Focus On : Lucite

I wanted to share with you my love for beading with Lucite flowers and leaves.  When the idea came to me, I sat down at the computer and went through my jewelry design photos to find the ones with Lucite.  I purchase my Lucite from The Hole Bead Shoppe.  This post will likely sound a bit like a commercial for their shop, but that is ok!  Kelli and Michael Burns are the owners and I have been a huge fan since I came across their designs in magazines and fell in love with the Lucite.  Lucite is a lightweight but durable and comes in a vast amount of colors and styles. I can't honestly say I remember what set me off down the "garden" path, but it is wonderful to have a product that incorporates well into so many designs.  I love flowers and nature is a continuing inspiration to my designs.  Here are some of the designs I have made using Lucite flowers and leaves.

Clockwise from largest box:
Garden of Skulls~award winning design in a contest sponsored by The Hole Bead Shoppe
Round Robin Bracelet project
Vineyard Fall bracelet
Autumn Hoot (lampwork owl bead by Keiara Wells)
Ladder stitch rings with Lucite embellishment
Christmas Holly (tiny red Lucite flowers in the fringe work)
Wienie Dog Garden Necklace for my niece, Creighton
Vintage Garden birds (with galvanized leaves and black Lucite flowers)
Autumn Splendor fringe bracelet
Fairy sets (made from Swarovski crystals and Lucite butterflies)

Clockwise from top right:
My first Bead Soup Blog Hop bead mix sent to my partner Shea (has Lucite leaves in the mix)
Tatterpillar Garden necklace (lampwork caterpillars by Chris)
Lucite purchase from Tucson trip (Plus I got to meet Kelli & Michael in person!)
Buzzy's Dream Garden (soldered charms from Brown Dog Studio)

And even with all those designs, I know I didn't find all the pictures or we didn't take pictures of everything.  Plus here is a brand new design using one of Chris's Beaky Birds (a new tropical version) and LOADS of Lucite flowers and leaves.

Isn't it adorable?  I love this bird!  The design actually came to Chris in a dream and we worked together to get the feet and legs right.

Also on the Hole Bead Shoppe, they are  now selling some of their famous design patterns.  I really love these!

English Picket Fence

Lucie's Daisy Patch

I actually bought the kit for the Daisy Patch, but have never had time to finish it!  I also have always wanted to make the Picket Fence, though I am sure the time issue would prevent it from happening too!

Since I have already done a commercial here, I will mention in closing that The Hole Bead Shoppe also sells seed beads, kits, Czech Glass (they have terrific prices on Spikes and Twins), and sequins.  I recently purchase some of their lovely sequins for embellishing all sorts of bead work! 

Stop by and shop for some Lucite and YOU won't be able to stop!
(By the way, I received no compensation for my promotion of The Hole Bead Shoppe, I just love their products and you will too!)

And The Winners Are...

So I just received this email, and wanted to share the results.

Hi Designers and Judges of The Day of the Dead Challenge,

We're happy to announce the winners of our Day of the Dead Challenge. First, I'd like to say two things!

Thank you so much for all your hard work. We so appreciate all the effort you each put into your designs and we know from experience how hard deadlines are - but even with the deadlines you all did a SUPER job.

All of the JUDGES......including Lauren Vasil and Debi Cogwell had lots of questions and worked so hard to judge fairly, by the contest rules for participation and make sure they got all information they could from the entries before casting their votes.

As a matter of fact - MOST of the judges votes were cast at the LAST minute because all the designs were so beautiful.

A note to the judges - thank you for complying with my harsh rules of NO likes or comments on the designers pictures before we announced the winners....you may NOW post whatever you like on the photo albums and blog. You're both amazing judges and I can't say how much we appreciate your hard work with your busy schedules.

So - I'll stop blabbing. WINNERS: Please CONTACT ME with ALL your information so prizes can be sent and forwarded. You can see all prizes on the blog...http://theholebeadshop.blogspot.com/

And thank you Debi RAE Cogwell and Pamela Hawkins of Bead Design Studio for your gifts.

And of course, you can announce that you won. We're going to list all the winners after our "Jar oh' Lucies" contest is over - but we would LOVE it is you told your friends that you've won. And congrats! And.......AGAIN thank you ALL for making our FIRST Bead Challenge so much fun. We LOVE you all....very much.

First Prize: Stephanie Sanner Haussler

Second Prize: Shelley Nybakke - Pleines

Third Prize: Beth Dewey

Fourth Prize: (Facebook FAN -Blog - People's Choice): Wendy Baker

Thank you again for all your efforts to make our contest a success.

Kelli and The Gang.....much love. 


Did you see what that says?!!!  It says I WON!  Oh MY GOSH!!!  I can't believe it!  I never thought I would win, maybe second but never first!  

