Minions in Dungarees, free tutorial challenge for Beads of Courage

Make a minion challenge for Beads of Courage

I was making some Minion beads for Beads of Courage the other day based on Heather Sellers fabulous make a Minion Challenge

I made one of them kinda oval just for fun and he looked like he was missing his dungarees so I decided to dress him and thought it would be nice to follow in Heather's footsteps and throw out a Minion making challenge for Beads of Courage too. 

So I challenge you all to make a minion and send it in :-D

UK Bead Donations:
Beads of Courage, Inc.
 c/o Diane Watt
 14, Radlow Crescent
 Marston Green
 Birmingham,  B37 7LZ

US Bead Donations:
3230 N. Dodge Blvd. Suite J
Attn:  Bead Donations
Tucson, AZ  85716

Canadian Bead Donations:
PO Box 71142
Silver Springs RPO
Calgary, Alberta  T3B 5K2

Firstly you will need to make some thick yellow stringer 2mm approx, some thick blue stringer 2mm approx and black stringer 1mm approx.

Wrap a wide footprint of blue glass on to your mandrel - I use the smallest cavity on CG Bead roller BR-46 large chunky oval to shape these oval minions. If you are hand shaping then aim to create a footprint that will be between 1/3 to half the length of your final bead.

Using a roller or by hand shaping with a graphite paddle, shape the wraps to form one half of an oval bead. If the flat end of your half oval has a pucker, gently heat and roll the bead against the side of your mandrel to remove the pucker to  minimise the chance of trapping a large air bubble in the middle of your bead when you add the yellow glass.

Add some wraps of yellow glass next to the blue taking care not to trap any air bubbles between the two colors.

Hand shape the yellow glass with your paddle to from the second half of your oval base bead or if using a roller, gently heat and press your bead into the roller cavity. Turn the mandrel a little between each press until you have created a balanced and smooth two-tone oval that will rotate freely in the roller cavity. If you have too much glass you can remove small quantities with a pair of long nose tweezers.

Wrap a line of thick yellow stringer around the blue half of your bead leaving a thin strip of blue at the centre which will create the straps of your Minion's dungarees. next wrap a thin line of black stringer around the yellow half of the bead near the bead hole.This will form the band for his goggles.

Melt your stringers in flat and then press your bead with some mashers, between two graphite paddles or with a parallel press. Don't worry about removing any chill marks at this stage as they will be removed during the next stages as you add further detail.

Take your blue stringer and create the "bib" part of your Minion's clothes by placing two swipes side-by-side that join up the dungaree braces to to the trousers. Repeat this for the back side also. Decide which face is going to be the front of your minion and place a small black dot where you would like the Minions mouth to be.

Melt all of the raised decoration in flush on both faces of the bead by warming the raised areas through and pressing them down gently with your graphite paddle. Once everything is flush partially mask your black dot with an offset dot of yellow to create the Minion's smile.

Melt the yellow dot in flat and then place a large grey dot from a full sized rod in the centre of the headband.

Flatten the grey dot but leaving it a little raised and then top the grey dot with white glass. Flatten the white dot also, leaving it slightly raised so that the dots are stacked up.

Top the white dot with a large blob of clear glass and let the clear glass round off to form a lens shape in the flame.

Choose your minions eye colour and place a small dot over the clear lens to create the iris. Next pick up your black stringer again and add a tiny dot to the eye to for the pupil. You can chose to add some more final last details at this point if you like, such as buttons and further details on the goggles. Warm your bead through and pop it in the kiln to anneal.

Minion beads are very well loved and treasured by Beads of Courage kiddos so it would be great if you wanted to give making them a whirl!

Have a lovely evening, Jo x
 
PS. This tutorial is written for bead makers with prior experience in mind. Please take all safety precautions when working with a very hot flame including proper eye protection and please do work in an adequately ventilated work space.

This tutorial is fan art and is not to be used for profit. It has no connection with the creators of Minions.

www.kitzbitz.com my own website at last...

Last weekend I put on my big girl pants and set about building a website for my beads. I've spent the past week loading up the shop with pretty goodies, some of which you can see here :-D To celebrate I have a voucher code - 104U - for 10% off which is valid today and tomorrow (26th and 27th of May '15).

Come and have a look www.kitzbitz.com

Jolene xx

Happy Hearts Tutorial in Beads & Beyond Magazine

I wrote a tutorial on how to make my Happy Hearts for the June issue of Beads & Beyond magazine but something went wrong in the proof reading stage and the mag went to print with the wrong step by step pictures next to the text.

Soooo now the full tutorial is up on their blog and I get to share the link with you :-D


Have a lovely evening, Jolene x
http://beadsandbeyondmagazine.blogspot.co.uk/2015/05/happy-hearts-june-issue.html

Rainbow woes part 2

 So the next step in my quest for perfect rainbows....Bullseye glass!

Bullseye is CoE 90 and much less finicky than CoE 104 in many ways, though I do often find the rods a tad shocky, especially French Vanilla.

The hearts on the left are over a base of Bullseye clear wrapped with stringers in various bright shades.

The orange looks a tad misty and the aqua and violet not as bright as I would have liked but overall I am pretty happy :D

I was super thrilled with these little rounds, all the bright stringers wrapped around a core of French Vanilla and encased in clear.

I am quite disappointed with Bullseye clear, there are quite a lot of micro bubbles in it, similar in many ways to Effetre 004. So the next thing is to try some other brands of CoE 90 clear...I have heard shat Schott clear is pretty good but hard to track down in the UK.

