Book Review: Jewelry Projects from a Beading Insider

This week's review is on Jewelry Projects from a Beading Insider: Original Designs and Expert Advice from the Editor of BeadStyle Magazine by Cathy Jakicic.  This is a brand new book put out by Kalmbach Publishing.  I am very excited to tell you about it, and not just because I know Cathy personally and have had an article in BeadStyle magazine.  :)  This is a great book on a great many topics, and it will be great to have on hand for techniques, inspiration, tips, and more!  Yes, I just said "great" three times in one sentence.  Read on, and you'll see why.

Let's start with the author.  You may be looking at her last name and wondering how the heck it's pronounced.  I hope Cathy doesn't laugh at my phonetic attempts here.  It's ja-KEYS-ick with an actual J sound at the beginning.  Until recently Cathy was the Editor of BeadStyle magazine, but now she has moved on to another position at another company.  I just found out that she also writes movie reviews for the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel.  How cool is that?  If you're interested in checking out her reviews, they can also be found on the Rotten Tomatoes website here with links to the original articles on the Journal Sentinel website.  I agree with her assessment of Disney's The Princess and the Frog, so she must know what she's talking about.

If you're on Pinterest, you can follow Cathy here.  There's even a board for her book with pictures of a few of the projects and some of her many tips.  Oh - there's a book review.  I shouldn't read that before I write my own.  Moving on!

And now for the book.  The title intrigued me, and on the cover "Beading Insider" is in very large, bold letters.  See for yourself:

If that doesn't catch your eye, I don't know what will!  You can carry this book around, and folks will immediately think you know what you're doing.  After reading this book (and with a little practice), you will.

Once I got past that fabulous cover and looked at the "What's Inside" (Table of Contents) section, I knew that this book would be perfect for not just beginner beaders but for intermediate and advanced beaders, too.

The first big section is called "Skill-Building Workshops" and covers beginner techniques needed for making jewelry such as plain loops, crimping, wrapped loops, and measuring for multi-strand necklaces all while explaining how to make beautiful necklaces or bracelets (and matching earrings for each project!).  Each technique is described in "Learn!" sections for each project (as well as in the "Techniques Review" at the end of the book), but there are also tips to help you master the technique and to help you plan your components for a flawless design.  For example, in the wrapped loops section, the tips include what gauge wire or headpins to practice on, how best to tuck in the end of the wrap, what to do if you're making clustered bead units, and more.  In the plain loop section, she gives two alternatives to the "standard" method of making the loop that might work better for some people or situations.  Even someone who has made numerous plain loops and wrapped loops (such as myself) can learn something from her tips.

If that isn't enough, the "Skill-Building Workshops" section includes a number of techniques I wouldn't have expected, including wire crochet, adding color to metal using Gilder's Paste, wire wrapping, simple beadweaving, and dyeing beads to get just the color you want.  There are tips galore and plenty of full-color pictures.

The next section is a "Creativity Boost!"  This section has three projects for what you can make with items already in your stash.  There are matching earrings for each of these projects, too!  The project that was most surprising for me in this section was the paper-folding one.  Remember the weave that can be made with gum wrappers?  Well, Cathy created a bracelet on that theme using regular colored copy paper!  Add a chain and a charm with some patina on it, and it's an adorable accessory.  She even experimented with different types of papers so you don't have to.

When you're comfortable with the techniques, it's time to create your own masterpieces.  The next section, "Designing with..." showcases necklaces and bracelets using a variety of materials: gemstones, river stone, art beads, charms, lucite, crystals, chain, ribbon, and more.  Of course, each project has its own matching earrings.  This shouldn't surprise me by now, but I was tickled when I figured this out.  A number of the projects in this section have alternatives so you can see how the same technique looks with different materials.  For example, in the "clear" project, "Clear and Present Style", the main project uses a silver chain with clear round and rough-cut beads for a classic, sophisticated look.  The alternate project uses the same beads and the same technique but with a patterned chain.  Just changing the chain gives the same necklace a fun, funky look.

In this section the tips cover designing, facts about the materials, what to look for when shopping, beading wire facts, and more.

The final project section is a second "Creativity Boost!"  The projects here challenge the "traditional" methods of using materials.  The first one has beads glued directly onto memory wire (I'd never have thought of that!).  The second project takes her mother's old necklace that had mother-of-pearl leaves on it and pairs them with bright crystals.  The third one is a pearl and chain necklace that is bold and full of visual interest.  I know my goddaughter would love to play with those dangly chains.  The one thing I'll say is that the original necklace in the second project was GORGEOUS.  I would have loved to have worn it.  I don't think I could have taken it apart, but the necklace wasn't Cathy's style.  The reconstructed one is bold and vibrant and I'm sure is more fun to wear.

I'm going on a lot longer than I thought I was going to, but there really is so much in this book that will keep any beader busy for ages.  The tips throughout the book are great, and they show up all over the place.  I just looked down at the reconstructed mother-of-pearl project and found a list of classic necklace lengths from choker/collar to rope/lariat.  They're everywhere, and I know that every time I open the book I'll find something new.

