Break Bead Fast

I gave up buying new beads for Lent. It was a rough 40 days. Now that Easter has passed, I am nearly overwhelmed with the knowledge that I CAN HAVE ANYTHING - if I can pay for it.

Now I wonder if I will be overwhelmed with the possibilities presented by so many new beads! I had been drooling over Indonesian glass, bicolor Czech glass, pyrite-encrusted quartz, and some delicious  alien pod-berries by Karen Elmquist. I have now bought them. Anticipaaaaaaation!

I cannot wait for the day that, as a designer, I have a specific image in my head that I am able to accurately recreate in reality. Sometimes I come close. Those are good days.

I am so psyched by this new necklace! A rare example of having the knowledge I needed to make exactly what I wanted.

I made the cloud shape from 16ga copper wire, pounded it for a bit, and then soldered the puffy curls together. I am proud of that. Plus new Happy Mango beads, a pinch of Czech glass, and a colorful range of rainbow amazonite.

The "petrichor" stamping is a subtle Dr. Who shout out, as well as one of the 100 most beautiful words in the list curated by Robert Beard. I've been hanging onto these letter stamps for a while now, hoping to find some beautiful words to stamp - I'm a little jaded by the cookie-cutter word stamps out there ["love" "live" "laugh"], so I had to come up with something really good. Found it! Expect more word stampings shortly.

My New BEADs!!!

No, it is that exciting. Exciting enough for all caps and three exclamation marks, which I rarely ever do.

I gave in to the enormous pressure of a big sale from my favorite bead company and went, possibly, a little overboard. The end result was that I ended up ordering a LOT of beads and went into debt to myself. There's a spreadsheet. It's a little complicated. I still owe myself 68 bucks, so I gotta keep getting Etsy sales so I can start accumulating the money to pay for Christmas, too. ;)

 This is how excited I was when I got:

 My big box of rocks!!!

Tourmaline in multiple colors, from watermelon green to that yummy pink.

Labradorite in rounds, nuggets, drops, rondelles, and puffed ovals.

Pink Peruvian opal and yum yum yum amethyst!

Chunky rose quartz and tourmalinated quartz behind there.

Rough aquamarine, smoky lemon quartz . . . eeeeeee!

Can't get over the schiller on this sunstone. o_O Love.

Faceted and brandy citrine.

More sunstone, ametrine, and this awesome rough, pebbly peridot.

One of my favorite stones, chysoprase.

Ohmigoodness!!! I've never seen beads this big. Ever. Enormous, faceted nuggets of rainbow fluorite.

I have a cardiac quiz tomorrow. And somehow, I will study, because I am a good student. But I'll be casting frequent longing glances over at my yummy rock box while I do.