat, het is een echte eyecatcher geworden!

This one is a beautiful delicate pendant I think. I combined a silverglass bead, which unfortunately doesn't shows his true beauty in this picture because there are several shades of blue and green in it, with playful dangles made of swarovski and stone beads and silver beadcaps.

Deze hanger is sierlijk en delicaat. De prachtige zilverglas-kraal (die helaas op de foto zijn werkelijke schoonheid niet toont, want hij bevat diverse tinten groen en blauw) is gecombineerd met speelse elementen gemaakt van swarovski- en siersteen kraaltjes gecombineerd met zilveren kralenkapjes die onder aan de kraal bungelen.

I while back I bought some new coneshaped mandrels and here are a few samples I made using them. I think I will turn them into some kind of tassels because I also received a swappackage send by one of my swappartners from one of the Dutch beadfora, which amongst a lot of lovely items also contains a box with several colours of seedbeads.

Een tijdje terug heb ik een 2-tal kegelvormige mandrellen gekocht en deze kralen heb ik daarmee gemaakt. Ik denk dat ik ze ga gebruiken om een soort sieradenkwastjes van te maken, ik heb namelijk ook mijn eerste swappakketje binnengekregen van de eerste van mijn swap-partners van één van de Nederlands glasfora en daar zitten o.a. diverse doosjes met hele mooie seedbeads in.

Mijn "Batic beads" zijn kralen die gemaakt zijn door een opaak basiskleur te combineren met dots van Goudrose en EDP of een combinatie van die twee met andere opaak-kleuren. Soms nog extra versiert met transparante dotjes. Ik blijf het leuk vinden om deze te maken :0)

Te bestellen via mijn Etsy-shop

My "Batic beads" are beads made using an opaque basecolour layered with either goldpink or edp or a combination of those with other opaque colours to form lovely patterns. Sometimes I also add some transparent raised dots for fun. I always enjoy making these :0)

You can buy them in my Etsy-shop

Ik was aangenaam verrast toen ik deze kraal zag. Door het gebruik van een transparent blauwe ondergrond en een twisty gemaakt van silverglas bedekt met transparent, lijkt het wel of er aan één kant van de kraal kleine veertjes opgesloten zitten in het glas...soms komen er echt kadootjes uit mijn oven :o)

Te koop via mijn Etsy-winkel of stuur gewoon even een e-mail.

When I took this bead out of the kiln I was totally surprised by the beauty of it. Blue transparent glass was layered with a twisty out of silverglass and encased with clear. Somehow it looks like little feathers are trapped inside the bead on one side, totally gorgious.

Available in my Etsy-shop.

Shiny beads

I have this terrible dilemma about wether or not I should etch my beads. Whenever I see etched beads by fellow-lampworkers I am in awe. Because I love the soft look etching gives to your beads. However when it comes to my own beads, I rarely dare to etch them and my main reason is that it's not reversable. Etching removes the shiny skin of your bead and when it's gone it can't be brought back. So what if my customers don't buy them because they are etched instead of shiny? Ofcourse I could mention I could do a custom order and leave those shiny. But one never knows if the customers read the descriptions very well no do they?

Regelmatig vind ik mezelf in een dilemma wat betreft het etchen van kralen. Iedere keer als ik van collega-kralenmakers voorbeelden zie van geëtste kralen ben ik helemaal weg van de zachte uitstraling die ze daardoor krijgen. Echter wat betreft mijn eigen kralen laat ik het meestal achterwege en de belangrijkste reden is misschien wel dat het niet omkeerbaar is. Wanneer je kralen etst dan verwijder je het "glanzende velletje" en eenmaal weg kun je de kralen niet meer glanzend maken. Dus stel dat een potentiële klant de set prachtig vind maar ze eigenlijk veel liever glanzend had willen hebben? Natuurlijk kun je in de beschrijving vermelden dat het door het plaatsen van een "custom order" ook mogelijk is om een glanzende set te bestellen, maar hoe goed wordt die beschrijving nu eigenlijk gelezen?

Etched beads

I would love to know you opinian so please leave a comment if you will... which version of the beads above do you prefer and should I list them shiny or go and etch them whenever I feel the beads would look better that way?

Ik ben eigenlijk wel benieuwd naar jullie mening, dus mocht je die willen geven gebruik dan de comment-functie onderaan het bericht... welke versie van de bovenstaande kralen vind jij het mooist en kan ik het beste mijn kralen glanzend in mijn shops plaatsten of gewoon mijn eigen gevoel volgen en ze etsen wanneer ik denk dat dit iets extra's toevoegt?

Bye the way these beads are available in my Etsy-shop.

Overigens zijn deze kralen te koop via mijn Etsy-shop.

Sometimes beads come out of my kiln I simply can not let go or at least not yet, that's what my feelings are with this set. I will at least make some more of the tubular bead because I love the way the design turned out and maybe also make a matching large focal. I usually don't make a lot of jewelry but I have some nice idea's to make a necklace out of these beads.

Zo af en toe komt er een set kralen uit mijn oven waar ik simpelweg geen afstand van kan doen, of in ieder geval nog niet direct en dat heb ik zeker met dit setje. Ik wil zowieso nog een paar van de kokervormige kralen maken en misschien ook nog een grotere bijpassende blikvanger. Ik ben normaliter ook niet echt zo van het sieraden maken, mijn lol zit voornamelijk in het kralen maken zelf, maar deze set nodigt om één of andere reden uit om tot ketting te verwerken... ik barst eerlijk gezegt van de ideeën.

I also made these Pandora/Trollbead style beads which are listed in my Etsy-shop.

Wel heb ik dit setje Pandora/Trollbead stijl kralen gemaakt die te koop staan in mijn Etsy-winkeltje

I've listed these beads in my Etsy shop. They are made to order, so these are the sample-beads and I will make them whenever they are ordered.

Ik heb deze grappige grootgatkralen in mijn Etsy shop geplaatst. Het zijn kralen die besteld kunnen worden, dus dit zijn de voorbeeld kralen en ik maak ze zodra ze besteld worden.

I'v been exploring a technique called electroforming to expand the posibilities to decorate beads. I'm only using copper at this moment because not only do I like the possibilities you have with copper, it's also much cheaper than using precious metals like silver, which by the way also would require much more safety measures.

Momenteel ben ik aan het experimenteren met galvaniseren. Dit is een techniek die ook gebruikt kan worden om kralen verder te verfraaien. Op dit moment beperk ik me tot het gebruik van koper, niet alleen omdat koper diverse mogelijkheden heeft om verder af te werken, het is ook een stuk goedkoper dan werken met edelmetalen die vanwege gezondheidsrisico's ook veel meer veiligheidsmaatregelen behoeven.

Here's my set-up. On the right is my recifier which supplies both positive and negative charges to make it work. On the left you see my beaker with blue electroforming solution and copper wire on top. The wire in the middle holds the bead I want to decorate (with thin copperwire) and is attached to the negative lead-wire and the other wire is U-shaped and holds two anodes (copperplates) and is connecte to the positive lead-wire. The copper-anodes are the suppliers for the copper that will be attached to the bead.

Dit is mijn opstelling. Rechts bevind zich de voeding die de aanvoer van positieve en negatieve lading verzorgt. Links staat de beker met blauwe electrolyt-vloeistof met bovenop koperdraden.
Aan de middelste koperdraad wordt met behulp van dun koperdraad de kraal gehangen die ik wil decoreren. Deze wordt bevestigd aan de voedingsdraad voor de negatieve lading. De andere koperdraad heeft een u vorm waar aan weerszijde met dun koperdraad koperanodes gehangen worden en waar de positieve voedingsdraad aan bevestigd wordt. Deze koperanodes zijn de voedingsbron voor het koper dat door de bewerking op de kraal opgebouwd wordt.