Are you a beginning beader?  Get this book.  It has everything you need to know to get started.  Have you been beading for years, off and on, and are comfortable with what you've been doing?  Get this book.  It'll help you refine your techniques and inspire you to try something new.  Are you a professional who sells your jewelry?  Still get this book.  At the very least, you'll remember things you'd forgotten and will give you ideas on different techniques to try and different materials to work with.

Don't bead at all?  Get this book for your friend who does bead, or maybe you can try your hand at a project from it, and you'll get hooked.

If you're on Facebook, feel free to "like" The Beading Insider's page.  I'm sure she'd love to see posts by you with pictures on what you've made!

Future project: Lion Brand's Fall Crochet-Along

A while ago I signed up to receive the "Weekly Stitch" e-mails from Lion Brand Yarn.  They give excerpts of some articles (one that was really funny was about school subjects being related to yarn and knitting called A-B-C-K-2-P-2 by Franklin Habit).  There are sales, and they always highlight some of their free patterns available on their website.  Also, there are links to what's on their blog, the Lion Brand Notebook.  There's more to the e-mails than that, but you get the idea.

It was in one of these e-mails that I first read about the Crochet-Alongs that Lion Brand holds.  Now, I'm not really one for group crochetings or knittings or readings or anything where I have to go along with the crowd, but I took a look at the projects.  One was a shrug - nah... I'm not fond of shrugs.  Another was a top-down jacket.  That one had potential, but it was striped (horizontally - ugh!) and only went to the waist.  The sleeves were to the elbow which is a nice length.  The third one... it was also a jacket, but it was long, had sleeves just past the elbows, and had pockets.  It looked loose, whereas the other jacket looked kind of rigid.  It looked like there were stripes, but they were more subtle than the other jacket, and stripes can be omitted.  The texture of the jacket would give visual interest, so a solid or variegated yarn would work just fine.

In short, I was enamored with this jacket and would make it no matter what.  It was just a matter of when.  I voted (along with over 20,000 other people), and the one I liked loved won!

 Isn't it purdy?

Click on the picture to be taken to the announcement post with all the relevant links and stuff.

Still, I wasn't sure if I was keen on doing a Crochet-Along.  When would I be able to afford the yarn, and would I have the time?

My birthday is this week, and in the mail came a Michaels gift card from Steve's parents that would more than cover the cost of the yarn.  Thanks, Mama and Papa!

The pattern calls for the new Unique yarn in a number of colors along with some stripes of Vanna's Choice yarn.  Some people asked about what yarn to use if they don't want stripes, and they recommended using Vanna's Choice.  Unique is a chunky yarn, and Vanna's Choice is a worsted weight - slightly thinner than Unique.  What I found interesting is that the pattern calls for different weights of yarns to be used in different rows.  That's typically not done.  I decided to use all Vanna's Choice, so the resulting jacket should be a little lacier, which is exactly what I want.  Perfect for chilly Loose Bead Society meetings or movie theaters.

Yes, the Vanna from Vanna's Choice is Vanna White from Wheel of Fortune.  She is quite the knitter and crocheter and has books of patterns as well as yarns named after her.  I have her Vanna's Afghans A to Z: 52 Crochet Favorites.  I haven't made anything from it yet, but there's one in there with cats on it, so it's only a matter of time.

The last thing I needed was a partner in crime.  Mom and John were over on Sunday, and I told them about the Crochet-Along and showed them the picture.  I thought it would be neat if Mom and I could crochet the same jacket at the same time.  She's going to be in the hospital for three weeks pretty soon for cancer treatment, and I thought it would be fun for us to Skype and show our progress.  It took some convincing because Mom has never crocheted a sweater before, but she gave in after only a little guilt-tripping.  So she couldn't back out, I showed her the yarns recommended for crocheting it without the stripes, and once she picked one, we ordered it from the JoAnn website to be shipped here (since she won't be home this week for medical procedures, either).  Hopefully the yarn will come before she goes in the hospital.  She'll be in Chicago, and I'm in Milwaukee, so I won't be able to just run it over.


Now that I've gotten Mom roped in I needed to get my own yarn.  JoAnn's had a sale on Vanna's Choice for $2.99 a skein (normally $3.99).  I saw a Michaels ad online that had it on sale for the same price.  They unfortunately don't have online ordering, so I called a store near last night's chilly Loose Bead Society meeting, but they only had 5 skeins of the color I wanted.  Other stores in the area have it, and I was pleased that there's no dye lot, meaning I can get the yarn from any store at any time, and it should all match.

Dye lot is a funny thing.  You would think that they would determine that "3R 1G 4B" would be the formula for a particular color and that would be the color forever and ever (amen).  However, I have seen some vast differences in colors for the same yarn (I can't say "exact same yarn" like I want to because it bugs Steve. :::grin:::).  I've seen this in scrapbook paper and beads, too.  What you need to do is buy at least as much as you need for your project at the same time to make sure it all matches.  If you're at the store buying the yarn, check the dye lot on each skein before throwing it into the cart.  Better safe than ACK! There's a big dark stripe right over my BOOBS!  How did that HAPPEN?!?

Update: See the end of the post for more on dye lots.

