Sunny side-up - fried egg mini tutorial

 A quick and fun bead to make that is  perfect for Beads of Courage 

 

Happy Melting, Jolene xx

Slimy Snail tutorial for Beads of Courage

 

This simple but effective snail design is perfect for Beads of Courage. 

You can find more great tutorials suitable for Beads of Courage in the BoCUK Bead Artists Group on Facebook.

Happy Melting, Jolene xx

Simple chocolate truffle tutorial for Beads of Courage

  Chocolate truffle bead tutorial for Beads of Courage.  

These chocolate truffle beads are quite simple to make and  can be decorated any way you like. Below are a few "recipes" and decorating suggestions.To make these little chocolates, start by making a round bead in your favourite chocolate brown glass colour and flatten one side so they will stand up. I have flattened mine on a wavy pattern brass texture plate but if you don't have anything like that then just flatten the base on any suitable surface.

Effetre chocoalte brown 444 with a swirl of white glass. I have used commercial stringer here rather than pulled my own.

Effetre chocolate brown 444 dipped in "sugar frit" Kuglar's Lead Crystal Clear (K100) in a fine #00 grind.

 

CiM Ghee for a caramel looking truffle with Effetre chocolate brown stringer waves.

Effetre chocolate brown 444 with chocolate brown stringer waves.

Find our how to support BoCUK with bead donations in the new Beads of Courage UK Bead Artists Facebook Group.

Happy melting, Jolene x

 

 

 

Messy testing - London Fog, Unicorn, Summer Haze, and Lemongrass ltd run

This post looks at 4 neutral/pale shades of opal glass from the CiM spring collection that came out earlier this year. The first is called London Fog ltd run. It is a misty opal glass and it's really lovely! I have paired it up here with stringers and dots of Class M Planet.

 

 

Unicorn ltd run is a milky opal white glass, the same hue as London Fog. Milky opals are semi-translucent while misty opals are just ever so slightly translucent and let more light through. I have paired up Unicorn with Poi and purple encased stringer work.

 

 

Summer Haze ltd run is a pale yellow misty opal glass. I have teamed it up with Grumpy Bear.

Lemongrass ltd run (pictured below) is a pale yellow milky opal glass. It lets through more light than the original opal type glass colours from CiM which I personally like a lot. I have paired it up with Oobleck to make these heart pair.

 

Summer Haze and Lemongrass are another pair of glasses that are the same hue with different translucency. I find I tend to lean towards the Misty Opals generally but I much prefer Lemongrass from this pair.

Jolene x

Messy Testing - Paradise, Goddess and Lunar ltd run

This post looks at three blue opal glass colours from the spring 2020 collection of new colours from Creation is Messy.  These hearts are made with Paradise ltd run, a blue semi-translucent milky opal glass.

 

Goddess ltd run, shown here on the right, is another blue opal. This glass is the same shade as Paradise but CiM describe it as a misty opal glass. It lets more light through than Paradise and has a lovely glow to it when you hold these beads up to the light.

The last glass I'm showing today is Lunar ltd run. It's is a very pretty shade of opal denim blue. These simple leaf beads look so pretty.

Jolene x

365 Penguins Fan Art lampwork bead tutorial for Beads of Courage

These super cute beads were inspired by a book that I read with my children in January 2015 called 365 Penguins. It was written by Jean-Luc Fromental and illustrated by Joëlle Jolivet. Joëlle has very kindly given me permission to write a not for profit fan art tutorial to show how I make them so that others may also create them for Beads of Courage donations. With Christmas just around the corner I thought that now would be a great time to share.

Step 1: Wind a tube of black glass on to your mandrel.

Step 2: Use a roller or a hand held graphite marver to shape your tube into a bullet shape.

 

I'm using a CG bead roller BR9 small chunky oval  here.

Step 4: Press your bead between 2 heat proof surfaces to form a tab shape.

Step 5: Draw a rectangle using chunky white stringer.

Step 6: Fill in your rectangle shape with swipes of white glass.

Step 7: Heat the whole bead and press it again.

Step 7: Add 2 swipes of black glass to form the wings and a large dot to form the beak.

Step8: Heat your bead and it press flat again.

Step 9: Add 2 large dots of orange or blue glass.

Step 10: Spot heat the tips of the wings and rake the soft glass with a dental pick to create points. Repeat this process to shape the beak.

Step 11: Heat the feet and press your whole bead flat again. Spot heat one foot and use a dental pick to rake twice to create 3 "toes". Repeat this process for the other foot. Add two black dots of glass for the eyes.

Step 12: Add a large dot of white on top of  each black eye dot, then layer on a second dot of black. 

Heat and press for a final time. Heat the whole bead through well and then garage in your kiln.