Now for my Thank You speech:

I have to thank Chris and Mina foremost for putting up with all of my beading craziness, and for supporting me.  I am a VERY lucky woman to have you loving me every day.

First I would like to thank Kelli, Michael, Tarlee, and the Gang at The Hole Bead Shoppe!  You guys have been awesome and encouraged me since we "met" on the web.  Thanks for such an awesome challenge!  So fun, and I have NEVER put more work or time into one piece.  Thank you.



I would also like to thank Carla for teaching me to bead, it has enriched my life in a way I could never have imagined in the beginning and for your friendship I am very thankful.  Thank you to Julie for giving me a job that is never a job, because I am the Bead Girl and I love it! To Sherry Serafini and NanC Meinhardt for completely changing how I bead.  I want to thank Lori Anderson because without participating in her Bead Soup Parties in 2011, my beading would not have moved to the harder design level that has also completely changed my beading.



Thank you to all of my friends, family, and customers for your support of my beading passion (obsession) and for making me thankful every day to have something I love to do that makes others happy!  Thank you for letting me share your lives!

Thank you to Debi Cogwell for the fabulous focal!  I really loved your beads before I got to work with one, but now I am a huge fan!  I can't wait to use my gift certificate! 


Congratulations to all my design challenge competitors, your bead work is also very beautiful!  I never thought I would win! 

Voting Link for The Hole Bead Shoppe Is Now Active!

Kelli Burns and the Hole Bead Shoppe now have our photos on the blog for voting.  I would appreciate if you could stop by and vote.  You need to list my name, photo# or the name of the piece in a comment to place your vote.  The piece is called Garden of Skulls and it is photo #1.

Garden of Skulls by Stephanie Haussler

Thanks so much for your help!

You can now VOTE on our Day of the Dead Challenge by leaving a comment. The comment should be for your favorite piece/designer. Share this link with your FB friends, family, whomever. These votes will be used in conjunction with votes on Kelli Burns page, The Hole Bead Shop fan page.
Our offsite judges PalmtreeQueen Lampworks Glass Beads and Lauren Vasil will help the staff at The Hole Bead Shoppe select the other three prizes. Let the voting begin.
http://www.theholebeadshop.blogspot.com/

Day of the Dead Challenge Update...

Last week I told you about my newest Challenge project.  As I am sure you have noticed, posts have been a bit thin the past couple weeks.  All of my time is being spent at work at my two jobs or at work at my beading table.  To date I have worked about 13 hours on my project piece.  I have done a right angle weave using Tila beads, fringed with Lucite, pearls, crystal, and LOTS of seed beads, and now I am working a spiral herringbone tube that will at this point wrap around the fringe section.  Next (once the tube is done) I plan to finish the rope hanging the piece using some 8mm Chinese crystal rondelles accented with a netting stitch.  I am amazing myself!  I haven't seeded beaded this much all year, but it is looking amazing!  Stay tuned for further updates!

New Challenges...

Sorry for the silence, beading has been consuming all of my time!  Friday and Saturday we were in Lincoln for the Lincoln Bead Show which took place on Saturday.  Here are some highlights:

• The meeting room where the show was held was large and fairly well lit (anyway our area was, people in the back section struggled though)
• The room we spent the night in at same hotel, not so great.  Think 70's disco movie, with the pool area rented out for birthday parties and there were 4 going on Friday night until Midnight.
• The "non" smoking room, may have been now, but wasn't for about the previous twenty years.  Yuck, old stale cigarette smell.
• Bathroom, postage stamp size, but had good water pressure and hot water.  Wasn't too scary if you kept the lights off or your eyes shut.
• The arm rails on the chairs looked like werewolves had previously stayed there.  
• The bed was comfortable and clean, though my side sloped to the floor.
• Mina hung out in the room after we headed down to work in the bead show, until it was check out time.  Check out time came sooner than she thought when she saw the mouse running around in the room.

On the plus side, we had a terrific show and spent time visiting with our other bead vendor friends and had fun visiting with new and returning customers.  The dragons were a huge hit!

On the new front, I am one of ten participants taking part in The Hole Bead Shoppe's Day of the Dead Bead kit challenge.  Here is a picture of my kit supplies:

My kit fee was $50 and I got a $120+ value!  Crazy the amount of items that were in the kit, and WOW do I feel the pressure to create an over the top, fabulous piece!  The kit has a wide variety of Lucite flowers and leaves, Vintaj keys and blanks, fresh water pearls, Czech daggers and fire polish, Swarovski crystals, a variety of seed beads and Tila beads, gunmetal plate spacers, Tierracast beads and spacers, and a Palmtree Queen Day of the Dead lampwork focal.  Here is a picture of the skull beads the Hole Bead Shoppe added to our kits:

Mine is in the second row, second from the left!  They are AWESOME!

I received my kit on Monday, and I have worked on my piece about 5 hours so far.  I have a long ways to go, I will keep you in the loop!