I went to Michaels last night after the chilly Loose Bead Society meeting with my friend Amy (who drove), and the yarn was not on sale.  I was perplexed, but Amy checked it out while I was in the hook aisle trying to find the elusive "O" hook (one bigger than the "N" hook the pattern calls for because I crochet tightly).  Turns out there is no "O" hook, so I'll have to use the "P" hook I think I already have.  The sale starts next week, so I bought 1 (one) skein using my 40% off coupon.  That will keep me busy for a little bit, and I'll either buy more next week when it's on sale or keep getting one at a time using 40% off coupons to save 40 cents or so on each skein off of next week's sale price.  Anything to milk that gift card!

Are you ready to see the color?  It's going to be a HUGE surprise...

Purple Mist!

I looked at other colors.  Really, I did.  I wanted a variegated yarn, so that limited the choices.  I decided I don't want anything too dark (I have a lot of that) or too bright (which just doesn't work for me), so the choices were even more limited.  Browns and tangerines are right out (shudder), so I was left with Denim Mist, Rose Mist, Seaspray Mist (light green), and Purple Mist.  It had to be purple.  Of course.

If I do it again I'll choose a different color.  Really... I will!

Mom chose Vanilla Twist:

That should be pretty!

When I was looking at the yarn in the store it looked positively rope-like to me.  Much thicker than I expected a worsted weight to be.  Later, I realized that the last few projects I've knitted (including the train baby hat) have been with sock (super fine) yarn.  Worsted weight is marked as a "4", and the sock yarn is marked as a "1".

Here are the two yarns next to each other:

I'm going to have quite an adjustment to make when I start working on the jacket!

As for the time I was concerned about having, my summer season is winding down.  I have a few more farmers markets to go to, but those don't need any more preparation at this point.  I've decided that daytime should be spent on the business (writing blogs and designing and bookkeeping and stuff like that) and at night I can knit or crochet or do nothing.  We'll see how that works out.

Now that I'm in, I will be posting periodic updates to my progress.  I may wait until Mom gets her yarn.  If anyone else wants to join in, I'd love to post pictures of your progress, too!  E-mail me at traci@creative-pursuits.biz and let me know you'll be crocheting along.

If you're on Ravelry (my name is taotte there - look me up!), there's a group for discussions and updates on this Crochet-Along.  It can be found here.  I'll be bopping in there from time to time to see how other folks are doing.

Yes, I'm aware I still have that damnable hooded cardigan to finish, but that will take forever.  Yes, I'm aware that it will take forever if I never knit on it, but that's a topic for another day.

Update:  I knew it was too good to be true.  There is a dye lot on the Purple Mist Vanna's Choice yarn.

Steve and I had to drop off my car at an auto body shop because some nimrod scraped along the driver's side while I was blissfully unaware in the grocery store.  Both doors have scratches and minor dents, and it's quite possible that it'll rust if it's not fixed.  I'm doing all the follow-up stuff to get it reported, and hopefully the culprit will be found (there's a tape at the grocery store) and will pay up so I will get my $500 deductible back.  Anyway - we were near another Michaels store, so I thought we'd use the 40% off coupon on Steve's phone to get another skein of yarn.  I was quite surprised (and dismayed) that there were dye lots listed on all of the skeins there (except for the two that were missing labels, of course).  There were 4-5 dye lots represented, and some had a more bold variegation than others.  I tried to remember what I had at home, and we picked one of the bold ones.

There is a very slight difference - the one on the bottom is a little bolder - but I don't think it'll be too noticeable.  The problem is that they only had about five skeins of this dye lot or others that looked close enough.  I'm going to need 16 skeins total.  My dreams of picking up a skein here and there as I needed it have unraveled like a badly crocheted sweater.  The only thing I can do is to go back next week when the yarn is on sale and pick up as many skeins as look right and hope that I can find more later.  I'll keep you posted!

Book Review: Recycled Crafts: Crafts Made Using Recycled Materials

Happy Friday!  Today is going to be short because I have a big sale tomorrow I still am getting ready for (the Donna Lexa Memorial Art Fair in Wales, Wisconsin) and because the kitten is trying to eat my words and my computer as well as trying to drink my water.

I'm not going to do this very much, but I'm going to post a review I wrote on Amazon for a Kindle book, Recycled Crafts: Crafts Made Using Recycled Materials by Kara Kelso and her 10 year old daughter, Jillian.  Kara has a blog, Idea Queen, where she discusses recycled crafts as well as other crafts, food & recipes, home & garden, and shopping & saving.  While a number of her posts and crafts are geared towards parents and what can be done with their children, I think I'm going to have keep an eye on this blog.  She has some great ideas!

This is from the Amazon website so I'd have an image to pin on Pinterest.  :)

Onto the book.  Like with her blog, many of the crafts would be fun for children, but I do see some that I'm going to try, and some have planted other ideas in my head.

Here's the review I wrote for Amazon:

I like that this book has a range of ideas and techniques. There is sewing, painting, decoupaging, and more. Each technique is described in good detail so even a novice should get great results.

There are a number of materials used (water bottles, CDs, T-shirts, jeans, boxes...) with cute, imaginative ways to dress them up for functional items. The full-color pictures are wonderful, and I like that multiple examples of some projects are shown.

