Unwanted Treasure

It's Amazing What You Find.

   As some of you may have seen by the first few books I've listed on ebay, I've started clearing out the barn, a big tidy up with the hope of a fresh lick of paint to follow, an all round make over after which I hope to once again start welcoming visitors back here, that's if anybody is interested.
   It's amazing how much stuff you find that you forgot you even had, I guess after seven years you would expect forgotten treasures and that's what we are finding, some useful for future use others now redundant. I have a large amount of jewellery making books and tools, not bead jewellery making but silver work, I had this idea that I would teach myself some silversmith techniques and as I always did, I jumped in at the deep end buying all the tools and books I needed. But now I realise I just don't have the time so I thought it would be a good idea to list some of the books on ebay, you never know there may be somebody out there who is thinking of starting up silver work who could give them a home, fingers crossed they won't just get put back on a quiet shelf.
   Yet again the rain has returned this morning and it very much looks like we are in for another wet weekend, no full beaches this week here in the east, surely those warm summer days will be here soon, I think most of us are now getting a little fed up with dark skies and wet days.
   Today I'm working on more gravity beads, I really enjoy making this type of bead and I get to use up lots of odd pieces of glass, as a lot of you already know I love just closing my eyes and picking out three or four different coloured pieces, whatever colours they turn out to be I gravitate them over a plain base bead, you would be amazed at some of the effects they produce, yes a very simple bead to make but a bead that can carry lots of interest in the colours it can produce.
   I remember laying out eight different coloured rod ends one day, colours that lets say were not very rich in colour, in fact they were really boring pale shades. I closed my eyes and selected three of them, then I made a plain cobalt blue base bead onto which I placed three strips of glass, one from each of the chosen pieces. I then melted in those additional strips and gravitated the surface of the bead in my flame, I have to say the next morning when I opened my kiln I was stunned when I saw the set I had produced, in fact I wasn't sure they were the beads I had made that way, the plain boring colours had mixed together into the most wonderful effects I had seen for a long while and from that day I was addicted to gravity beads.
   Over time I've found that by adding silver, iris glass or indeed silver glass to the chosen strips I can add even more interest to the beads, so any of you out there who make beads give it a go, you really will be pleased and in some cases shocked at the results you can get, one friend calls them Johnson blind beads as she enjoys the fact I never see what colours I'm picking, but remember, once you pick the colours never ever swap them, no cheating, you always stick with those pieces you pick, that's part of the fun.
   Right back to my torch and another long day making beads while watching the rain dance on the surface of the pond, roll on those days when we moan about the heat in the barn being too much !