 

Happy Penguin making, Jo  xx

Messy testing - Avonlea, Andrew and Adriatic ltd run

A collection of green and blue beads from me today, three more colours from the May 2020 release of new glass from CiM

These flower buds are made with a core of Avonlea ltd run with Effetre light aqua petals over the top. It's a  very striking combination.

Avonlea is a bright happy grass green with a barely there misty opal effect. Little green spacer leaves look so pretty made with Avonlea.

These flower bud beads are made with a core of Andrew ltd run with Effetre light aqua petals over the top. I often use a harmonising transparent glass over the top of an opaque or opal core for these textured beads. The opal blue here makes the flowers look as though they glow from within.

Andrew is a perfect opal shade of powder blue. One of my absolute favourites glass colours from this round of testing. It makes me think of summer skies and sunshine. There is no sign of a reaction with silvered ivory stringer.

I have made these last two pairs of little hearts with Adriatic ltd run. It is another example of  CiM's new misty opal glass, this time in a pretty shade of blue that leans towards aqua a bit. It's very beautiful.

Jolene x

Messy testing - Onyx, Cotton and Swan ltd run

Today I am looking at two very pretty new white opal glass colours from CiM. Here is a side by side comparison of Swan ltd run and Cotton ltd run hearts which are variations on CiM's Marshmallow opal white.

Swan is what CiM describe as a misty opal. It was made in a very small quantity and will not likely be readily available in the UK. I have made a pair of hearts with Swan and wrapped them with a black stringer of another new glass called Onyx ltd run.

Cotton is a transparent opal glass, very similar to Marshmallow but more lovely in that it lets more light pass through it than the original more opaque opal white colour does.

These little striped lentil beads show how Onyx behaves over the new white opals. Over swan is holds it's crisp edges quite well, though I have overheated  (boiled) it whilst melting the stringer down flat and caused some textured micro-bubbles to form. Over Cotton it looks quite different, those crisp edges are nowhere to be seen and the Onyx stringer has taken on a feathered look as I melted it in over the top Cotton.

Jolene x

500 isolation bead challenge for Beads of Courage beads 64 to 91

A few more sweet little beads that I will post off soon to Beads of Courage UK to lift the spirits of some very brave kids.

Have a lovely day, Jolene xx

500 isolation bead challenge for Beads of Courage beads 53 to 63

This is my first update in a couple of weeks because I downed my lampworking tools and started sewing cotton face masks for family, friends and neighbours. If anyone is interested in sewing their own this is a great tutorial to follow...

How to sew a re-useable face mask

Stay safe everyone, Jolene x

500 isolation bead challenge for Beads of Courage beads 34 to 52

Blog post number 2 about my personal challenge to create 500 special little beads for Beads of Courage UK and Ireland during this strange time of social distancing and staying at home.

For more information about Beads of Courage in the UK click here....

More cute beads coming soon :-D

Jolene x

Scavenger Hunt no 3

Day 3 of our homemade scavenger hunt lists...... I wonder when the kids will get bored of these? Not yet it seems!

Feel free to join in :-D

Jolene x

Scavenger Hunt no 2

Keeping my kids busy while we are all staying home to flatten the curve....

Jolene x

Messy testing - Firecracker and Goldfish ltd run

This evening I am looking at a rich transparent red called firecracker ltd run and a bright transparent orange glass called Goldfish ltd run.

This large encased tumbled heart bead looks as though it was made with 3 colours. It has Firecracker at the top and Goldfish at the bottom. I wrapped the orange glass around the mandrel first and then wrapped the red glass next to it. This means that the orange glass at the point of the heart was allowed to cool much more than that directly next to the red before it was encased. The result is that that part of the bead has struck to a much deeper shade of orange.

These flower bud beads have petals made with Firecracker over a core of Alley Cat - my absolute favourite orange glass. The sepals and spacer beads are made with Elphaba.

The petals of this raised flower bead are Firecracker over white.

Solid Firecracker heart shaped beads with dots of striking Effetre tongue pink.

The petals of these flower beads are made with Goldfish over a core of Alley Cat. The sepals are made with Elphaba and the spacer beads are made with Ogre.

The petals of this raised flower bead are Goldfish over white. I had trouble striking the colour so parked this bead in my kiln at 510 degrees C for a few mins then  reintroduced it to the flame to get the colour to bloom fully.

There is a tiny core of Goldfish at the center of these tumble etched heart beads. The look is patchy, again because I have not quite got the knack of striking it yet but I like the look!

So of course, glass named Goldfish needs to be turned into one! The crab sidestepping next to it is made with Firecracker. These were the very first 2 beads that started my 500 isolation beads challenge project for Beads of Courage UK- you can see a bit more about that here....

Jolene x