Because glass doesn't have a methal surface for the copper to attach to, you need to prepare your bead. This means you need to clean, (partial) etch and paint the bead with electroconductive paint on the places you want to be electroformed. Since the copper will not adhere to the glass permanently you need to paint it in a way the copper won't slide off when it's ready. Also every part of the painting needs to be connected either to the other paint or to the negative leadwire to be able to receive the negative charge. Fun part is you can also attach extra's by glueing it on and paint those as well.

Omdat glas geen metalen oppervlakte heeft waarop het koper zich kan vastzetten, moet je de kraal van te voren behandelen. Dat wil zeggen goed reinigen, (gedeeltelijk) etsen en voorzien van geleidende verf op die plekken waar je later het koper wilt hebben. Uiteindelijk zal het koper een laag vormen op de plekken die je beschilderd hebt, maar omdat deze laag niet echt aan het glas hecht, moet je de kraal zodanig beschilderen dat de koperen vorm er naderhand niet af kan vallen en ook alles met elkaar verbonden is of directe verbinding heeft met aanvoerdraad voor de negatieve lading. Het leuke van het geheel is dat je allerlei extra's kan toevoegen om op te nemen in het geheel, zolang je maar zorgt dat deze ook beschilderd en verbonden is met de rest van de verf.

When everything is ready the bead will be attached to the copperwire in the middle using the thin copperwire and placed into the solution between the two anodes, and the electricity is turned on. For these beads I used 0.28 amps. and waited for about 6-8 hours to get the results and in between changed the position of the bead so the thin copper wire would not be attached to the copper that already has been forming.

Als alles klaar is, wordt de kraal bevestigd aan de middelste koperdraad met behulp van het dunne koperdraad en in de vloeistof geplaatst precies tussen de 2 anodes. Vervolgens is de voeding aangezet op 0.28 amp. en dan is het een kwestie van zo'n 6-8 uur wachten afhankelijk van de gewenste dikte. Tussendoor wordt de kraal nog wel af en toe verschoven op het koperdraadje om er voor te zorgen dat dit niet vast komt te zitten aan de zich vormende koperlaag.

I'm not planning on electroforming all my work, but being able to do so when I think it would make it a bit more special sure is nice!

Nu ben ik echt niet van plan om al mijn werk te gaan verkoperen, maar dat ik nu de mogelijkheid heb om dit te doen als ik denk dat het toegevoegde waarde heeft, vind ik toch wel super.

The beads below I made last week and they are for sale in my Etsy-shop.

Onderstaande kralen heb ik vorige week gemaakt, ze zijn te koop via mijn Etsy-winkeltje.

Based upon these a lovely Italian lady placed a custom order for some beads in the same colors. Only she wanted them smaller and I mean really smaller. I used to make tiny beads in my first year of lampworking when I still worked on my hothead. But the longer you are lampworking the more experienced you get and therefore you have more confidence and working on a Minor Bench Burner (which combines oxygen with propane) sure makes it easier to melt the glass quicker and I think those are de reasons I make bigger beads nowadays

Op basis van deze kralen kreeg ik van een aardige Italiaanse dame een order om vergelijkbare kralen te maken maar dan kleiner en dan bedoel ik dus echt kleiner. Toen ik pas met glasbranden bezig was en nog werkte op de Conkinect maakte ik van die kleine kraaltjes. Maar hoe langer je bezig ben, hoe meer ervaring en dus ook meer vertrouwen je krijgt in je eigen kunnen. Dat in combinatie met het feit dat het smelten van glas op een Minor Bench Burner (die zuurstof en propaan combineert) een stuk sneller gaat, zorgt er voor dat mijn kralen tegen woordig een stuk groter zijn.

Anyway here are the results of my effords...

Hier in ieder geval de resultaten van mijn gepriegel...

And due to the fact these colors where on my desk for about five days, a few extra items are for sale in my Etsy- and artfireshop.

En vanwege het feit dat deze kleuren zo'n vijf dagen op mijn werkbank lagen zijn er nu nog wat nieuwe artikelen in deze kleuren te vinden in mijn Etsy- en Artfire winkeltjes.

Everyone who's living a creative life of some sorts knows them... these awful days where nothing works out the way you want them to and your Creative Muse seems to be on holiday or something. Well I had some of those days the last week and a half. So yesterday I decided it was time to stop trying to beat the odds to make beads nice enough to be sold and return to practice and play and see what would happen next. So I decided to experiment with some of my silverglass and continue my EDP mission. As you can see in the picture above al lot came out of my kiln this morning and to be honest I'm pretty happy with most of the results, I even am smitten by some.

Iedereen die op welke wijze dan ook creatief is kent ze ... die vreselijke dagen waar niets werkt zoals je wilt en je Muze blijkbaar heeft besloten om op vakantie te gaan of zo. Dat was waar ik de laatste anderhalve week weer eens last van had. Geen in mijn ogen fatsoenlijk verkoopbare kraal of kralenset kwam uit mijn handen en dus besloot ik gisteren die strijd te laten voor wat hij was en terug te keren naar de techniek en het spelen. Ik besloot dus om wat van mijn zilverglas uit te proberen en mijn EDP missie te vervolgen. Zoals je op bovenstaande foto kunt zien is er flink wat uit mijn oven gekomen vanochtend en eerlijk is eerlijk, ik ben helemaal niet ontevreden met sommige resultaten en er zitten er zelfs een paar tussen waar ik helemaal verrukt van ben.

About the mission...

Would you believe me if I said only 2 kinds of glass are used to make al of the above beads? Well its true really, I only used EDP and dark Ivory and the range of colors and designs are simply created by heating it in different ways, add some silverleaf occasionally or leave some of the decoration raised. I'm in love with this glass really I am.

Zou je me geloven als ik vertelde dat bovenstaande kralen allemaal gemaakt zijn met 2 kleuren glas? Het is dus echt zo, ik heb alleen EDP-paars en donker ivoor gebruikt en de uiteenlopende kleuren en decoraties zijn simpelweg het resultaat van de verschillende manieren van verhitten, het toevoegen van zilverblad en door een deel van de decoratie maar gedeeltelijk in te smelten. Ik ben echt helemaal weg van dit glas.

And these are the beads that totally smitten me. I absolutely love the way they look and although normally I don't like to make beads exactly the same over and over again, I know for sure I won't mind making lots and lots of these. So be ware of the EDP scrolls, LOL...

En dit zijn dus de kralen waar ik compleet verrukt van ben. Ik vind ze echt super en alhoewel ik er normaal bijna een hekel aan heb om constant dezelfde kralen te maken, weet ik zeker dat ik daar in dit geval geen enkele moeite mee zal hebben. Dus pas maar op voor de EDP-krulkralen, GREINS...

The above examples are made of plain EDP (the spacers) and some melted in EDP-scrolls with ivory. As you can see the purple reacts with the ivory, which results in a dark background to bring out the purple beautifully.

Bovenstaande voorbeelden zijn gemaakt van enkel EDP (de kleine kraaltjes) of een combinatie van ingesmolten EDP-krullen op ivoor. Zoals je ziet reageert de paars op het ivoor waardoor er een donkere achtergrond ontstaat die de paars prachtig benadrukt.