I also like that the author's cat, Stella, is in a few pictures. The poor cat thought she was going to get a dolled-up box that was destined for another purpose. I hope the author and her daughter dressed up a box for Stella, too.

Unfortunately I did find some formatting problems:

The table of contents is not functional. If I want to go back to a specific project, I either need to scroll through the book to find it or set bookmarks for each of the projects ahead of time.

In some places, the picture and the description are on different pages. Once I thought the description was for the picture right above it (on the same page), but it was really for the one on the next page. I'm not sure if there's anything that can be done to fix that, though. Maybe a page break?

In the T-shirt pillow section, there are a number of white squares that appear with the black or sepia background. I have sepia turned on because I do a lot of reading when I can't sleep (like tonight), and it's less jarring in the dark. I checked them with the white background, and they aren't visible. I don't know if those are missing pictures or something else.

Later in the book, starting in the "Computer Art" section (specifically the line above "Window Art" and down until a few lines after "Step 1"), it appears that lines are highlighted. It occurs in "Keyboard Necklaces", too (the whole section), and just the heading for "Word Magnets". Again, I wouldn't have noticed it if I was using the white background (I checked). It doesn't distract from the instructions, but I found it a bit odd.

All in all, I recommend this book. Hopefully the author can get the table of contents working to make the book easier to flip around in, but don't let that detract you from getting this book and trying out these projects! The next time my husband is ready to toss a pair of jeans, I'm going to make catnip mice for our cats, and I'll keep in mind the other projects as we have the available items!

Yes, I did go on a bit about formatting things, but I would want to know about it if it was my book.  Fortunately, Kara agreed and wrote a reply to my review:

Thank you so much for the feedback! Your suggestions for formatting and table of contents will be fixed in the second edition. So glad you found a lot of useful crafts for you and your family.

Oh, and Stella does have her own decorated box (two, actually) that Jillian made for her :)

Steve can tell you, I was very tickled at this reply.  I've written 11 reviews on Amazon so far (most of them in the middle of the night when I couldn't sleep, so I hope they're coherent), and Kara has been the only one to respond.  I was also genuinely happy that Stella the cat has her own decorated boxes.  I may have to do that for our cats.  I think Steve thought I was nuts, going on and on about Kara replying to my review and about Stella having her own fancy boxes.  I guess I'm still in that "authors are out THERE" mentality that I mentioned in my Sweater Quest book review a few weeks ago.  (Oh! Adrienne Martini linked to that review on her her blog.  I was so excited!)

Like I mentioned in the review, I recommend Recycled Crafts: Crafts Made Using Recycled Materials, especially if you have kids and are looking for ways to recycle materials meant for the trash.  I look forward to reading more about what the "Idea Queen" comes up with!

Same stitches, different beads (and a few updates)

Last July I wrote about a set of jewelry I made using the same bead but different stitches. The necklace was made with spiral stitch, the bracelet with Right Angle Weave (RAW), and the earrings with RAW beaded beads with a bit of a change.  I get a lot of compliments on this set, and people look at me funny when I tell them it was easy.

When I bought those adorable vintage purply/gray bicones, I also picked up some vintage black bicones and frosted white oval-ish/bicone-ish beads.  I thought they would look good together in a RAW bracelet, and yesterday I finally did it.  I took a picture of it with the original purply/gray bracelet so you can compare:

I like the subtle and bold look the bracelet has, and it will go with just about anything.

Next I made the earrings.  The challenge with making RAW beaded beads with these beads is inconsistency in sizes, especially with the black bicones.  It took a few tries, but I got two that look to be the same size:

They don't look as compact and ball-like as the originals, but they have an interesting look to them.  Instead of just nestling a bicone at the top and bottom of the beaded bead, I had to also add one in the middle for the black/white ones to give it a little more stability (and so you don't see the headpin through the gaps).

Finally, I'm working on a spiral rope for a necklace.  It's not done yet, but I have enough of it done for you to see how it looks:

You can really see the spiral when using two colors like this.

Unlike the purply/gray set, the black/white set will be for sale.  I'll be sad to see it go, but I have so many pieces with black, white, and gray that I won't miss it.  Besides, I'll have enough beads left over to make a few more sets, I think.

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Update #1:

The above set will be completed and out for my big sale of the summer, the Donna Lexa Memorial Art Fair in Wales, Wisconsin.  It's from 9a - 4p, and it's sure to be a lovely time.  I hope to see you there!

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Update #2:

A few weeks ago I wrote about making jewelry for my friend Geri based on a shoe that she was to wear to be in a wedding (if you missed it, you can read about it here).  I mentioned that Geri couldn't go to the wedding, but she was still thrilled with the jewelry.  She wore the jewelry and the shoes (but with different clothes) to an Adam Ant concert, and she posted a few pictures:

I think she looks great, and I'm sure she had a great time at the concert.  I'm so jealous.  Thanks for the pictures, Geri!

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Update #3:

This is a sad update, unfortunately.  Last August I wrote about the passing of my cat, Simoon.  (You can read about her here if you're interested.)  She loved being on my desk and right in the middle of everything. 

