Wednesday's Wear It Or Frog It

This necklace has been in my 'hmm not sure' box for some time. Looking at it now I realise that's because it's really not my style. I'm also horrified at how I wasted these beautiful triangle beads by just stringing them when I could have woven them into something far more interesting! Even though I still think it's pretty I've decided to frog it and use the beads for something else.

Monday Moodboard Reveal - Autumn Colours

Welcome to this week's Monday Moodboard! Here's a recap of the mosaic I posted for inspiration last week...

Clockwise from top-left: October Queen, Pot of Gold, Autumn Green, Chocolate Brown in Basketweave.

Nothing from me this week as I completely ran out of time! But we do have two gorgeous pieces from our team members Sarah and Maria.

Sarah created this stunning metallic gold and olive cuff in 3-drop peyote using the knitted image as inspiration...


And this beautiful autumnal butterfly pendant was made by Maria using wire and a mixture of beads.


If you've been inspired by this or previous Monday Moodboards then please drop me a line with your photos to liz@thecrimsonmoon.co.uk or alternatively add them to our Flickr group pool - we'd love to see your work!

Wednesdays Wear It or Frog it.

I rediscovered this necklace two weeks ago during the great wip cull of 2010! At the time it escaped the frog pond as I love the colours and anticipated that it would get more wear during the Autumn/Winter season and also because I remembered that it was a really fiddly job sewing those tubes together and didn't want the effort to be wasted. However, it's been back in my main jewellery box for two weeks now and I haven't worn it, so I have taken the plunge and frogged it.

Monday Moodboard - Autumn Colours

The trees are starting to change from green into autumn colours, the weather is getting colder and I picked up my first conker yesterday! So what better time to have an autumn themed Monday Moodboard...think chocolate brown, forest green, fiery gold and burnt orange or whatever colours make you think of autumn.

Clockwise from top-left: October Queen, Pot of Gold, Autumn Green, Chocolate Brown in Basketweave.

We'd love to see what you make using these colours so don't be shy, send us a photo! You can email them to me a liz@thecrimsonmoon.co.uk or if you have a Flickr account simply add them to our group pool.

Wednesday's Wear It Or Frog It

Well this is a blast from the past! I was digging around inside a box in my wardrobe the other day when I came across this necklace. I was so pleased to find it as it holds my very first peyote beaded bead!

I'd wanted to make one for ages but I couldn't find any instructions so decided to just wing it and see what happened. I was so proud of my first attempt and wore it all the time. Since then, my beads have improved a lot and I've made hundreds in different sizes, even making tutorials to teach other beaders how to make them.

It's gappy, it's lumpy and there's a lot of thread showing, but I can't bear to frog it. So now I've found it I'll wear it now and again, just to remind myself how far I've come :)

Monday Moodboard Reveal - Grey, Silver & White

Before I show you the gorgeous jewellery inspired by last week's Monday Moodboard, here's another look at the mosaic...

Clockwise from top-left: Bead Horizon, Gandalf White Shores, Light, Cat.

The etheral grey, silver and white colour scheme proved very popular!

Sarah created this beautiful cocktail ring using grey seed beads and silver glass pearls...


I used glass pearls as well, combining them with a faceted crystal, tiny beaded beads and silver chain to make these miss-match earrings...


Maria chose to make earrings too and used pretty silver stars with haematite chips, cat's eye beads and seed beads...


And I'm very pleased to say that this week we have a beautiful piece created by one of our lovely blog readers, Arina Ozoliņa, again using pearls...




Thank you very much for joining in with us this week Arina!

Have you been inspired by this weeks colour scheme? We would love to show your photos on the blog, just email them to me at liz@thecrimsonmoon.co.uk or add them to our Flickr group pool and I'll show them on the blog.

Wednesday's Wear It Or Frog It.

No before picture this week as this is an update from last weeks Wear It or Frog It piece. I loved the little acorn I made last week so much that I made another. I dug out some lovely olive seed beads and made a simple spiral rope necklace, looping one end so that the acorn drops through to close the necklace. This weekend I got a bit of a bee in my bonnet about the number of wips I have hidden about the place, which resulted in what I am now calling the great wip cull of 2010. I ripped out loads of unfinished pieces and now have a huge bag of beads to reuse including over 450 Swarovski crystals! I will post pics later. We'd love to see pics of any pieces that you have reinvented. You can add photo's to our Flickr group http://www.flickr.com/groups/1455268@N20/

Monday Moodboard - Grey, Silver & White

This weeks Monday Moodboard is a serene combination of grey, silver & white, inspired by a quote from Gandalf in The Lord Of The Rings...

"Pippin: I didn't think it would end this way.
Gandalf: End? No, the journey doesn't end here. Death is just another path, one that we all must take. The grey rain-curtain of this world rolls back, and all turns to silver glass, and then you see it.
Pippin: What? Gandalf? See what?
Gandalf: White shores, and beyond, a far green country under a swift sunrise.
Pippin: Well, that isn't so bad.
Gandalf: No. No, it isn't.”

Clockwise from top-left: Bead Horizon, Gandalf White Shores, Light, Cat.

We'd love to see your creations here! As always you can email your photos to me at liz@thecrimsonmoon.co.uk or add them to our Flickr group pool (you'll need a Flickr account for this).

Wednesdays Wear It or Frog it

This week's wear it or frog it piece was in deep, deep hiding in a box at the bottom of my wardrobe. I made it a while ago and have never worn it. It is easy to see why, I don't really know what I was thinking when I made this, it is very boring and more than a bit blah! I cut it up in quick time and the pile of 7 wooden beads sat on my beading mat as I wondered what to do with them, there aren't really enough to make a whole necklace or even a bracelet. One of them rolled next to a bead cap that I had just made and I realised that combined they would make a perfect acorn, so I whipped up a little pendant and attached it to a chain. I also have some other ideas and I'll show you those later.

Do you have any jewellery that is now languishing at the back of your wardrobe? Why not dig it out and decide whether to wear it or frog it? We would love to see what you come up with, you can add pictures to our Flickr Group http://www.flickr.com/groups/1455268@N20/.