And here are my last examples. Three are made with silverleaf which peeps out in between the EDP lines and you also see some of the EDP/Ivory background reaction. The color of the EDP in this case depends on more or less heating and honestly not all are to my liking. The one on the right is simply raised decoration on dark ivory and I believe I experimented with the oxygine a little (however I'm not absolutely sure about it)

Dit zijn mijn laatste voorbeelden. Drie ervan zijn met zilverblad dat tussen de strepen EDP tevoorschijn piept en hier en daar zie je ook wat van de EDP/Ivoor "achtergrond-reactie". De kleur van de EDP in deze voorbeelden zijn het resultaat van meer of minder verhitten en ik vind ze niet allemaal even mooi. De kraal rechtsvoor heeft een ondergrond van donker ivoor waarbij de decoratie niet ingesmolten is en waarbij ik een beetje met de zuurstofinstelling gespeeld heb (alhoewel ik dat niet meer zeker weet)

I have neglected this blog and most of the time my glass as well, for more that a month and mainly because a lot has happened. Most of it has to do with personal stuff so I'm not going to write about it here, because that's not what my blog is about. I hope to be able to have so more things to share with you glasswise and therefore be able to write more regular again.

Al meer dan een maand heb ik deze weblog en ook mijn glas verwaarloosd,voornamelijk vanwege het feit dat er in die tijd een hoop gebeurd is. Een groot deel daarvan is dermate persoonlijk dat ik er hier zeker niet over zal schrijven, simpelweg omdat ik dit blog niet met dat doel schrijf. Ik hoop in ieder geval ook weer flink met mijn glas aan de gang te gaan, waardoor ik ook weer wat vaker een berichtje kan schrijven.

Yesterday I had a lovely meeting with some glassfriends from a dutch forum from which I am one of the moderators. Normally we meet in a studio to talk about glass and share some techniques, but because some of our forum-members are on vacation we decided to do something completely different. We visited the exhibition Pasha of Glass. Travelling Collector Anne Tjibbes van der Meulen in The Dutch National Museum of Antiquities in Leiden. It wasn't a very large exhibition but I really enjoyed it. It also made me very humble to see that people in the past were able to make beautiful glass items, without the easy to use modern equipment and supplies we have at hand these days.

Gisteren had ik een enorm gezellig bijeenkomst met glas-vriendinnen van het glasforum waarvan ik één van de moderators ben. Normaliter komen we samen in een atelier om te praten over glas en andere zaken en technieken met elkaar te delen. Omdat een deel van de forumleden met vakantie is, hebben we besloten nu eens iets heel anders te doen. We hebben dit keer met zijn allen de tentoonstelling Pasja van het Glas. Reizend verzamelaar Anne Tjibbes van der Meulen in het Het Rijksmuseum van Oudheden in Leiden bezocht. Het was niet zo'n enorm grote tentoonstelling (onderdeel van meerdere tentoonstellingen) maar ik heb er erg van genoten. Ik werd erg getroffen door de schoonheid van wat er zoal te zien was. Het maakt je toch wel erg nederig te zien dat men in het verleden toch zo veel moois heeft weten maken, zonder de beschikking te hebben over de moderne apparatuur en de kant en klare basismaterialen die wij tot onze beschikking hebben.

Parth of our meetings is always to look, admire and discuss our work and ofcourse yesterday wasn't any different, although ofcourse it pretty unusual to discuss your work in the cafetaria of a museam ;) Here I am together with Nannie (on the right) admiring someones work.

Vast onderdeel van onze bijeenkomst is ook altijd het bewonderen en bespreken van elkaars werk zo ook gisteren, al is het natuurlijk best wel apart om je werk te bespreken in het cafetaria van een museum. Hier zit ik samen met Nannie (rechts) iemands kralen te bewonderen.

To finish our lovely day, we went to dinner at one of the many restaurants which have their terrace on a boat located in of the waterway opposite the restaurant and enjoyed ourselves tremendous!

Tot besluit zijn wij nog met een aantal uit eten gegaan in één van de vele restaurantjes die een platboot in de gracht als aanvullend terras hebben, reuze gezellig!

This is Sander my youngest. Normally he's more of a gamer but unfortunately his computer had to go to the repair. So in order to find something else to do besides watching the tv and playing the gitar he asked me if he was allowed to try to make some beads instead. And since just about two weeks ago I made and extra temporary workspot with a simple hothead he is allowed to come and play in my studio ;0)

Dit is Sander mijn jongste. Normaliter een echte gamer maar helaas momenteel computerloos vanwege het feit dat die gerepareerd moest worden. En dus in zijn zoektocht naar bezigheden naast TV-kijken en gitaarspelen, wilde hij graag eens proberen om ook kralen te maken. Nu had ik pasgeleden al een extra werkplekje gemaakt in mijn studio voorzien van een simpele propaanbrander en dus komt hij nu af en toe bij mij "spelen".

For my mission to conquer EDP I bought the Frogsong's Starburst And Nebula Style Beads Tutorial. These are the first ones I made using this wonderful tutorial. Ofcourse they look a bit different than the ones in the tutorial, because I made rounds instead of lentils and therefore the twisty doesn't show as much of it's pattern. But that's ok, I simply need to make some adjustments and ofcourse I would like to make them a bit more me anyway.

Om mijn EDP-missie te ondersteunen heb ik de Frogsong's Starburst And Nebula Style Beads Tutorial gekocht. Dit zijn mijn eerste resultaten gebaseerd op deze tutorial. Ze verschillen ietwat van de voorbeelden in de tutorial, omdat ik in plaats van lentils ronde kralen gemaakt heb waardoor het patroon van de twisty iets minder uit komt. Ik moet dus wat aanpassingen maken, maar dat geeft niets want ik wil ze toch iets meer mijn "eigen stijl" geven.

Links:
Frogsong's Starburst And Nebula Style Beads Tutorial

One of my new sets listed on Ebay

I'm on a mission and it's all about this particular color of glass in the glassworld also known as ‘Evil Devitrifying Purple’ or EDP for short.

Ik ben aan een missie begonnen die gewijd is aan een bepaalde glaskleur die in het glaswereldje bekent staat als ‘Evil Devitrifying Purple’ afgekort EDP.

Look at the tip of the rod to see what a wonderful bright purple it's able to give you, if you are working it right. Only it's a very difficult color to work with because of it's nasty habit to devitrify quit easely. It's kind of etching itself and even the colors it has been used upon. That could be a major problem but it can also work in your favour, if you like the organic type of bead that is. Because it will give your beads a kind of soft stony look, you could even use it to give your beads the etched look by fuming them with EDP right before you finished your bead.

I already used this glass before in my "reaction-beads", because it also has the spreading the color-effect just like Rubino which results in the lovely outlinings in the set below.

Bekijk de top van deze glasstaaf maar eens om te zien wat een prachtig helder paars dit glas kan geven als je het goed verwerkt. Het is echter een behoorlijk lastige kleur om mee te werken, dit vanwege het feit dat het zichzelf en de kleuren waarmee het verwerkt is gemakkelijk "ontglaast". Dat kan een enorm probleem zijn, maar als je van organische kralen houdt kan het ook prima in je voordeel werken. Het geeft je kralen namelijk en zacht geëtst uiterlijk. En dat is ook de reden waarom je dit glas prima kunt gebruiken om kralen te "etsen", door de kraal vlak voordat je klaar bent nog even met EDP te "fumen".

Deze kleur heb ik overigens ook gebruikt in mijn "reactie-kralen", omdat het net als Rubino de kleuren uitspreidt waardoor de donkere lijnen in onderstaande set zijn ontstaan.