TTFN, Jolene x

Rainbow woes........

 I loved making these and was tickled pink when they came out of the kiln looking like little sweeties yesterday morning. This morning I spotted and incompatibly crack in one of the hearts - literally heart breaking.

They were made over a core of CiM Peace with tiny wraps of bog standard Effetre colours over the top and encased with 006. The cracking is internal, partial and only over the "hot" colours.

So a few hours of pouring over internet and I found a good lot of interesting info on Lampwork Etc which talks about Cadmium based colours being inconsistent under encasement.

These rainbow rounds came out of the kiln looking perfect this morning. I made them before the first crack appeared on the hearts and just a few hours later 3 now show small fractures internally too.

So some things to try - making a core of clear glass under white before layering on the rainbow or making the rainbow directly over a core of clear. Or making a similar design using Bullseye glass which is CoE 90.....update coming soon.

Have a super evening, Jolene x

Mini Mo' Jan '15 - Indigo and Blackcurrant

My first collection of 2015 is called Blackcurrant. I've created this glasswork with CiM Gypsy, CiM Blackcurrant and CiM Dirty Martini.

This first set of hearts uses Blackcurrant canes to make delicate petals over CiM Thistledown.

Followed by a set of Dirty Martini shank buttons decorated with Blackcurrant murrini.

These hearts have some silvered Dirty Martini shards melted over the top and feature Blackcurrant murrni too.

My second collection for Jan 15 is called Indigo. I've used CiM Indigo, CiM Mediterranean, CiM Loch Ness with Marigold and Effetre light turquoise 232.

The shards in this collection are the original recipe "Troubled Sky" shards that I first made way back in 2009.

A Vetro Smoke Rings focal heart decorated with Indigo canes.

And last up, a sweet trio of shank buttons that feature Indigo and turquoise daisy murrini (these need a long soak in some coke to take away the dull grey effects that you can see on the surface of the turquoise glass).


Wishing you a lovely evening Jolene x

Mini Mo Dec 14 - Willow Pattern and Earthenware

My first Mini Mo' collection for December is called Willow Pattern. I have used CiM Cornflower, CiM Zachary and Effetre White.

These beautiful silvered shards are a special one off mix for this collection.

An encased Easter egg focal with a Willow Pattern twistie wrapped core over Vetrofond mid blue.

Both the Willow Pattern and earthenware collections contain pretty black latticino canes, shown here over CiM Glacier and under clear.

My second collection for December is called Earthenware and uses CiM Stoneground and Reichenbach Multicolor dark.

I've created this floral decoration with swipes of Earthenware canes to form the vines and petals.

An Ethenware twistie cored heart wrapped with silvered Stoneground shards.

This is what the some of the Earthenware canes look like under deep encasement.


Have a lovely evening, Jolene x

Mini Mo' Nov 14 - Print Room and Playtime

Print Room, my first collection for November was made with CiM Hades, Vetrofond opaque red an CiM Peace

This striking heart focal heart features some of  the Print Room twistie under encasement and over a core of white.

Another encased Print Room twisted cored heart, this one has twistie wrapped over a core of clear.

And a sweet heart collection, the focal is decorated with a dragonfly with twistie swiped wings.

My Playtime collection was made with CiM Daffodil, CiM Keylime, CiM Grumpy Bear and Effetre Coral.

This bright little button trio is made uses Playtime murrini as decoration.

This large focal heart uses some of the Playtime canes both encased under a layer of clear glass and on top of the bead as raised decoration.

Have a super day, Jolene xx

Strawberry iced chocolate bead tutorial in Beads & Beyond magazine Feb 2015

Hot off the press and fresh on the shelves, the Valentines edition of Beads & Beyond magazine has a tutorial in print for my fab strawberry iced chocolate beads. I couldn't be more thrilled, the page looks beautiful.

Jolene xx

My lampwork tutorials and EUVAT from Jan 1st

Tomorrow (Jan 1st 2015) sees the beginning of a massive change in EU law that sees VAT on ebooks and digital services charged at the rate of the country of the buyer..... an administrative and technical challenge that I am simply not able to meet as a one woman business.

(You can find out more about the changes on the EU vat action website http://euvataction.org).

Rather than withdraw my tutorials from sale completely I have been looking around for a 3rd party website that is VAT compliant and have decided to list with Payhip who are ready for the big changes on Jan 1st. My tutorials are only available on my blog for the time being.


 

6 Organic Shard Recipes and Shard Blowing tutorial is now available via Payhip as an instant download, £10 plus Vat for your country

Buy eBook

Tutorial details: 24 pages, 50 colour images, 9.58 MB and is written in English.

There is also a brill bonus tutorial on applying shards and making encased beads with a graphite roller.

Making Lime Murrini available Via Payhip as an automatic download, £12 plus Vat for your country.

Buy eBook

 

Tutorial details: 37 pages, 135 images, 6.2 MB and written in English

This eBook teaches you how to make my signature semi-circular lime murrini slices. There are 66 step by step images for this project accompanied by written instructions. This tutorial is aimed at for intermediate to advanced lampworkers and is not Hot Head friendly, a kiln is also required.

There are also 3 bonus tutorials

Amoeba beads for Beads of Courage
My favourite vine cane recipe
Chocolate Limes with the Kati was here! La Patisserie press
(which shows how to use pictorial murrini as raised decoration).


Jolene x