Sunday, December 20, 2009

Hello everyone! Im so excited to be involved in this, my first Bead Journal Project. I've oogled the BJP website for the past year like a kid in a candy store and I cant believe Im actually going to be a part of it myself! Im relatively new to beading--most of my experience is making jewlery--and I feel priviledged to "rub elbows" with the rest of you creative geniuses! I've always wanted to learn how to embroider with beads and I cant think of a better way to do it then the BJP.

While I wont have a theme (this way I can change it up as I go along) I was hoping to incorporate some machine embroidery into my pieces. I noticed Karen Cohen, from 2008, used machine embroidery very succesfully so I hope my pieces can be 1/10th as good. I also plan on displaying the pieces in shadow boxes when they are all done. I have not chosen a size yet, guess it depends on the size of the shadow boxes I buy or make (working on a budget here).

I hope to work with Japanese beads. I live in a very rural area and supplies are limited so I've never had the opportunity to buy/use them before but have always wanted to. I found a website that is a good source for Japanese beads and plan on buying them thru the internet. So, as you can see this will be a total learning experience/stretch for me.

4 comments:

Crazy Mama said...

hi, sharon. you mentioned that you will be buying your beads online. i just wanted to recommend bellomodo.com (free shipping and a free sample goodie), painterartbeads.com if you're buying delicas (you can order as little as 1 gr), fusionbeads.com (free shipping) and artbeads.com (has a nice selection of interesting things and free shipping). can't wait to see your work!

Sharon M said...

Lisa, thank you for the bead source suggestions, they sound wonderful! The web source I was referring to is beadiesbeadwork.com. They seem to have all kinds of Japanses beads and their prices appear to be very reasonable. At least to me they do, in a rural area we dont have much choice or competition.

Robin said...

Hi Sharon and welcome! I hope you're still checking for comments as I'd also like to recommend a source for Japanese seed beads... my personal favorite is whimbeads.com - very reasonable, good pictures and awesome number of choices. I use a lot of 15s and they carry most of the colors. I know what it's like to live in a rural area (try an island) where there are no bead shops for miles and miles (and an expensive ferry ride) away... I like Karen's machine embroidery too. She integrated the beads and embroidered pieces really well. I look forward to seeing what you do with them. Cheers, Robin A.

Sharon M said...

Thank you Robin for the empathy and for the recommendation. I will definately put whimbeads in my "favorites" along with the sites Lisa mentioned. Wow, I cant imagine a ferry ride just to get beads, or living on an island, how exotic! The closest bead shop to me is almost 4 hours away, but there is a craft store with some bead selection 1.5 hours away. Im somewhat embarrassed to share my pieces in the face of such creativity and beauty, but I can also tell this is the perfect place to find encouragement and motivation!