Set Carnaval - Rubino, EDP, Coppergreen and Opalyellow on a light aqua base.

This glass is one of the most diverse colors there is, it has a huge color range and I also like organic kind of beads. That's the reason I've decided to start my mission to master this glass. I already have seen some gorgeous bead examples from glassartists like Pinar Hakim and Debra Jennings from Frogsong studio, who also wrote an article about this glass on Watch Me Create.
Know I want to discover if it's possible for me to implement a kind of organic look into usual bead-style.

Dit glas kan ook de meest uiteenlopende kleuren geven en heeft het een enorm kleurbereik en daarbij houdt ik ook van "organische" kralen. Dat is de reden dat ik heb besloten om mijn missie te starten om dit glas te gaan leren beheersen. Ik heb prachtige voorbeelden gezien van glaskunstenaars zoals Pinar Hakim en Debra Jennings van Frogsong studio, de laatste schreef ook een artikel over dit glas op Watch Me Create.
Kortom ik wil gaan ontdekken of het me lukt om mijn "normale" kralen ook te maken in een soort organisch variant.

First example beads - Eerste probeerkralen

Links:
Pinar Hakim
Debra Jennings
Watch Me Create article about EDP

Another set listed on E-bay

On most of the beads the decoration is made by slowly and carefully layering dots and rake them into patterns, but some also have my regular dot and stringerdecoration.

De meeste kralen uit deze set hebben hun decoratie te danken aan het feit dat ik heel langzaam op elkaar "gestapelde"dotjes glas heb laten insmelten en die vervolgens voorzichtig in een patroon getrokken heb. Een aantal hebben mijn "normale" versiering van dots en stringers.

I find it to be a real challenge to make "unique" bighole-beads because of the fact the "canvas" is so small. In the past I didn't make bighole beads whenever I was making beadsets and visa versa. But last week while making a beadset I also made some bighole beads as well. Honestly I'm happy I did because I feel these are starting to show more and more my personal style and I like that. They are for sale in my Etsy-shop.

Ik vind het een behoorlijke uitdaging om "unieke" grootgatkralen te maken, want eerlijk is eerlijk met zo'n klein "canvas" is het best lastig om daar nog iets speciaals van te maken. Voorheen maakte ik ook geen grootgatkralen als ik met een kralenset bezig was en vise versa. Vorige week echter heb ik dat wel gedaan en ik moet eerlijk zeggen dat ik erg tevreden ben met het resultaat. Ik heb het gevoel dat deze veel meer mijn "persoonlijke stijl" hebben en dat bevalt me goed. Ze zijn te koop in mijn Etsy-shop.

This new set is listed on E-bay.

I'm totally in love with this set. The colors are so rich and intense and I definately will use it again.

The colors used are CIM's Stone Ground and Moretti light and dark periwinkle, transparent cobalt white and a touch of white.

Again way to long since my last blog-entry. What happened in between??

Well my youngest turned sixteen, I've been to two meetings from different dutch glass-forums, dropped my beloved photocamera so now it's total loss. From my former colleagues from the Nikon repair-department I received a new digital camera as a replacement for the old one. Ofcourse I'm very grateful to receive a gift like that, but honestly I'm afraid the quality simply isn't comparable with my old one and so now I decided to use my daughters camera instead.

In any case I have a number of beadsets on E-bay at the moment so go check them out if you please.

Wederom is het al weer veel te lang geleden sinds mijn laatste berichtje hier. Wat er in de tussentijd zoal gebeurt is??

In ieder geval heb ik wel weer een aantal kralensets op E-bay staan voor het geval je geïnteresseerd bent.

Sweet Sixteen - beadset made of CIM's Butter Pecan and Granberry pink and Moretti white and clear glass.

Present time - beadset made with Moretti's black, white, transparent blue, periwinkle and green glass.

Purple happiness - beadset made from Moretti's periwinkle and transparent purple, white and silvered ivory glass.

Look what flew out of my kiln yesterday...

Kijk eens wat er gisteren uit mijn oventje kwam vliegen...

Most beadmakers I know started lampworking simply because they wanted to personalize the jewelry they're making by using their own beads. Well that's not why I started, I simply wanted to play with hotglass and making beads turned out to be a a perfect way to do just that. I like the proces of making beads.Staring into the flame while making a bead is a kind of mental yoga, you start thinking and clear your mind. I think you can even compair it with sitting by a campfire or by the fireplace. But that not what I wanted to write about...

Het overgrote deel van de kralenmakers die ik ken zijn met het glasbranden begonnen om hun eigengemaakte sieraden nog persoonlijker te maken door ook zelf de kralen te gaan maken. Dat geldt dus niet voor mij... ik wilde simpelweg glasbranden en het maken van kralen was voor mij de manier om dat te realiseren. Ik geniet dus ook enorm van het proces, staren in de vlam is eigenlijk een soort yoga voor de geest, je ontspant en overdenkt van alles en geeft daarmee gedachten en gevoelens een plekje. Het is eigenlijk ook te vergelijken met het turen in de vlammen van een kampvuur of open haard. Maar dat was eigenlijk niet waar ik over wilde schrijven.

I wanted to write about the beads I made lastnight. Sometimes I'm feeling a bit dissapointed when I open up my kiln in the morning and look at the actual results from a nights work for the first time. Most of the times this feeling will change after I release the beads from the mandrels. Don't ask me why because it just does. That's also what happened this morning. I made two set's and I wasn't all together happy with the both of them. Well long story short... the first set is now listed on E-bay. The set above only contained three beads, not spectacular and therefore I decided to add some extra beads from my beadstash. I thought this turned it into a lovely set and I was planning to put it on sale in my Etsy-shop. However somehow this set started talking to me and suddenly turned me into a jewelry-maker!

Waar ik wel over schrijven wilde zijn de kralen die ik gisteravond gemaakt heb. Het komt namelijk regelmatig voor dat wanneer ik mijn oventje opendoe, ik helemaal niet blij wordt van de resultaten die er in liggen. Het gekke is dat het regelmatig voorkomt dat als ik de kralen dan van de mandrellen heb gehaald ik juist wel weer blij wordt. Dit gebeurde dus vanochtend ook en om een lang verhaal kort te maken... één van de sets staat nu dus op E-bay. Bovenstaand setje bevatte in eerste instantie uit 3 kralen niet zo geweldig groot dus en daarom besloot ik het aan te vullen met een aantal kralen uit mijn voorraadje. Daarmee veranderde dit naar mijn idee in een leuk setje om in mijn Etsy-winkeltje te plaatsen. Tenminste dat dacht ik, maar op de één of andere manier begon dit setje tegen me te kletsen en veranderde mij in ene in een sieradenontwerpster!

"Offspring" - lampwork beads, sterling silver, white coral, lemon jasper rondelles and seedbeads

Lately I'm more experimenting with shapes and techniques. These beads are freeformed and decorated with shards. To make shards you take a hollow mandrel and start building a hollow bead at the end and blow it into a balloon as showed below. When it cooled down you break it into piece and use these piece to decorate your bead. I further more added lines and transparant and opaque dots in different sizes, some with airbubbles and even some with flowers trapped inside.

De laatste tijd ben ik wat meer aan het experimenteren met vormen en technieken. Deze vrije vorm is van verschillende kleuren transparant glas en gedecoreerd met shards oftewel scherfjes. Shards maak je door aan het eind van een holle mandrel een holle kraal te vormen en deze op te blazen als een ballonnetje zoals hieronder te zien is. Na het afkoelen wordt deze ballon in stukjes geslagen en de scherven gebruikt om je kraal te versieren. Verder heb ik de kraal versierd met streepjes en dotjes in verschillende maten en van transparant en opaque glas. Sommige dots bevatten luchtbelletjes en sommige zelfs bloemetjes.

