Tuesday, March 15, 2016

Beading and learning and repurposing

These are two motifs from a beaded bracelet kit.

My motto this year is "use it!" so when I ran across this kit bought two years ago I thought, "don't store it, use it!"
 so I gathered my little beading dish, instructions, fireline pattern, glasses, kit beads, and courage to follow someone else's pattern. I got together with one of my beading friends Cindy, took a deep breath, looked over the instructions, threaded the needle and began.
I made one motif, we put our heads together and realized I had missed some important instructions.
(blink, blink) (do I abandon the project? hide the evidence deep in the studio? Undo the beads back to the mistake? )
I carefully undid the beads, and miraculously finished two motifs, and joined them with a motif before I gave up for the day!

Lessons learned:
1. not all patterns are clear although this one really is done well
2. go ahead and start, you can do it!
3. have a friend nearby for support
4. Learning is a good thing. Doing something you've never done, a good thing.
I used fireline and double holed cylinder beads for the first time, and wove the pattern for the first time.

I carted my stuff along in this bag...
Thank you to Lancome for the freebie!

It's silver and black leather like and a great size.

I didn't really like the Lancome brand on it however, sorry to them...






It occurred to me I could place one of my ornaments over it...
so all I have to do now, is sew in on to have another cool tote, more like me.

Repurposed.

And I'm "using" a bag and an embellishment.

BTW, my friend Joanne just did a great post showing many miniature quilts so take a look
http://teatimegardening.blogspot.com/2016/03/mini-quilt-show.html

6 comments:

Deb said...

Your beaded motifs turned out well, I love the new look of the tote bag. happy beading.

easyweimaraner said...

I like the meaded motifs... the deep blue makes it special and a little mysterious somehow... like a magic amulet :o)

quiltedfabricart said...

so true - I save all earrings that I have lost the other one or it's just not my style, cool buttons, bangles - anything that catches my eye. you never know when it will come in handy. I must take out my collection and start using them more. thank you for the nudge :-)

Quiltsmiles said...

Beautiful Lee Anna! Love that you are using your kits, bags and embellishments too, good for you!!!! Of course while doing a beautiful bracelet project means even more kudos to ya.
Now that is another area where I am sliding and I had hoped to get to one project a month done this year, the operative word there was HOPE.
Too many things I want to get to. Just got back from a month long Florida vacation and haven't had a chance to blog about it. Still need to upload many photos now that I've got most of the mail and many emails attended to.
I'll be stopping by again soon.

Joanne said...

Hi LeeAnna,
Thanks for placing the link! Great to hear/read Barbara enjoyed it!
Super beadwork! And an expidition tote! "use it" 2016! Sucessful!

Joanne said...

Hi LeeAnna,
Thanks for placing the link! Great to hear/read Barbara enjoyed it!
Super beadwork! And an expidition tote! "use it" 2016! Sucessful!