After a few months, Steve's cat, Miss Katy, wanted to hang out on my desk.  She came up next to my chair and meowed at me.  I lifted her on my lap, and after she had enough of lap time, she climbed up on my desk.  She loved stretching out and pressing the Caps Lock key or the Escape Key (especially while I chatted with Steve on Facebook during lunch).  I liked having her there because it made me a little less lonely that Simoon was gone.

You know what's coming... Katy was 20 years old.  Her age caught up to her, and she started shutting down.  Last Friday we took her to the vet where we said goodbye to her.  We are both heartbroken.  Steve had her since she was a small kitten, and I worked very hard to win her over since Steve and I started dating in 2007.  I spent a lot of time with her: during the day with her on my desk or on her shelf in the kitchen, in the evening with her on the back of my couch (sometimes begging for food), and at night with her sleeping between our pillows after I brushed her.  A lot of that time was spent petting her and telling her I loved her.

We will miss her terribly, but we have no regrets.  We cared for her the best we could, and we knew she loved us as much as we loved her.

Frisco, our new kitten, is already taking up some of Katy's duties and is frequently keeping watch on the kitchen shelf as well as bothering me on my desk.  He's even started sleeping with us for part of the night, and that helps somewhat.  It'd help a lot more if he wasn't so playful (and so sharp while he plays)!  He has time.  Lots and lots of time.

Tool Review: One Step Looper

One of the first things I ever made when I started making jewelry was earrings.  I'm not sure the grammar of that sentence is correct, but you get my meaning.  I took a head pin, put a bead or three on it, cut the excess off leaving an indeterminate amount, made a loop in it, and voila! I had a dangle for an earring.  I don't remember when I started doing this, but I believe I was in my early-to-mid twenties.  As I am about to turn (ahem) 42, it has been probably about 20 years.

In all of those 20 years, I have not yet perfected this simple dangle.  What's that?  I make jewelry for a living but can't make a consistent dangle?  Yeah, I know.  Embarrassing, isn't it?  I can never gauge how long past the beads to leave the wire, so my loops are either too small or too big or too odd-looking, and I found myself remaking pieces and throwing away a perfectly good pin.  I even took to using straight pins (from the sewing aisle) because they were incredibly cheap.  Not very malleable, though, so that might have contributed to my problem.

At long last, there is a solution.  It's not without its problems, but it is a HUGE step in the right direction.  I first heard of BeadSmith's One Step Looper from my friend Michelle.  She was so excited about it and gave me a demonstration.  She has let me borrow it, and I made many pairs of earrings in a short amount of time and decided to tell all of you about it.

Here's what the tool looks like:

Yup, that's in it's "natural" position.  It's a little wide for my taste, but there is a reason for it.  Let's look at the business end of the Looper:

The wire goes in on the left side.  It goes under that circular peg, above the two pointy bits, and through the hole you can't see on the right side which is in that round swoopy part.  Yes, these are all technical terms, I'll have you know.

Let's see it in action:

The wire is placed, and we give it a squeeze:

This is in mid-squeeze.  You can see that the wire is already cut and the loop is starting to form.  The excess wire shimmied its way through the hole as I was juggling the camera and the Looper.

(Do you know how hard it is to take a picture of a process like this?  One hand is squeezing, and the other hand is taking a picture.  Very hard!  I should have waited until Steve got home so he could take the picture.)

Once you've squeezed (squoze?) all the way, here's the result:

As you can see, the loop isn't closed all the way.  This is okay if you're going to put it on an earring wire.  You just slide the loop onto the earring wire then close.  It would be nice if it had the capability of closing all the way, but I'm more concerned with the amount of wire is left between the bead and the loop.  That's a little much for me.

I tried it again and really pushed the beads up as far as they would go:

Michelle said that it helps if you rock it a bit while you're squeezing.  I think that tightens the gap and closes the loop more, but I haven't tried it yet.

Here's what I got from pushing the beads far up:

The first one I did is on the left, and the second is on the right.  Much better, isn't it?  I don't think it's ever going to be right next to the beads, but I can live with a little gap.  I also wish the loop was a tiny bit larger or if there were attachments that you could snap in to make different sized loops, but for making simple dangles for earrings, these Loopers are brilliant.  I found that if I press my thumb in on the end while I squeeze there is a smaller gap.

So since I can't have inconsistent earrings like the above pair, I remade the first one.  PLD (Pre-Looper Days) I would have tossed that pin.  However, PLD (Post-Looper Days - hey, wait... that doesn't work), I can use that pin to make a small dangle.

Here's a comparison of a normal-sized pin and the cut-down pin from the first earring (with a 6mm bead on it so you can kinda tell how big it is):

I inserted the pin as far in as it would go:

The hole in the swoopy part is there to stablize the wire.  When working with a smaller wire, I had to be careful it didn't slip.  It was long enough to cut and loop, leaving me with a small dangle and a small end I don't feel guilty tossing:

I put that dangle in a diamond-shaped earring component:

No wasted wire!

But what of the spare piece leftover from a non-rejected dangle?  That can be used, too!

That's a 5mm crystal up there for size comparison.  I took one end of the wire, made a loop right at the end, put the crystal on, and made a loop at the other end:

This could be used in any number of jewelry pieces.