For this one I used blue opaque- and transparent aqua, rolled it in some glassfrit and added some stripes of silvered ivory.

Voor deze heb ik transparant en opaak glas gebruikt dat in glasfrit gerold is en voorzien is van strepen verzilverd ivoor.

sold / verkocht

My mother collects thimbles and so last year when learned someone was selling thimble-mandrels, I decided there would be not better christmas-present for her, than a couple of handmade glass- thimbles to add to her collection. Ofcourse I could not blog about them back in december because I know as a fact she's reading my blog ;)

Last weekend I made another one and so I decided it's time to show them off...

Mijn moeder spaart vingerhoeden, dus toen ik er eind vorig jaar achter kwam dat er ergens iemand vingerhoed-mandrellen verkocht moest ik er wel één aanschaffen. Want wat is er nu een mooier kerstkadootje dan een paar handgemaakte vingerhoedjes van glas. Ik weet zeker dat ze die nog niet in haar collectie had. Natuurlijk kon ik er geen blogberichtje over schrijven, omdat ik weet dat ze één van die "stille" lezers van mijn blog is.

Hoe dan ook afgelopen weeken heb ik weer eens een vingerhoed gemaakt, en dus vond ik het tijd om ze toch maar eens te showen...

These now belong to my mother / deze heeft mijn moeder nu in haar bezit:

I haven't done a lot of lampworking the last couple of months because most of the time it's been to cold in my studio and there still is the need to get the ventilation in order. But this weekend I really wanted to play with hot glass and so I did.

De laatste tijd is er weinig gekomen van het glasbranden. Het was simpelweg te koud en daarbij is de ventilatie ook nog niet op orde. Maar dit weekend moest het er gewoon even van komen en met de onderstaande setjes als resultaat.

Denim dreams - a combination of de color Leaky Penn and Dirty Martini.

Playfull colors - black base decorated with white, yellow, green, red and a hint of blue.

Although I made myself a promise I would write at least 4 or 5 days a week to keep this blog interesting, only one flu-attack was neccessary to totally ruin my good intensions. Not that I spent all time in bed you know, but somehow when you haven't blogged for more than 2 days you get out of rhythm and it's super easy to convince yourself it's ok to wait another day to write a new message and before you know it a week has passed. So I have to get my act together and jump back in the blogging-saddle again!

Zo zie je maar... ondanks al mijn plannen om het hier een beetje interessant te houden door minstens 4 à 5 keer per week een berichtje te schrijven, is er maar één griep-aanvalletje nodig om die goede voornemens volkomen in de war te schoppen. Niet dat ik nu heel die tijd in mijn bedje heb doorgebracht, maar eenmaal een dag of 2 niet geschreven en je bent direct uit het ritme. Overigens is dat ook de reden waarom ik vroeger nooit een dagboek heb bijgehouden, dat hield ik simpelweg niet langer dan een week vol. Het is dus eigenlijk best een wonder te noemen dat ik nu al een aantal jaar met enige regelmaat blog!

Yesterday I went all the way to Miriam in Leende, which is almost a 2 hour drive, to attend a workshop she hosted with Melanie Moertel. Since I feel like I already am on a somewhat similar level I had to think twice before I decided I would go, because those workshops doesn't come cheap. It always is a bit difficult to decide wheather the knowledge you gain will be in proportion with the costs. I decided to go ahead because I hoped to learn some of her secrets in combining certain colors and how she builds her murrini's. I'm not dissapointed but I'm certain this will be the last one I will attend for now.

Gisteren ben ik naar Miriam in Leende gereden om een workshop te volgen van Melanie Moertel. Zo'n workshop is niet goedkoop en het is dus altijd een beetje de vraag of de kennis die je opdoet in verhouding staat met de prijs. Ik wilde haar graag leren kennen maar heb van te voren toch wel even getwijfeld of ik daarvoor zo'n dure workshop moest volgen, vooral omdat ik het gevoel heb dat mijn niveau dat van haar aardig benaderd. Toch heb ik besloten de workshop te volgen omdat ik graag wat van haar "kleurengeheimpjes" wilde leren en ook hoe zij haar murrini's opbouwt. Ik ben niet ontevreden maar ik denk dat dit voorlopig wel eens de laatste zou kunnen zijn.

This is me heating a gather of glass that's going to be pulled into a thick stringer and which, once it's cooled, can be cut in pieces to form the murrini's.

Op bovenstaande foto ben ik bezig om een grote hoeveelheid glas zodanig te verwarmen dat ik daar een dikke staaf van kan trekken die, nadat hij is afgekoeld, in stukje geknipt gaat worden om de z.g. murrini's te maken.

Below you see some pictures of Melanie explaining. (Thanks to Miriam)

Hieronder nog een aantal foto's van Melanie (met dank aan Miriam).

Links
Melanie Moertel
www.facet-design.nl/Miriam

I finally have a beadset to show in my favorite colors and I think this will become a necklace for myself for a change.

Eindelijk ook weer eens een kralenset om te laten zien in mijn favoriete kleurtjes en ik denk zo maar dat ik hier maar eens een ketting voor mezelf van maak.

It's not that cold anymore and yesterday I was able to heat up my studio and my kiln and made some new trollstyle-beads which are now available in my Etsy-store.

Gelukkig is het niet meer zo koud en dus kon ik gisteren weer eventjes mijn studio en oven op temperatuur brengen om een aantal nieuwe trollbeads-kralen te maken. Deze zijn te koop via mijn Etsywinkeltje.

It's still to cold to do make new beads in my studio, however Istill had some trollbeads laying around waiting to get silvercores and be photographed and placed in my Etsy-store.

While photographing each bead I decided that maybe it would be a nice idea to make sets, photograph those as well and show them with every seperate item in the set. This way people could see what the beads would look like in a matching set. So basicly one might say that I have been playing with my trollbeads all afternoon and it although it was a lot of work it actually was fun as well ;)

Anyway below are pictures from two sets I made and ofcourse only the glassbeads are available in my etsystore.

A pink set:

And a lightblue set:

Last monday I was planning on making my usual round beads using light transparen aqua, sky blue, red and uranium yellow. The last one definately is of my favorites because most of the times it looks like off- white, which I think creates a much more lovely soft combination with a lot of my favorite colors than plain white could ever do.

Ofcourse I also could use ivory instead of white, but ivory has this habbit to create dark outlines when used in combination with some of the blue colors and althought that can be used to your advantage, most of the times I don't prefer it because I like my lines to be "smooth".

Anyway I cleaned out my desk. I prefer to start fresh most of the times, so I restore the rods from the day before, place large stringers in a rack I specially bought for that reason and trash everything that not large enought to be stored, which bye the way isn't that much because I'm a typical dutch girl ;)

And after getting my colors of the day out and lighting my torch, somehow the feeling appeared I didn't want to do rounds. I wanted to play more without planning whatsoever and just see what would come out. Personally I like them a lot, freeformed decorated with some sort of "tentacles", swirls, dots , flowers and ofcourse a few lines every here and there, but most of all a kind of manic ;)

Today my Mystic Ocean beadset was sold on E-bay and I'm happy and sad at the same time. Happy because it's sold for a reasonable price, which means I will have some money left after I subtract costs. Sad because it's certainly one of my most favorite sets of the moment and it will be hard to let go.

