Turquoise bead embroidered pendant

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I'm still besotted with the color turquoise, which seems to happen on a fairly regular basis, especially in the Summer!  The beautiful focal and the metal ring are the work of my friend Jennifer West.  The pretty raku bead just above the ring is by Amy Mealey.  I love Amy's and Jen's work together, and you might have noticed that I often combine them.   

This piece is deceptively simple, with a few extra embellishments to make it special.  I stitched the bezel with size 11/0 seed beads in peyote stitch and topped it with size 15/0 seed beads in right angle weave.  Since the count worked out properly, I was able to go back and stitch small drops between each pair of "up" beads in the last size 11/0 row.  To continue that theme, I stitched a butterfly style bail and edged it with the same drops.  The beadwoven bail works best if stitched with Delicas or other cylindrical beads.  Fortunately for me, I had a pretty good match for the Czech seed beads! You can find instructions for making this bail in Diane Fitzgerald's wonderful book, Shaped Beadwork and Beyond (my review is at the link).  In fact, the blue star that you see on the cover is made from the links that fold to make the bail!

Copyright 2019 Cyndi Lavin. All rights reserved. 

By the sea, by the sea...a mermaid bead embroidered pendant

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Here is another mermaid focal that I fell in love with, made by my friend Sheri Mallery.  I decided that she would be the centerpiece of my next pendant.  I kept the back stitching fairly simple, just adding a few accent pearls and cup chain.  The bezel also has just a few small pearly embellishments.  But then I got to the fringe...!!

Pearls, dyed pearls, cup chain, fringe drops.  I feel like she's guarding her treasure!

My e-book Some Assembly Required covers many different styles of fringe and other beautiful finishing techniques.

Copyright 2019 Cyndi Lavin. All rights reserved. 

Blue floral bead embroidered pendant

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SOLD!!

This new pendant combines a polymer clay focal by Shari Smith McDermott with a raku bead by Amy Mealey.  Shari's cabochons are black polymer clay that she paints.  The ones I bought have an iridescent sheen that is hard to appreciate in photos, while Amy's raku beads are the perfect accompaniments!

Step-by-step instructions for putting together a bead embroidered piece, including back stitch, edging brick stitch, and stack stitch can be found in the free first chapter of my e-book Every Bead Has a Story.  Chapter two has instructions for stitching a peyote stitch bezel, and Chapter three teaches the square stitch bail.  Additional chapters focus on altered surfaces, dimensional beading, found objects and unusual materials, and integrating bead embroidery with other fiber arts.

Copyright 2019 Cyndi Lavin. All rights reserved. 

Copper + green bead embroidered pendant

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I love these polymer clay and resin cabochons by Mary Anne Williams Knapp.  I buy them from her in her online trunk shows.  They are not terribly deep, so it doesn't take many rows to bezel them and get down to the fun parts of embellishing!  I used edging brick stitch all around the piece and then added small drop beads along the top and short stack stitches and dagger beads for fringe along the rest.

If you want to learn how to make bead embroidered pieces, I show you how to do it with over-sized beads and lots of pictures in the free first chapter of my e-book Every Bead Has a Story.  There are also free instructions there for back stitch, edging brick stitch, and more.

Copyright 2019 Cyndi Lavin. All rights reserved. 

Green bead embroidered pendant with a tree

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SOLD!!

I just can't get enough of these metal clay focals that my friend Jennifer West makes!  You can find beauties of your own by visiting Off the Grid Designs, or find Jennifer on facebook...she frequently sells through online trunk sales there.

Anyway, I had exactly ONE of these cute little mother-of-pearl leaves left from another project, and when my client said she liked earthy green tones, it just seemed perfect.  She is also petite, so I had to restrain myself from over-embellishing :-)

If you'd like to make one of these bead embroidered pieces, instruction can be found in Every Bead Has a Story, where the first chapter is free to download.

Copyright 2019 Cyndi Lavin. All rights reserved. Not to be reprinted, resold, or redistributed for profit. May be printed out for personal use or distributed electronically provided that entire file, including this notice, remains intact.

Floral swirl and ant bead embroidered pendant

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I'm still obsessed with raku and metal together.  This time, the raku focal takes center stage, another beauty that I bought from Amy Mealey of Xaz Bead Company.  Amy does trunk shows online, which you can learn about at the link. 

For the beadwork, I tried to pick up the flash colors in the raku piece.  It's hard to get photographs that do justice to these colors, as they shift so much depending upon the angle and the light.  The bezel top is finished in a twisted seed bead pattern.  The edges are all finished with edging brick stitch, stack stitches on the upper 3/4s, and strands of seed beads and two raku beads, leading to a sweet little ant charm made by my hero, Jennifer West.

Step-by-step instructions for putting together a bead embroidered piece, including back stitch, edging brick stitch, and stack stitch can be found in the free first chapter of my e-book Every Bead Has a Story.  Chapter two has instructions for stitching a peyote stitch bezel, and Chapter three teaches the square stitch bail.  Additional chapters focus on altered surfaces, dimensional beading, found objects and unusual materials, and integrating bead embroidery with other fiber arts.

Copyright 2019 Cyndi Lavin. All rights reserved. Not to be reprinted, resold, or redistributed for profit. May be printed out for personal use or distributed electronically provided that entire file, including this notice, remains intact.

Blossoms of the Moonlit Waves

Blossoms of the Moonlit Waves

This is one of my favorite necklaces EV-AH, and I got to rock it out for Mother's Day!  It took a monstrously long time to make it, mostly because I wasn't sure what components I was going to need.  It was one of the bead embroidered necklace projects that moved me in the direction of working with components rather than as a solid collar style in the first place.  My e-book Some Assembly Required follows that journey, featuring another piece. If you've never tried making a large necklace without a solid foundation and a plan first, maybe it's time!

The original tutorial for Blossoms of the Moonlit Waves is at the link.