First attempt at a ndebele collar necklace. Inspired from Carol Wilcox Wells Creative Bead Weaving

The beads are japanese seed beads, I do believe most are matsuno and miyuki opalescent seed beeds with gold wash in the center. They are lustrous and have such depth. They are muted and still have a fiery glow within each bead. This charactoristic in seed beads is beautiful and the combined effect adds elegance and nuance to this necklace.

The size graduation enables the necklace to curve back on itself. As you can see from the slight ruffling of the edge, I probably should have skipped the 11/o seed beed row. I did this in the fall of 2004 and anticipate making another one as well.

The clasp is a piece of toile ribbon tied like a bowtie. Took me a bit of research to master that technique, but it did come out perfectly!

I also made the base on which it is displayed. I used newspaper and plaster gauze for setting broken bones to form the shape and covered it with a rayon fabric from an old blouse! I really like the way it came out. I can rotate items for display.

This is a choker length necklace which has hammered fine silver 28 and 22 gauge wire as a focal and accent elements. I used mostly czech, and german beads, with some indian beads as well as some oddball vintage bits and a bit of semi-precious thrown into the mix. It's a very eclectic piece of warmth, character and a dash of whimsy. A bit dreamy!

It was half-hard wire that I worked into shapes and each has it's own finding. The exception is the main focal swirl, I took a small piece of 28 gauge and got it very flat and strong. I have been reading Alan Revere and Erhard Brepohl, so I did try to anneal it a bit on a lightbulb so I could hammer it some more. Since I do not yet understand pickling and other jewelry making details, I lost one sample bit to fire scale. Oh well, now I understand why I didn't want to use a candle!

Extremely pleasant to make. I liked working with the shapes. In the future I will take beads and slide them down the wire and capture them with the hammered flat portions. Mental note...buy smaller hammer!

What a pleasure this necklace was to finish! I love the pearlescent beads, these are matsunos, which to me are just the nice chubby beads that come out so well! It's a gray with light yellow and green spiralling through it. I tried to lattice the design, but perhaps in my next incarnation, this took concentration, but I am so please with the results!

I made a sterling wire clasp and fitted the ends with some silver (base metal) cones, I had them in the findings box, don't know where I got them, but what a nice found item! This is my first attempt at wire work, after a false start, and the realization I need one more item in my toolkit, I am pretty happy with the closure!

The ndebele stitch has become a real favorite of late, I love the smoothness and drape of the finished item. Soon I will be learning beaded crochet, but up til then, I am digging ndebele!

This inspiration came from a particularly poisonous soul I encountered. My motto: Defang it. Take their power. So I did! Making this was a lot of fun, and I got to experiment with some sculptural aspects of brick stitch in making the head. The clasp was made from the split toungue, hidden, within the length of it. Lots of fun to make!

Will have to work on figuring out how to smooth out the decrease, perhaps the next time! This is made from japanese seed beads, I think toho's but I was not sure since I bought them from a seller on ebay quite some time ago.

Using a combination of brick and square stitch, I built the head, and the toungue is ndebele, as is the body of the snake. Quite a nifty stitch!

I confess I love this choker! At first I was intrigued by Beadwork Magazine's article about brickstitch donuts (The article called them Doh'nuts) and of course, my nascent efforts were just a little slower than I anticipated. Such a bold design, I can't imaging a bunch of donuts, nor, earrings. I am not much for matching sets anyhow.
It was a fun to get my head around a three dimensional piece. I have a new regard for thos who sculpt using beads! Wow.

In fact I made the herringbone, or rather ndebele, necklace portion first. It's some old delicas a base of amber with a spiral of red, mixing in pink. The mesh of these colors just came out so nice!

So when I was done, the donut seemed to be the right step. And how to marry the two? I used a square stitch loop.

Would I try to invisibly connect the necklace to the donut? No because I love the slidey freedom of the donut on the necklace.

Four stitches: brick, ndebele, square, ladder (clasp connectors)

Last thought. Delicas are a little sharp, the soft edges of non-delica's may make a smoother donut! :D

News flash!!! This summer I won 3rd place in the Beaded Jewelry catagory at the Puyallup Fair 2003! Whoo hoo!!! Very exciting! I went to the fair and there was my name and my necklace! The competition that beat me was very nice! Yay! I have never entered anything like this before, but what a pleasant surprise!

This rosary came about when I was losing Jasper and has become very special to me.

This is from the Missouri Botanical Garden Bible Plant Collection web site:
The fruit of the pomegranate (Punica granatum) has long symbolized passion and love, as in this biblical reference, "Let us get up early to the vineyards; let us see if the vine flourish, whether the tender grape appear, and the pomegranates bud forth: there will I give thee my loves. (Song 7:12)

It is made of deep pomegranate givre czech beads with white shot through it. The givre bead is one of my favorites. This one has white hidden inside pomegranate colored translucent glass. It is a humble bead, nothing vintage or rare, but the light dances through them, and I think of my little friend.

I made this necklace with opalescent pink beads and handmade lavendar beads. The larger beads in the handmade set were losing dichroic layer on the outside, rendering them useless, (any tips on how to get it all off? email me at johanna@benatus.com with ideas!). So the little spacer beads made perfect match with the opalescent pinks.
The tubes, or main part of the necklace, are square stitched tubes with three colors of delicas. The three colors I forgot to document! Ack!
Well anyhow. The stitch is the only off loom weave that I have mastered, and since Albert's arrival into my life, I have been remiss in trying to learn the other ones! The sections make a spiral of three colors, a translucent mauve, an opalescent pink (very pale), and an off white.
I made this necklace for my sister, Paula, and it was a lot of fun to work on, though it is a larger weighted piece than she normally wears.

This necklace is a fun one that I made for my mom, Carole, for spring of 2001. I really love all the shades of soft jade green. The humble druks, the vintage crackle glass, and satin beads dance around the two vintage chinese face beads. It was a lot of fun deciding what beads go where and finding the green crackle beads are too amazing up close. My truely favorite beads here.

This may be a "restring" project, though, because as I learn more about design, I realize that this might have more opportunities to shine with chain and some contrasting beads.

For now it is a bold statement to wear as a joie de bead!

My sister gave me a collection of beads she'd gotten at a bead show in Idaho years ago.

I procrastinated too much! Her intention was to make a bunch of dangle earrings. I just don't like dangly earings, however, I did have some garnet colored seed beads, and a nice batch of garnet colored vintage beads that were on headpins that dangle. So the beads found a home on a necklace for her.

She wore it as soon as I gave it to her, which is a good sign that it was a success.

This crazy color combo was my '80's flash back...though in the 80's I wouldn't have been seen dead in these colors! LOL. I wanted to make a bracelet toggle and loop out of some stitches that have been unattainable to me: Brick Stitch and Peyote. Guess what!? It worked! The loop I used a pattern I have seen on a lot of different work, mostly in magazines, it wasn't so hard! The toggle was a brick stitch, and next time I may try to increase and decrease so I can effect a bit of sculpture to it! Most fun. And the motivation for any one who has seen this? If I can do it, YOU can do it!!!

Inspired by some deep cranberry colored beads I purchased from http://www.beadyeyedwomen.com at a bead show. The first thing that came to mind was a repeating pattern that had no beginning and end, again, trying to figure out a clasp, so I hid two hook and eye clasps inside. The gold beads were galvanized and after two gentle wearings the gold beads began to shed color...revealing the crystal beneath. I have since learned that one must seal those beads. I will redo this bracelet in Miyuki Delicas, largely due to the uneveness of these beads. Still learning to "let some beads go" if they just don't fit!

And since beads are not square...time to find better graph paper!