Trip Finds

Just a quick post with a couple of things I found on my recent mini-vacation. We just got back and I really don't feel like moving much after driving to Canada and sight seeing for a week. I'm going to have to get going sometime today as the larder is bare; as bare as Old Mother Hubbard's cupboard.

I'm in LOVE, in love with the Lucite that Beadin' Path in Maine stocks. I see them at the shows, but it is so much more enjoyable to visit the store and walk the wall of Lucite arranged by color. I can pick, choose, fondle, put back and find things that take my fancy. And, I can do it in quiet, surrounded by other beading things.

Here is what came home with me. The Deco polygon drops (at the top) in orange, sage and pink are going into the next bead crocheted lariat I make for myself. However, in the light of day, in my studio . . . I'm wondering what possessed me to get 30 silver drop shapes that now remind me of the old soda pop tops? Must be something like comfort food, reminding me of my youth. What would you do with these silver thingies?

I met a knife sharpener at the Farmer's Market on Prince Edward Island. He had some vintage, sharp edged things for sale in his booth. I got an interesting historic perspective on North American knife makers from him as well as a beautiful pair of shears for the unheard of price of $20. I don't need any more shears, especially this large, but they were a thing of beauty. They fit my hand and cut cleanly all the way down the tip. You can see their size against my regular Gingher sewing shears. Ah well, maybe I can just hang them on my studio wall and just enjoy them for the fine tool they are.

All of the other trip photos are still on my travel camera which is still in the car. I'll share more later.

Oh Dear . . .Peaches, Bead Book & Vacation

I'm feeling pushed. Somehow too many things have come down to needing to be done TODAY!I'm leaving for vacation tomorrow morning to go see the Bay of Fundy - be gone a week.

Meanwhile Laundry needs to be done, fridge cleaned out, mail put on hold for a week, suitcases packed, and sundry other life things. So, along comes a gift of another bushel of local peaches . . . they are not perfect and dead ripe. They also won't hold in the house for a week.

I gave away 2/3rds of them and still had a lot left. I spent yesterday evening making another batch of peach salsa and peach hot pepper jelly.

This morning I'm wondering if this peach hot pepper jelly will set up. If it doesn't I'll have to find a use for hot pepper syrup. Don't think it would be good over ice cream.

Bead Crochet eBook

I've hit a milestone in getting my "Triangular Bead Crochet Ropes" book done. The copy is off to the Editor and my layout person is expecting all of it on her desk the first week in October.

This is the other part of feeling pushed . . . I'm only 1/3 of the way done with all of the photos for the book. When I was supposed to be doing photography, I was dealing with peaches.

I hate being hurried as that is when you make mistakes and compromises you later regret. So I guess we'll see how far I get today between life's other chores.

I have some really great bead faeries. They help out by testing patterns and making samples. This is one of their samples. This is one of the projects and ropes in the eBook. Isn't this Triangle Twist bracelet a simple, beautiful color combination. It would also be great with coral and turquoise for the fall.

Hopefully the November 15th publication date is still a good one. I'll have definitive information here on the blog when the time comes closer.

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Now back to work and hope I can cram it all into today's time frame. Then off to relax and look at the scenery driving north, up the coast of Maine, New Brunswick and into Nova Scotia.

3rd Book Teaser

I think I've twisted my brain with this one. It's taken me three tries to work one bead bug out of it so that it's a smooth transition from triangle to twist all the way around and back again.... 3 different colored sides.

It's the last pattern page in the book and I was sure that it would do what I graphed it to do. That is until I woke up in the middle of the night and just had to string it one more time to make sure I didn't have a brain flip and get something wrong. I'd much rather be sure myself than have a book owner frustrated with a pattern that doesn't work because of my mistake.

These primary colors look neat and show off what's happening with this bead crocheted rope. However I can see it done with metallic base beads and maybe freshwater pearl drops. It would be an eye catcher, "how ever did you do that?" type of bracelet.

I'm still on schedule for an early November eBook publication. I have a great Editor making sure that the i's are dotted. My Graphics Gal has saved me layout time in October unless they come in first in a Korean Design contest. You'd think I had more pull with my daughter, the Graphics Gal!

Heeding My Own Advice . .

I got this nice German Profi crochet hook about a year ago and I love using it. It's marked 1,00 which I presume is a 1.0 mm. I've been doing larger 8/0 bead crochet lately and have not been happy with my tension. When I teach and people complain about their tension I tell then to go up/down a hook size and try and change the position of their loops on the shank of the hook.

So today I drug out my old faithful, Susan Bates #11 at 1.15 mm and put both hooks together. Well, no wonder I'm having tension problems.

Look at the difference in head sizes. More importantly, look at the difference in shank sizes where I generally work my loops. When I went back to 11/0 and 10/0 beads my tension was way looser than I wanted it to be. When I swapped back to the Susan Bates hook, all the tension problems went away.

So, I guess I should have taken my own advice. Or at least I should have taken a good look at the hook differences some time ago. These Profi hooks have been discontinued, but I did manage to find one that is more the same size as my Susan Bates.

HINT:

tension too tight; go up a hook size, or two and/or

try and work your loops back from the hook head.

tension too loose; go down a hook size and/or

try and work your loops closer to the hook head.