Beading Arts

Blue Floral This pendant has found its forever home, but I have others that are similar! Contact me to adopt one of my pendants The focal is by Shari Smith McDermott , and the little raku bead is by Amy Mealey . Copyright 2021 Cyndi Lavin. All rights reserved. 

Available!  Leave a comment Copyright 2021 Cyndi Lavin. All rights reserved. 

I love seashore colors, especially in the summer! Copyright 2021 Cyndi Lavin. All rights reserved. 

Looks like Copper may have found its forever home! Copyright 2021 Cyndi Lavin. All rights reserved. 

Available!  Leave me a comment First introduced in 2019 ...now looking for it's forever home! Copyright 2021 Cyndi Lavin. All rights reserved. 

Available!  Leave me a comment Ammonites are one of my most favorite cabochons to work with.  They are deep, and need extra care to bezel them properly, but they are sooo worth it! Copyright 2021 Cyndi Lavin. All rights reserved. 

This is one of my favorite pieces.  I made it years ago, and it was inspired by my Mother, who has the greenest of green thumbs I've ever known!  I wrote a tutorial to show you the basic steps of how it was conceived and put together.  It combines bead embroidery, beadweaving, and a little bit of stringing.   Copyright 2021 Cyndi Lavin. All rights reserved. 

The Peaceful Fox and The Ghost of the Forest have found their forever home!  I know they will be well cared for.  Please contact me if you are interested in adopting a different pendant <3 Copyright 2021 Cyndi Lavin. All rights reserved. 

Andante The idea for this piece started to form in my mind when my husband became involved in restoring an antique player piano. The keys called to me in ways that I couldn't explain. I cried when I thought about the elephants that had been destroyed to make these objects of beauty. My tribute to those majestic animals is to prevent some of those keys from ending up in a landfill.  Note ~ The only ivory that it is currently legal to use in the United States is either ancient fossilized ivory, or old recycled ivory like these keys.  Copyright 2021 Cyndi Lavin. All rights reserved. 

Gaea Emerging Wool roving, seed beads, pearls, aventurine, jade, copper  In making Gaea Emerging , I developed a two-layered solution to the problem of stitched-on embellishments getting lost in the texture of the wool roving when felted wool is used as a background. The centerpiece of Gaea Emerging is a CopprClay pendant that I made, fired, and patinated. The organic feel of the piece led to the name.  There are some step-out photos and basic instructions at the link.  Copyright 2021 Cyndi Lavin. All rights reserved. 

Ancient Waves  Ammonites, jasper, Swarovski crystals, seed beads, and pearls  Here are some step-out photos of the process at the link :-)  Copyright 2021 Cyndi Lavin.  All rights reserved.

Dark Lady An antique purse that was well beyond repair provided the steel-cut beads and the chain used for the closure of this recycled bead embroidered necklace. All of the black beads, from the fringe to the smallest glass charlottes are recycled antiques as well. The steel buttons have been attached in such a way that their shanks have been preserved.   Copyright 2021 Cyndi Lavin. All rights reserved. 

Orinoco Flow   My daughter pointed out to me that this piece uses several very primitive symbols, like concentric circles and jagged lines, which often represent watering holes and the rivers that connect them. So I picked Orinoco Flow as the name. It has turquoise, amazonite, and pearls, and gold wire along with the glass beads.  If you'd like to see a couple of process shots , visit the link!  Copyright 2021 Cyndi Lavin. All rights reserved. 

Midnight at the Oasis  "It's midnight at the oasis, send your camel to bed," sang the incomparable Maria Muldaur. My friends and I used to howl with laughter as we sang along! Now I find myself nostalgic for the song if you can believe it.  This bead embroidery necklace uses complicated clusters of graduated stacks of seed beads to create the texture. The photograph just doesn't show how dimensional it is. If you'd like to see all my process shots, there's a three-part post on my blog that starts at the link.  Copyright 2020 Cyndi Lavin. All rights reserved.

Phoebe Hello friends! I haven't had time to work on new pieces since I'm still running a food pantry and hot meals program during the Time of Covid. So I thought I'd take a bit of a trip down memory lane and share some of my older pieces again. I hope you don't mind. This one is called Phoebe . She is named for Saturn's ice moon, which was in turn named for a Titan of Greek mythology.   Copyright 2021 Cyndi Lavin. All rights reserved. 

I got this great polymer clay cabochon set from Sherri Kellberg, BeadazzleMe . I thought I just needed a push to get back into making things, and this seemed to do it. I am trying to set aside some creative time when I'm not working on or obsessing over the food pantry and meals program. Further instruction on making bead embroidered pieces can be found in Every Bead Has a Story , where the first chapter is free to download. Copyright 2020 Cyndi Lavin. All rights reserved.

Some of my friends - around the US and around the world - have probably wondered why I've stopped posting new work. Here's why: I run a food pantry and a weekly dinner for the food insecure, lonely, and marginalized people in my community. With the covid-19 crisis, my work there has increased a higher percentage than I can even figure out. I've been eating, sleeping, and breathing Stone Soup Kitchen Ministries . It has left no vacant brain space for making new art right now. As an introvert, I would have liked nothing better than to hunker down and just make things. But that wasn't in the cards.  I've been put in a uniquely privileged position to be able to do this, and I thank you all for understanding that it is the most important thing to me right now. Some day in the not TOO distant future, I hope to be able to create art again.

Available!  Leave me a comment Just last week I finished and posted a pendant using one of  Yvonne Irvin-Faus 's quirky fun pieces.  Seems I'm on a roll!  For this one, I decided to go more elaborate with the bail, stitching up a butterfly bail .  They are waaay easier to make than they look.  In fact, when I was on vacation last summer, I stitched up a whole bunch of these.  Which leads me to an idea. If you are stuck inside right now, especially if you can't get the exact materials you'd like in order to start/continue/finish a project, or if you are finding your creativity waning because of stress, try this.  Pick an easy small project like bails and make a bunch of them in various colors.  It doesn't have to be bails.  It doesn't have to be anything fancy.  It doesn't have to be something for a specific project.  JUST MAKE SOMETHING...ANYTHING!  The act of making, of moving your hands, will open your mind and...

Available!  Leave me a comment I love these bright fun pieces by Yvonne Irvin-Faus .  Yvonne has a site you can check out called MyElements by Yvonne .  In fact, I just realized when I went to post this piece that I had made a similar one almost exactly a year ago!  You can see it at the link...it's a bit more elaborate than this one. As always, if you are interested in getting started with bead embroidery, I invite you to download a free copy of my e-book's first chapter, Every Bead Has a Story .  If other forms of beading interest you, please check out the Tutorials tab at the top of the blog.  Since we are all laying low right now, due to the virus, it's a good time to plan and try out a new art form! Copyright 2020 Cyndi Lavin. All rights reserved. 

SOLD This pendant features a pyrography fox cabochon that I bought from House of the Green Lady on etsy.  I fell in love with him the moment I saw him.  He is only 1 1/2 inches tall and an inch wide, so I wanted to keep the embellishment pretty simple and straightforward.  He has a square stitched bail on the back.    Copyright 2020 Cyndi Lavin. All rights reserved.