My daughter asked me why I list them so quickly and not have them around a bit more. My answer was quite simple. First of all we can use the money and secondly I have this strange deviation, the longer the beads are around the more I see what I don't like about them instead of enjoying the way they look.

Oh and there's also a third reason... I don't like making jewelry myself so why keep them. I find it particullary difficult to come up with a necklace- or braceletdesign. The few times I did make something with my beads resulted in a very long proces. I'm pretty sure that if I'll try more it will probably will get easier but for now I'll stick by the beadmaking.

However if I was into jewelry-designing, wouldn't it be lovely I could make something like this:

Designed by Kerry of Kabs Creative Concepts and I totally love it!

Or maybe something like this:

Designed by Stephanies Sersich

As you can see I like necklaces that make a statement ;)

Here is new set I made yesterday. The glass I used for this set goes by funny names like "Leaky Pen"and "Dirty Martini" and I listed the set on Ebay:

I also made another star with the same glass, which is available in my Etsy-shop:

Today I listed some new beads on E-bay...all made with some of my most favorite colors.

Blueballs

a combination of light skyblue, light and dark periwinkle and powderpink, decorated with lines, swirls and layered dots and matching spacers.

Grasshoppers

A gorgeous green from CiM which is beautifully bright and transparent grassgreen from Moretti, decorated with lines, curls and dots using periwinkle and opal yellow,.

LOLLIPOP

A large handformed flat focal made using with Light sky blue, light transparent blue and opal yellow, decorated with handmade murrinis trapped inside the transparent glass, lines, layered dots in brown, yellow and light sky blue and a trail of bright orange raised dots.

Remember these:

I was so happy to sell these on Ebay for a reasonable price but unfortunately they got lost in the mail between here and the buyer in Spain. I feel so sad about it because there is so much of myself going into these beads. I guess now the price will not be as good as I though because I can't let my customer down now can I. So I have to figure out wether or not I shall refund or try to make another similar set.

This particular set could really make my day because of the gorgious rich colors. Yummie bright pink and rich oranges provided by the combinations and layering of goldpink/rubino and opalyellow/rubino on a grey base with lines in coppergreen and dots in white, opal yellow, coppergreen and pink.

However this particular set makes me really sad :(

In the past I have used Kugler grey with white, rubino and EDP (Evil Defitrifying Purple) which resulted is some lovely beads. It has the same COE (104) as Moretti and so it should be compatible but... In this particular set the rubino/opal yellow/goldpink doesn't seem to like the grey base so much because most beads have superficial cracks in some of the rubino parts.

When I first noticed a few of these beads having cracks, I thought I didn't warm them enough before putting them in the kiln and since I was planning to list these on E-bay, I decided to make some new ones to replace those with cracks. However every day I see more cracks appear and they even appear in the new ones. And so although these beads (made with very expensive glasses) really make my day colorwise they also make me very sad.

I want to sell top quality and therefore these "beauties" will not be for sale.

Well finally I found the time to write a litlle bit about what is going on around here.

After such a long "summerbreak" lampworking in my new studio didn't go as smooth as I thought it would go.

First of all the colorcombinations...my normal routine is to choose a set of glassrods (opaque and transparent) in colors I think will make a lovely combination. After that I start pulling stringers, twisties and sometimes I will also make murrini's and when I've finished all that I finally start making the beads. However the first couple of days the colors I choose didn't seem to work at all together. The beads turned out totally dull or even plain ugly.

Secondly my skills. I almost felt like starting all over again, I had to reinvent the hole stringer/twisty-routine again, wasn't able to make some kind of beadset.

So after two days I started getting a bit grumpy and started thinking about what I was doing wrong and why thinks didn't work out. My conclusion was that since I wasn't able to light my torch for a long time, but in the meantime did see a lot of lovely and inspiring lampwork on the internet, too many ideas and techniques were stored in my head which resulted in blocking my creative fun. So the next day I allowed myself to just play and connect with the glass again. I didn't plan something, just grabbed some black and whiteglassrods and some of my favorite blues and greens and started pulling stringers and placing dots.

Apparently that did the trick because that day I made this:

And since that I made these:

The first set I sold already and the last two are on Ebay at the moment.

As you might know once in a while I like to make tree-softies I call Olmies. I always wanted to make a glass-olmie but haven't tryed it yet until last week.

I definately like the result but I don't think I will be making these to sell because the branches and the little bird are too delicate and I think they will get broken in the mail. So this one is just for me and I'm happy with the way it looks :)

I did promise a while back to give a bit more information so you can understand my messages about lampworking a bit more.

So I thought I start with the mandrels. Mandrels are stainless-steel rods which are dipped in a bead-release or seperator (a mixture of alumina and high-fire clay). This coating is used to make sure the bead can be removed after it is cools.

They come in different sizes and even variations and you can't do without them because it holds the molten glass that's used to form the bead. This is what forms the beadhole so the thicker the mandrel used to make the bead, the bigger the actual hole in the bead will be.

I don't have a big variation yet most of them are 2mm-3mm-5mm and 6 mm plain mandrels. I do have one ringmandrel (the very large one in the middle) wich as the name already implies can be used to make a ring. I also have two hollows which can be used to actually blow glass, for instance to make slightly bigger vessels than the ones I make now or to make your own glass-shards which can be used to decorate your beads.

So that's the first entry explaining lampworking... more will follow soon.

Today I've worked on a major update for my Etsy-shop. I added a lot of Trollbead/Pandora/Biage style beads and this one:

Now I also need to make some new things for my other shop as well!

Ofcourse there is more you can make with hot glass except from beads. One of the thinks I'm working on to improve my skills at the moment are small vessels. You can hang them on a leather cord or silver chain and fill it with your favorite perfume or essential oil.

Here are some of the vessels I made last week:

The glass I used for this vessel looks like liquid soap or shampoo... soft, shiny and an absolute gorgious shade of blue

I'm really happy with the way this one looks... elegant and stylish! The glass used is a vetrofond odd lot called "Belgium lace" with purple for the "stripes" and silvered Ivory for the small dots.

Oh and about the small challange I brought upon myself... it didn't work for me yet. Yesterday I did some playing with Photoshop and Illustrator but nothing memorable came out, so nothing to show on that front yet ;)

This week I'm into sculpting with glass and to be more specific into making goddesses. I bought a tutorial by Teresa Laliberté a highly inspirational glass-artist who's sculptural work I really like a lot and who I hope to meet in person later this year.

These are my Goddesses and I must say I'm very pleased with how they turned out... I can see an addiction coming up here!
The one on the left is etched wich gives her a somewhat more ancient look, as if I used clay to make her.

The last time I feel like I'm in some kind of time-sportscar. Time rushes by and lately almost every end of the month I find myself thinking: Oh my is it really already end of the mont, where did the time go and more seriously what did I do with all this time?

I have a lots of idea's that simply aren't realised yet because I find myself in a constant lack of time. But there also is a lot I did realise... I designed and build a new website for a client and also started designing one for another, I'm constantly busy improving my webshop, wich by the way now also is open for business to foreign customers as well. Ofcourse I also made some new items to fill it, because what good is a webshop if you don't have anything to sell. One of the recently added items: Lovely lampwork phonecharmes and some vessels, so go check them out...

I already sold some of my lampwork and jewelry, received an order for a bracelet and (wich made me very happy) I received some orders for a customised version of my "gardian angel" pendants.

I also made some beads for a reactionglass-swap from one of the glass-forums I frequently visit.I was very happy with the results and before I send them off, I took them with me to a party to show them off. I'm so happy I did because I it resulted in an order for a necklace with similar beads, wich are the "flower-power-beads" showed below...

