Wafer Madness?

What a perfect way to showcase a wafer bead! This ring is designed by Ann Westby.

On the Bead Cruise everyone received one wafer bead in their gift bags, I would love to see how other artists use this unusual bead. I'll have new wafers coming out soon in olive, copper, purple and periwinkle.

How would you use a wafer beads? Leave a comment on how you would use a wafer bead and at the end of the week I'll draw a random winner for a set of wafer beads in one of the new colors!

Party Favors

These remind me of candy, yummy little colors that they are! I'm in a celebrating kind of mood. The Art Bead Scene's first birthday is this month. Every 5 days one of our contributors is giving away a prize. So be sure to stop by and read up on this month's challenge. I'm offering free shipping until the end of March on my humblebeads site, a little gift for you! Use discount code ABSBirthday. I hope your week is filled with creative moments and new inspirations.

Bead Cruise Review

This year the Bead Cruise was so enjoyable. I feel like I'm getting the hang of putting together the events. We had a few problems with the meeting space & lighting, but that was a matter that Royal Caribbean failed to deliver on and was out of my control. Other than that, the cruise was perfect. This was the first time I had a few moments to bead while on the Bead Cruise, imagine that! I even took one of the classes.

I was having too much fun to take photos. All my pictures seem to be from the Turtle Farm! So I'm borrowing some from Rosanne's Flickr Album...she was much more of a shutterbug than me.

Okay, so every Bead Cruise starts out with our awesome gift bags donated from our sponsors. This year Ornamentea provided us with artsy tote bags to fill up. Along with many other beady goodies, we had 7 art beads in each bag!

I loved our instructors. Each one is a fabulous designer who is generous with their students, all had rave reviews. They are wonderful, professional women that I had the honor of working with over the year.

The group we traveled with this year was so much fun. I loved each time we would get together and like little peacocks, we strutted around admiring each others beaded creations. You could always spot the Bead Cruise group, we were the ones decked out in the fabulous jewelry.

Anne Kinter was working on a beaded wall hanging of the Mona Lisa. I was IMPRESSED. I hope she blogs about it. hint, hint!

The students enjoyed their classes, some were even able to finish their projects before the cruise was over. Everyone was sporting their Siren's Song necklaces, I was so proud of them! My beadmaking class had wonderful results, again with me and no photos. Everyone's beads were great and of course I love when students experiment and come up with unexpected results.

Our evenings were filled with beads, friends and all the entertainment onboard the ship. That included parades on the promenade, dancing on deck, midnight buffets, treatments at the spa, all dressed up for formal night, a cocktail party under the stars, late night beading and we were even sung to by Maria, one of our lively cruisers!

We went to Jamaica and experienced a little local flavor. We spent the day in Grand Cayman. We did a tour of Hell, (where they sell bottled water by the way) the turtle farm and swimming with the sting rays. The sting rays were beautiful and terrifying at the same time. You can see that by the look on my face!

Bead Cruise 2008 was the best time ever, it always goes by too quickly. I'm working on the details for our next adventure and I'm even considering doing a second Bead Cruise that has a little twist. I'll share more when I can!

Visit FabFibers & NoEasyBeads for more blogging about the Bead Cruise.

Bead Cruise Blues

What? Only one course meals? No one is making up my room twice a day? No elaborately folded towel animals? There isn't a room full of fun beady women to hang out with every day? No spa treatments or hot tubs? No exotic beaches to lounge on? I wish the Bead Cruise could last for weeks!

This year was so much fun! I had the best instructors, I just loved Eni, Marcia and Rachel. So much talent! We had the best group to travel with, the women this year were so sweet, enthusiastic and made the cruise a pure joy. It was worth every ounce of effort I put into it through the year.

The necklace above was the cover for this year's Bead Cruise Program. I titled it The Key to Davy Jones Locker. The key is from The Venerable Bead's etsy shop. The Boro glass from Sonoran Beads and then I have one of my wafers and a few disk beads. All on some inexpensive chains from Micheal's. You have to love your local craft store for a little last minute inspiration!

I am glad to be home, back to work and making new beads. I have new ideas rolling around in the ocean of my mind like it's high tide!

More cruise pictures to follow soon.

Where did I go?

Well for a while I was in bed, not easy for this workaholic! But the flu/cold season hit the humble household hard! And then I rushed over to this place...

Yep, a week in the Big Apple. Do New Yorkers actually call it that? Probably not, they are way too slick for such hokey stuff. What was I doing there? Attending a Children's Book Conference for the organization that I volunteer for, the SCBWI. We work a little, but we get to attend the events and they are amazing. One of my dreams is to illustrate and write children's books. As much as I love beads, I do have a degree in art and would very much like to put that training to use making books! Slowly but surely I'm getting there. Of course there will always be beads, but when your muse calls, you must answer.
Okay back to the city, here is Times Square which was a few blocks from the hotel. Way too much excitement and hype for me.
Rockefeller Center is more my speed. We went to the top of the building to the observation deck. Breathtaking! I went sight-seeing at Central Park, the NY Public Library and Grand Central Station. My biggest regret is not making time to hit the bead shops, there is a whole block of them. Next year I will have to go there!

Oh and my little eyes got to feast on such things as this. Dare I dream? I never thought I'd see this painting in real life. It's at the Museum of Modern Art, where we did not spend enough time.

And then I got back home and I hit the ground running, getting ready for the Bead Cruise. My to-do list is still way longer than my days, but I see a light at the end of the tunnel. Or maybe that's the plane lights at the end of the runway? Either way this time next week I'll be in Florida getting ready to sail off into the sunset.

I don't know if I'll have time to post again before I leave. But I promise to share all sorts of exciting things with you when I get back. Until then, happy creating!