Polymer and Tornados Combined

So here is a necklace with my last two blog entries combined. I made a batch of Winter Solstice beads on December 21st, and then made some tornado beads. I originally strung them together on a cord but didn't like it, so I hung them from a chain with one Winter Solstice bead as a focal. I'm not sure what my next project will be, but I'm almost certain that I'm through with cool winter colors. I can feel the days getting longer already. The bunny charm at the end of the focal bead hints at spring.

Winter Solstice Beads

First Batch

I just made these beads to celebrate Winter Solstice. Or more accurately, to celebrate the shortest day of the year because tomorrow the days get longer. Hooray! I don't normally revel in winter or winter colors, so I thought I would challenge myself to use a limited palette of blues, white, and lavender.

I made my first batch (above) of Winter Solstice beads using some simple cane techniques, trying to come up with different bead looks using the same colors. I was reaching for my silver leaf to use in mokume gane, when I realized I didn't have any silver leaf, just gold and copper. So instead of doing mokume gane, I grabbed my Pearl Ex Powdered Pigments and mixed some blues and lavenders into translucent clay, and then swirled the pigmented translucent with white, and the resulting second batch of beads (below) remind me much more of winter than the first ones I did. I like these so much that I am going to make more using different colors.


Now the next thought process will be to make a necklace out of some of these to wear this season, so I can tell Old Man Winter that he ain't got me down, I'm using him as inspiration.