I did try it with one straight pin, and it cut just fine.  I have some earring components with a bunch of holes in them, and I think I'd prefer to use straight pins which are dirt cheap rather than the more expensive headpins.  However, since the tool isn't mine, I didn't want to dull it by cutting a bunch of harder pins.

To sum up: this tool is really neat.  (Another technical term, that.)  I don't know if there's any way they could change it so there'd be less of a gap, but that can be worked around with a bit of patience and ingenuity.  The benefits far outweigh the negatives, so I recommend it very highly for anyone who makes earrings or dangles for any purpose.

Unlike the two previous tools I reviewed (the Xuron Fireline scissors and the Xuron 4 in 1 Crimper), I have no plans to carry the BeadSmith One Step Looper.  They can be found all over the Internet, sometimes under BeadSmith and sometimes under Vintaj.  As far as I can tell, they're the same tool.

I have one last warning:  If you get this tool, you will soon run out of earring ideas and maybe even beads!  That's not a bad problem to have.

Unfortunately, I need to give this back to Michelle.  Hopefully I'll get my own soon, and Steve will have to make me another earring holder!

Update!

Up there ^ I mentioned that I wish there could be a bigger loop.  As of June, 2014 there's a new tool called the One Step Big Looper, which makes loops twice the size!  I've posted a review of it, including comparisons with the original One Step Looper.  Check that out before you pick up the tool so you get the right one for the size loops you'll need.

Butterscotch and green luster (Kits rant #2)

You may know that I am busily getting ready to submit classes for the 2014 Bead&Button Show.  The submissions are due Friday, and I still have a few things to stitch.  Steve said I should call this post "Stitch 'n Bitch", but I didn't want it to get confused with Stitch 'n Bitch: The Knitter's Handbook, their other books, and their groups.  I haven't read any of the books yet, but they look like an awful lot of fun.

A few weeks ago my blog post was about my struggles in getting all the beads I need for kits.  I said that I had to order from five different places to get what I wanted.  One concern was price, but another concern was color.

Hold on... a package was just delivered.  Yes!  It's my final order from my purchases a few weeks ago.  That was fast considering it came all the way from the Czech Republic!  Excuse me while I open it to see if I'm going to bitch about the color of one type of bead or two.  This box is more secure than Fort Knox.

Huh, this is interesting.  Okay - I'm going to bitch about the color of two types of beads.  I'll cover the original one then get back to the Czech order.

Butterscotch.  Sounds tasty, doesn't it?  The original color scheme of my Cobblestone Path (that I showed in my post from a few weeks ago) has 6mm faceted round fire polish beads in a Butterscotch color.  I'm not able to buy in bulk where I originally got those beads, so I have been looking for them online.  I found what I thought were the same beads on only one website (called two-tone crystal and tan).  They didn't have anything else I needed, so I had to get a few other things to get up to the $25 minimum.  Not a huge deal - I'll use those to make jewelry to sell (as opposed to putting them in kits).

So here's the original color:

Here's the picture from the website of the two tone crystal and tan:

 

 
It's a bit hard to tell the color, but it looked really close.  I could see a bit of crystal in there, which made sense since they're called "two tone crystal and tan", but it seemed that the color would be mostly tan with just a little bit of crystal.  Not ideal, but I was willing to live with it.

However, here's what I got:

The color is very close, but look at all of the beads that are mostly crystal with hardly any tan in them.  I think that would completely change the look of the piece.  I wouldn't mind some crystal in the beads, but since the rest of the beads in the design are opaque I don't want there to be a lot of translucency in the largest beads.  I think it'll look weird.  Steve liked them, but I wasn't happy.  I kept envisioning what it would look like stitched up and didn't like it.  I'm sure the beads will work for something, but not for this.

I looked at the website more and found some 8mm two tone tan.  The picture looked too much like the crystal and tan one, though, and I couldn't find any of the same color in the 6mm size.  There was also a Butterscotch that I was curious about, but there wasn't a picture.  I called them and asked if there was a two tone tan in 6mm, but we realized that the item numbers were nearly identical (the only change was the code for size), and she agreed that the picture looked a lot like the 6mm size.  She said there's not too much of a call for tan beads so they don't have a lot of choices.  Just my luck to fall in love with a color that's hard to find!

I asked about the Butterscotch, and she was kind enough to e-mail me a picture, not just of the Butterscotch but showing them with the two tone crystal and tan:

They're a little darker, but the color is solidly matte (not solid, but I like the variations) with no crystal peeking out.  Steve and I discussed it, and we decided to not return the first ones (I'll do something with them, and we'd have to pay to ship them back which seems like a waste of money) and to get the Butterscotch for my kits (plus some extra black 6mm for more kits of that colorway).  They came yesterday, and I like them a lot better.

Here's a picture with all three of the colors side by side.  The original ones are in the middle so you can compare them with each of the new ones.

I'm pleased that I chose to not try using the crystal and tan ones and that I asked to see the Butterscotch ones.  Those stick closer to what my vision is for the piece.

Now for the green luster.