And last but not least I now am a I'm a registered SRA Member: No. E25

For additional information about the project, check the link below
http://www.self-representing-artist.com

Yesterday I spend a lot of time making beads for some beadswaps I am taking parth in. I ended my day playing around with some of the new glassfrit's I bought and that's when I made these two. This was the second time I made fish-beads, the first one I made unfortunately lost his tale because I dropped it shortly after it was released from the mandrel...

These are some of the beads I made after attending the workshop of Dora Schubert. I was impressed by the size of Dora's beads and tryed to make mine bigger also. I'm still looking to find the right size for me thow. Small size still is very comfortable for me but increasing the size results in more "canvas" to make a nice design, guess I need to practice some more ;)

Here also a set wich I think turned out to be a beautiful colorcombination:

I'm all into making these little angels at the moment.It's so much fun to see them come into being and getting a personality. I think that's why I like to make them so much... not one of them is the same even if I use the same color and decoration!

A few weeks ago I decided wednesday would be my glass day... well everyday is my glassday at the moment that's how addictive this lampworking is, but on wednesday I warm my kiln so I can make some more complex items.

However sometimes there are those off-days. On those day things go wrong and nothing works as you imagine or planned and it probably is a lot better (and cheaper) to just quit lampworking. Last wednesday I had an off-day like that and among other things that turned out to be a total disaster, I also made these little girls.

Now I know you probably would say what wend wrong here? They look so sweet and not to sound a total smug but I think so too. The problem with these girls is the fact that the beadrelease broke underneath and so know these little girls are attached to the iron which means they cannot leave the mandrel.

So that why they are called mandrelgirls...

Today is wednesday again, my kiln is warming up and I hope this day will be a lot more productive that the last one was.

I'm all in to reactive glass at the moment

Since I had the flue this week and apart from sleeping a lot the lying in my bed doing absolutely nothing isn't exactly my cup of tea, I spend my awake time making this Beaded Treasure bracelet wich is made with a finger weaving technique.

I've been neglecting this weblog way to long, so sorry for that and so let me start to wish anyone who stopped by a happy and most of all healthy new year.

My creative year started with making beads for a bracelet. A special order from my father in law for the birthday of a very special lady... his wife. The colors should be either pink or blue and not to bright but soft-toned and I spend a lot of time finding the perfect match. I made a lot of beads that turned out well but simply not well enough for her.

Since I also have a new burner to heath the glass, I now have the opportunity to work with some more difficult glass, that didn't work for me on the old one because most of the time I burned them.

I started playing around with Rubino/goldruby and EDP because if worked right you can get beautiful patterns using those exact colors. Rubino is a transparent glass with an awsome pink color, burns very easely but because of it's reactions with other colors a wonderful glass to work with. The reaction of the color beneath or on top of the Rubino is a colorconcentration on the inside which results in darker lines or dots. EDP (Evil Defitrifying Purple) is a purple shade with a similar reactions but it's opaque and not transparent. The name is a result from it's nasty habbit to become a uggly rough kind of white if it's worked in and out of the flame too much. Both these colors combined with opaque pink and one of my favorite shades of blue and yellow resulted in beads that exactly matched the idea in my head.

And these are the final pieces of jewelry. A bracelet with a matching necklace made out lampwork beads combined with spacers and closures made out of pure silver and a pink waxed cord for the necklace. I love them and so does my mother in law!

Although I don't live far from the beach I don't visit it a lot because on our beaches there is way to much sand for my taste... I only like sand in it's liquid form ;0). The sea and and the beach are however a wonderful source of inspiration...

I'm getting more and more comfortable with hot glass and so I also made some new little figures. These angels I made to hang in our christmastree and some I gave to family-members. The little bathing-ducks are prototypes for beads I'm going to sell for the trollbead-, pandora- and biagi-bracelets.

This is the first beadset I sold trough my website to a colleague of mine. She bought it as a "Sinterklaas" present for her mother and from what I've heard her mother was very pleased! Needless to say I was too ;0)

I finally made myself a bracelet with my own lampwork beads, sterling silver spacers, Swarovski cristal beads and a sterling silver clasp. For the beads I used poked, raised and layered dots, with transparent topaz and blue, ivory and white Moretti glass. It's a real treasure and although I'm not used to wearing bracelets I think I will from now on...

I am a seasonal girl. Really I don't think I could live in a place with sunny and warm weather day in and day out. Not that I don't like those wonderful sunny summer-days, nope I love them and honestly this year they were pretty rare, but...

I simply also need the dark winter days, when it's cold and rainy outside and you desperately want to stay inside wearing cozy sweaters and warm socks, drinking hot coco and watching movies on the tele.

One of the highlights of autumn is to see the leaves turn into all kinds of beautiful red, brown and yellows and fall down eventually in order to give the trees time to retreat and get ready for spring to arrive with beautiful fresh colors and (I'm overly optimistic here) promises of the hot summer days ahead.

Anyway this bead set is truly inspired by the beautiful colors of autumn-leaves.

Still playing with Copper Green and this time I also used Dark Ivory and Lauscha Clear. The black lines are parth of the reaction between the Copper Green and the Ivory wich is enhanced by the clear. The beads are finished with some olive and uranium yellow dots.

A few days before I went to the workshop with Sarah I received a glass-shipment. I ordered some new colors and one of them was Copper green. I had read about it on a forum and also had seen some very nice examples.

I also wanted to try to make a large hole bead suitable for the trollbead-bracelet's and I bought some silver cores for finishing. It's quit difficult to make a trollbead-bead because it should not be to large and because of the large mandrelsize it's quit difficult to get an even amount of glass all around with a nice rounded hole at both sides so the core will fit perfectly later on.

So here's my first trollbeads-bead and I must say I really was happy with the result. I used the Copper Green with EDP and believe me these really were the only two colors used for this bead. I totally love the way these colors react together, so you can imagine my happiness to find out these were used in Sarah's workshop too. Oh and EDP stands for Evil Devil Purple because it's also very difficult to work with.

The size of my bead turned out perfect, but I guess that was some kind of beginners luck because I haven't achieve a similar result since... :(

Here's a set of beads I made with Copper Green, EDP and some yellows combined with some encased yellow "bubble"beads.

The focal beads are all made during the workshop using selfmade twisties and murrini's and using the raking-technique. Some of the small beads I made at home last night.

For the focals I was able to use Sarah's crunch-beadpress and since I really like the results I decided to order a crunch and a lentilpress so hopefully soon I will be able to make some more pressed beads.

As I explained in this entry earlier this year , me playing with hot glass started when I came agross Sarah's beads on her Flickr account and seeing this entry on her blog. That truly was a real eyeopening moment... it's possible to work with hot glass at without having a specially equipped studio. Although in all fairness I have to admit it would be very helpful to have some kind of studio because most of the time a big part of my living-room-table is a total mess because of the hothead and glass standing there already and it's still growing.... some more supplies are ordered or on my wish-list ;0)

Anyway imagine my joy to learn she was planning some workshops and her first ones ever would be given here in Holland! That's an opportunity I would not pass and so I signed up right away for one of them. Because I still feel I'm not an advanced lampworker yet I signed up for her beginner course about color reactions.

Here's a picture of the whole bunch that took this workshop as well (with thanks to Miriam and Sarah for taking the pictures and sharing them):

That's me second from left with bandeau, glasses and two chins ;) Sarah is standing in the middle with the purple sweater.

