Focusing on Life;Growth and Change

Focusing on life this week the subject was growth and change. I think my flowers show growth and change  more than anything around me. I start my morning glories from seed in the spring and by this time on year they are all the way to the roof of my porch. I have highway mesh between the porch posts and it gets covered with morning glories to make a private hideaway that is truly beautiful. It's a peaceful place to sit and relax. I agree with Sally that we are all growing and changing throughout our lives. It is hard to show personal growth in pictures so I am letting my flowers speak for me. To see what the other participants posted this week click on this link http://thestudiosublime.com/blog-2/

Today I am participating in Lorelei Eurto's blog hop. She showed items from Michael's arts & Crafts and asked us to get the same items and make something with them. The first piece I made used the Chartreuse rounds and the shell discs. I added copper cornerless cubes and a handmade copper clasps. The two chartreuse ovals my friend Ruby got in a box  from a flea market in Hawaii and gave to me. The lampworked bead came from the teacher of my first lampworking class. I added a copper frame to showcase it. I hope you like it. Next I made "Blue Owl." I made links with the ceramic beads, seed beads, and brass wire. I connected the links with ceramic donuts and more brass wire. I used the white nuggets to accent the donuts. To me they look like feathers. The focal is one of the owl buttons mounted on a Swazi square button with more feathers nuggets below it. The ends of the straps also have the owl buttons. I finished  the necklace with brass rolo chain and a lobster clasp. You should check out what others made for this hop at http://lorelei1141.blogspot.com/

Alenka Obid is a wonderful polymer clay artist who's work I admire. Today is the first anniversary of her blog. To celebrate she is having a blog hop. I am one of the participants. She sent us each one of her clay components and asked us to make something with it. Here is what I made. The moment I looked at the component I saw fringe on the bottom so that is what I did. I stitched spiral ropes for the straps using shades of yellow and light apricot. I used double gold findings to finish the straps. I cut a finding in half for the clasp end. The focal end has beautiful yellow pearl and a Montana blue faceted teardrop.  I hope you like my necklace. It was fun making it. Please see what the other participants made at http://pepita-handmade.blogspot.ca/

If you follow my blog you know that I have been designing for www.znetshows.com. I was a prize winner in the last www.znetshows.com design challenge. My prize package arrived in the mail yesterday. I was excited to open it and see what I got. The pic above is what I got. Am I lucky or what? Working with their products has been great. The pearls have beautiful luster and come in wonderful colors. Their crystals glimmer and shine. I am going to place an order for more of their sea glass. I had a package of the wavy discs on my order list and I am lucky enough to get them in this prize package. I have thoroughly enjoyed designing with their wonderful products. You should click on the links above to see all of the beads and findings that they have. Their prices are very reasonably.

Focusing on life:blue

Today's prompt for focusing on life is blue. I chose these little blue flowers, My husband's Mom and Grandma have had these flowers growing for as long as he can remember. Each time they moved they took them with to the new house. The last move Mom didn't take the little blue flowers with and later she regretted  this. She didn't know the name of the flower. They all just called them little blue flowers. Several years ago we were driving country roads to a car show when we stopped at a garage sale in a town of about 100 people. The lady was in her 80's. She had some of the little blue flowers in an old boot for sale. She even knew that they were wild wandering jews. Now they are back in our lives. They are the most intense blue I have ever seen in a flower. I included my thumb for size reference.To see the other participants blue choices please go to http://thestudiosublime.com/