My original color scheme uses green luster Super Duos.  I really like them because they're opaque, matte, and have the slightest variation in color.  I needed more to make a second sample, but the store has been out of them.  I stopped by a different store because I was in the area, and while they didn't have "green luster", they had "opaque baby blue".  Wait a minute!  Blue isn't green, Traci!  Yeah, I know, but look:

The ones on the left are green luster, and the ones on the right are "opaque baby blue".  Yes, they have a slight bluish tint, but since I needed to stitch up my sample, they're close enough.  They look pretty good, too!

Today's package from the Czech Republic included 100 grams of Chalk White Green Lustre.  Here's the picture on the website:

My "Huh, this is interesting." from above is what I found when I looked at the Chalk White Green Lustre that was delivered.  There's some purple in some of the beads, which is not shown in the above picture.  I thought at first that some purple Super Duos made it into the bag (which happens occasionally), but the other side of the bead is the right color.  Sometimes it occurs on the side, sometimes on the end, sometimes on the front/back.  It's not on every bead, though, and it doesn't seem all that distracting.

Here - you can judge for yourself:

This time the original green luster is on the right side.  I purposefully put a purple one right in the middle of the "new color" pile.  You can see hints of purple in a few other beads.  Steve would say that I'm going to say this because it's purple, but I kind of like it.  It's just a touch, and it doesn't clash with any of the other colors in my Cobblestone Path design.

On a side note: if you want to pour beads from the original bag into a reclosable bag, don't do it over your example, especially before you take pictures.  Beads will go everywhere, and you'll have a hard time picking them out of the "original color" pile and will have to use new ones out of the tube to get an accurate color example.  On the plus side, since I had a hard time picking the new color out of the pile of the original color, I think I succeeded in finding a good source!

Now that all my beads are here, do I put aside the one I'm 2/3 done with and stitch a new one with the new colors to take a picture of for the class submission?  No, I don't think so.  Time is ticking away, and the one I'm working on is very, very close to what the kit colors will be.  (Steve is breathing a sigh of relief right now, I'm sure.)

Since this blog should actually have a point, I'll say that it's very important to have patience and a bit of flexibility when ordering online.  If I had my heart set on that exact color of 6mm bead or the Super Duos, I'd drive myself even more crazy trying to find them, or I'd spend a lot more than I want to get enough for kits.  I'm looking forward to making test pieces out of each of the color schemes to see how well I did.  Hopefully I'll get that done and posted next week!

Book review: Sweater Quest: My Year of Knitting Dangerously

Long time readers of my blog may remember my first mention of Sweater Quest: My Year of Knitting Dangerously back in September 2010 in my Stop me!!! post.  The author, Adrienne Martini, commented on my post and difficulty with knitting: "Keep at it. You'll get it!"  I squeed about this in my By Jove... post the next day.

We had a brief e-mail exchange, and in January 2011 I asked if I could do a book review and quote a few passages from the book.  I also sent her a link to my post about my second knitting project.  That's about the hooded sweater I had so many problems getting started (and which I'm still working on and will be posting about when the damned thing is finally done).  She replied, "Please review away! And I admire your determination of project #2. I believe I would have just set the thing on fire."

So before I get to the book, I want to do a little "author review".  Adrienne Martini is awesome!  It used to be (not all that long ago, actually) that authors were (to me, anyway) untouchable and  unreachable.  The Interwebs have changed all that.  It's one thing to follow an author on Facebook (which was essential when Brandon Sanderson was finishing up Robert Jordan's Wheel of Time series), but for an author to find a blog post and comment on it and also to be so cool in e-mails really blew my mind.  She's encouraging and funny, and I want to be just like her when I grow up.

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And now for the book review, two and a half years later than I had planned.  As I mentioned in Stop me!!!, I had seen Sweater Quest in a bookstore but purchased it for the Kindle.  I do feel a bit bad about that, but we like to save money as well as space in our house.

The basic premise of the book is that Adrienne Martini decided to knit a Fair Isle sweater (Starmore's Mary Tudor) in one year.  That seems like an awfully long period of time - if you really concentrate and knit every day, it should take far less time to knit a sweater.  My husband and my mother are laughing at me right now - I've been working on that damned hooded sweater for almost three years, and it still has quite a ways to go.  But to be fair, there have been many months where I haven't even touched it.

What makes Adrienne's quest so daunting is that Fair Isle is an extremely complicated style of knitting.  Take a look here for a Google image search on the style.  Not only was she going to do a sweater, which is complicated to begin with, she was going to do fancy colorwork that puts the train hat I just made to shame.  She had never knit in this style before, so she had to learn an awful lot before she could even start despite already being an accomplished knitter.

After a bit of an introduction on her and why she chose to knit the Mary Tudor, she explains the mechanics of knitting, which I found most useful when I picked up the needles to try knitting for the 5,000th time.  She discussed different ways of holding the yarn which made me question why I was doing what I was trying to do.  I did it the other way, and voila! I'm able to knit.

For those of you who do not knit, here's an accurate description of what it's like when you start:

At first, knitting feels like the most awkward thing you could be doing with your hands.  The needles jump out of your hands.  The yarn ties itself in knots.  Your fingers act like an infant's when he tries to pick up a Cheerio.  Knitting feels like the hardest easiest craft in the world.  Practice, coupled with a willingness to look foolish, is what separates knitters from nonknitters.