I really enjoyed the workshop and learned a lot. I thought it was a rather cool but noisy experience to be lampworking together with so many people (one hothead already makes a lot of noise imagine 7 of them making that same noise together!).

It also was a real pleasure to meet Sarah herself. She really is a very kind and friendly person, as was to be expected from reading her blog. I really admired her stringer-control and knowledge of lampworking and wished I was able to take all three workshops, because it would have been great to learn some more of her freestyle techniques and silver secrets as well.

Here's a little compilation of "action-pictures" taken by Miriam and Sarah:

Here's a picture of a necklace I made as a birthday present for my niece. It's a red leather cord with 5 lampwork beads and two silver-colored spacers.

The focal bead is made from Effetre's Dark Red Brown carefully multi-layered with red, white and striking red. After that I added some multi layered dots using several kinds of red and pulled those to the edges of the beads. The bead is finished using some more layered dots forming the base for the little flowers.

The two smaller beads are made from Ivory using the same red colors to add some multi-colored dots. The spacer beads are made from plain Ivory.

I especially like the combination and I'm planning on making some necklaces like this to sell in my future shop.

reallife size (5cm height)

One of my latest lampwork creations. This little cow is made out of 2 beads, one for the head and one for it's body.

This focal is made using silvered dark ivory, ivory and pastel red combined with transparent striking red and Lauscha orange. The bead is raked to get the "flames" and decorated with smal raised dots and one big poked dot.

I made some pendants as presents.

The one on the left was for my mother. It's a combination of lampwork beads and silver colored beads and has a neckless made from seedbeads, leather and cotton lace and beadingwire combined with beads in lovely green shades.

The right one is for a friend and was made totally with lampwork beads and has a simple cotton lace neckless.

Today I also set up my hothead and started beadmaking again. I love how this particular one turned out. So much I even made a picture with the beadrelease still in it!

It has a large hole bead because it's made on a 4mm mandrel and fit's my daughters Trollbeads bracelet.

It is a beautiful combination of Lauscha Blue, Blue Violet and Moretti's Periwinkle with a touch of white and transparant. I think this colorcombination is awsome and so these colors definately will be on my favorite list for re-ordering!

I'm still not totally satisfied with my results. A lot of times the beads don't turn out the way I was expecting. Sometimes the colors don't work well together and sometimes it's simply a mess because of my shaky hands. So I need to practice a lot more. I will not have much time next week thow because of other responsibilities and the week after we will go off to the South of France for 3 week-holiday.

Here are some examples from beads I made lately. I bought some basepins so I'm able to make pendants with 3 or 4 beads depending on the size of the beads.

I've been working on my encasing skills. It's pretty difficult not to make a mess of the basebead while encasing it with clear and to cover it equally without leaving room for the basebead to come to the service. I'm still practicing simple beads with one basecolor encased with a clear. Whenever I messed up I added dots on the places the base reached the service, wich I think is a nice way to cover up the bad spots ;0)

And this is a mix of different techniques... raised flowers, placing dots and working with stringers. I even tryed to swirl the hot glass. This particular time everything worked out fine and so I'm pleased with the way this set looks.

I hope once to be able to make beads like for instance Anastasia. She really makes awsome beads and is able to combine a very creative style with some perfect beadskills!

Ofcourse I couldn't help myself, I need to play and leave the boundaries of simple practice every now and than to see if there already is a possibility to have some nice "artistic" results. Although there are some minor details in the next beads I'm not quit happy with (sorry can't help myself but I'm a bit of a perfectionist sometimes) overall I'm quit happy with them, really!

A focal à la Sarah Hornik. She was my big inspiration to start this new addiction. one side of the bead is a little bit to sharp and there are some small reactions in the glass I don't like but hey I've been doing this for let me think... 3 weeks so I should not be naging about it ;0)

And a lovely round bead with some more mixing. When you look closely you will see there's also a bit of one of my first twisty's in there and this time I also tryed to move some hot glass...

Apart from the ones I show here there are also a lot that don't make it, so there's a lot of practice needed wich ofcourse I don't mind because this playing with glass sure is addictive!

I saw this beautiful combination in "Passing the Flame" from Corine Tettinger and since I convinced myself I need to focus on one technique every time, I used this color combination to practice placing dots.

This combination was a practise on stringer control and encasing. I also tryed to make some twisties but that didn't work out real good yet and my stringer-control needs a lot more practice also... so back to my torch for practice and more practice :0)

Finally I have some new beads to show wich I made the last couple of days, ofcourse the pictures were taken showing the best side of the beads but I'm starting to get a little bit positive about my results. Ofcourse those that didn't work out will not be shown here ;0)))

Well here they are... my first selfmade beads. Far from perfect and ofcourse the real beadartists probably can make them in their sleep but I'm happy and proud. It's not so simple at all to get a beautiful round bead or make perfect shaped dots.

This is what you do...
With your less dominant hand you need to keep the mandrel (that's the little specially-coated RVS-stick, wich will form the hole of your bead later on) turning round and round in a nice constant movement at the end of the torch-flame. Not simple at all but for someone with shaky hands like me... a real task ;0) Your dominant hand is used to hold the glass-rod that needs to be melted in the hotter part of the flame. Once you've melted a proper amound of glass you take both the mandrel and the melted glasrod out of the flame and wound the glass around the mandrel to form the base of the bead. You need to repeat the turning, melting and wounding untill you have a nice amound of glass on the mandrel. After that you have to keep on turning and heating the glas on the mandrel to form a nice round bead. Ofcourse if you don't turn the mandrel nicely gravity does his work and you end with a bead that's thicker at one side, like the one on the right...

After you manage to get a "nice" round beadshape decoration starts...

Karin teached me how to pull strings to make small decoration rods, how to place small dots, to make a raised flower and to put a little airbell exactly at the place you want(like in the bead on the right).

Ofcourse it's simply a matter of practice to make perfect shapes and dots and that's what I'm going to do in near future... So yes it was just like I expected and probably there will be more beads to show in future and maybe in a while I will be able to show off some nice round beads with awsome color combinations and lovely techniques ;0)

However the gypsy caravan I always told Albert I would love to have as an atelier in my backyard, would not be a luxery because if it's going to be the addiction I think it will, I will be in desperate need of some proper workplace... Ofcourse an extra garden shed will do nicely also ;0)

I never concidered working with class to be a something for me. I was very impressed by the work I saw from Yvon Trossél when I visited the glass-atelier she shared with some other artists in het hoofdkantoor during de kunstlijn two years ago.

I especially liked her work because of her use of color and style. But that never leaded me to go check out to see if it was something I could do.

But some weeks ago I found these gorgious bead-pictures on Flickr from Sarah Hornik and man did I fell in love ;0)

I don´t wear much jewelry myself, I do love the pandorra-type bracelets and have some colorfull earrings I like. But to say I'm heavy into jewelry... No.

However the beads Sarah makes are little pieces of art. The combination of colors and textures are simply amazing and that's what triggered me. I love to combine colors and textures and experiment with different techniques and somehow I feel this lampwork/glassmelting has all of that combined in it. You can make beads like Sarah's but if you feel like making beads shaped like my cat-softies I think it's possible too. So I'm getting seriously interested!

Ofcourse I could start the way I normally would, namely directly buy some stuff to get started and begin experimenting . But for once I decided to first check out if it's as wonderful as I think it will be by attending a workshop. Guess that's a result of being enormously patient the last couple of months because of my immobility. So there was something positive about it after all ;0)

So tonight I will go to the workshop and we'll just see what happens next. Shall I need to rename this blog into Glas&Zo or can I keep it as it is?

To be continued...