There's quite the feeling of accomplishment when you can actually create a piece of fabric that looks like the ones you get in the stores, I must say.  Those first few rows where it "looked right" had me hooked.  Wait, not hooked - that's crochet.  Needled.  Yeah - that's the word.  Knitting has me needled in many senses of the word.

She then discusses the different ways to add different colors to your work (as if knitting single-colored pieces isn't difficult enough):  Intarsia and stranded.  I am impressed with how she describes each of the methods using every day objects that nonknitters can understand (provided people remember what a dot matrix printer is).  The Mary Tudor uses stranded knitting - holding one color of yarn in each hand, and Adrienne practiced by learning how to knit while holding the yarn in the "other" hand (the one she's not used to using).  It was stressful, to say the least, but she writes about it with a sense of humor.

At this point you'd think the book would go into a detailed description of each row of the knitting itself:  "Row 2 - Lost track of the pattern and had to rip it out.  Row 19 - Ran out of yarn and had to add a new ball."  Yes, there are times when she discusses the actual knitting, but there is so much more - history and insight into the process from her point of view and from other knitters' experiences - that I came away with an understanding of just how rich and varied this craft is.


Since Adrienne knit a Fair Isle sweater, she explained the history of Fair Isle knitting and how it became a distinct style.  She also wrote about the author of the pattern and the huge legal battles She Who Must Not Be Named fought protecting her brand.  There are discussions about copyrighting and branding that every designer (of any sort of craft) should read and consider.  How much of a change from your design is needed before it's no longer your design?


One big impediment to knitting a true Mary Tudor is the yarn.  The specific yarns needed for the pattern are no longer made.  Appropriate substitutes are difficult if not impossible.  She found out just how wrong one of her substitutions was by making a swatch:

All knitting designers insist that swatches are a necessary evil.  If you don't swatch, you are a bad knitter.  You'll get the gout, they warn.  Asteroids will crash into your backyard.  Chaos will rule the land.

She knits the swatch, ditches math after trying to calculate how long the sweater will take based on how long the swatch took, blocks the swatch for testing the size, and wrenches it away from her cat who "is so angry about damp handknits".  She realizes that she needs to go up a needle size (which is why you do swatches in the first place), but then she makes a startling color discovery:

Eucalyptus is not a substitute for Marjoram.  It's not even close enough that you could squint your eyes and mumble, "It'll do."  Eucalyptus leaps out of the design like a naked lady at a nun convention.  So much so that my husband, when I show him the swatch, gently asks, "Before I say this, are you beyond the point where you could change anything?"

"Not at all," I say.  "It's just a swatch.  I was staving off gout."

"Anything you can do about that ugly green?"

"Get a different one." I explain that I was trying to find a substitute for a color that no longer exists.

The main reason I included that section is because I nearly peed myself laughing about swatching to stave off gout.  I hate swatching, which is how I got into all sorts of trouble with that damned hooded sweater that will never be done.

She lucked out that a friend of hers happened to have the exact yarn needed and sent it to her immediately.  Crisis averted!


Adrienne wrote about people, too: Mary Tudor (yes, THE Mary Tudor, since she's the inspiration for the sweater's design), the woman Adrienne bought the design book from on eBay, her friend Ann who sent her the much-needed Marjoram yarn, Susette Newberry (who knit an abecedarium - check out her blog for what that means and for what she does), Cyndi Lee (who knits and teaches yoga), Stephanie Pearl-McPhee (who also writes about knitting and who also has made me almost pee myself laughing), and so many more.  She traveled to New York, Canada, the Knitter's Review Retreat in Massachusetts, and a few other places throughout the year while knitting the sweater and writing the book.  Everywhere she went she talked to knitters about why they do what they do, and it's all interesting.  When you knit you're in your own head, and I found it fascinating to get insight into why others knit and what they think about it.  Interspersed throughout it all are glimpses into everyday life with her husband, kids, and the damp-knit-hating cat.

And, of course, she writes about the sweater.  Did she finish it in time?  Does it fit?  Is it beautiful?  Does it look remotely like it's supposed to?  These are all questions answered in the book, and you won't get any hints from me!  If you like a dry sense of humor, knitting, history, people-watching, cats, and more knitting, I think you'll love Sweater Quest: My Year of Knitting Dangerously by Adrienne Martini.  Even if you don't knit, I think it's a great read.  You never know, it may turn you into a knitter as it did me!

(If you click the above graphic, it'll bring you to the Amazon page, and it seems that the paperback version is on sale for $6!  Such a bargain!)

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I have to say that blogging today has been quite difficult.  First Frisco the bitey-kitten wanted to eat the words I was typing - no joke! - then he crawled all over the keyboard, then he latched onto my arm to nom on my hand.  I tried to get a picture of him trying to eat the words off of the screen, but he stopped being cute the second I picked up the camera.  And then... when he finally became quiet and fell asleep, he used my iPad as a pillow.  The same iPad I needed to write the review.  I got that picture.  :)

Fortunately kittens don't sleep for long, and fortunately when he woke up he decided to wander around the kitchen, leaving me to write my review in peace.