Sunday, 5/11/08, 2:52 PM.............................................................New Auction

Just a quick update to wish you all a happy Mother's Day. I'm headed over to see my own beautiful mom, then we're off to my sister's for a family crawfish boil, which has become kind of a Mother's Day tradition in my family over the past few years.

I caved in to the pitiful, guilt-inducing emails a few of you guys sent after missing the last auction, and have decided to commit to 4 more sets of the 'Street Art' custom text beads. New auction is up now, and these are the LAST sets of these I'm offering, seriously, so if you wanted a set, this is the last chance highway, babe.

Hope you guys have a wonderful day. See you again soon!

K.

Thursday, 5/8/08, 10:20 AM

Good morning! Here's an unusual, kind of fun offer...I've never done anything like this before, but the Serenity Prayer set seemed to spark some interest in custom sets of text beads, so I've decided to offer a few sets on a made-to-order, you-choose-the-words basis. All the details are in the auction listing...if I missed anything or you have questions, just drop me an email. Have fun!

K.

Sunday, 5/4/08, 11:38 PM

Welcome! This will be a pretty short update; I've been sick with a cold for a few days and at the moment my head feels like it's encased in a concrete block, but I did at least want to get out of bed long enough tell you about the new beads. I finished these yesterday and had such a blast working on them — I have that obsessed feeling about this as a new direction and am pretty sure I'll be exploring the whole text bead thing a lot more in the weeks to come...anyway, hope you'll check them out.

I'll be back with more beads as soon as I'm feeling better and back at the torch, hopefully in a day or two. Thanks a bunch for stopping by, I'll see you soon!

K.

Wednesday, 4/30/08, 3:04 PM

Hey there! I thought I'd start putting up the occasional middle-of-the-day listing — I've heard from a few folks out there who keep missing my "Buy It Now" auctions because I normally list new auctions at night and they only have internet access at work during the day, so I'm going to try to vary my listing schedule a bit to accomodate those of you who have to sneak-browse at the office. Anyway, this new listing is a yummy double strand of hollow beads from my Bella Luna series: delicate, light-as-a-feather spheres formed from the palest transparent glass in bands of sapphire, emerald and lavender, and decorated with raised metallic trim on the ends. There are also some matching metallic accent beads, in a flat-top disk shape with raised surface detailing. I really like the antique vibe these have...hope you enjoy them.

That's all the news for now. Have a happy Wednesday!

K.

Sunday, 4/27/08, 6:56 PM

Happy Sunday! Rainy day here today, gray and cloudy all day, but I'm sitting here with a smile on my face just the same. I have a belly full of crawfish, spent the afternoon laughing with good friends, and am feeling pretty blessed right now...it was a very good day.

Now, if I could only figure out how to fit this into my already-strained budget, life would be perfect:

Hey, a girl can dream, right? Nothing wrong with looking at pictures on the internet, and I'm just going to keep wishing over the picture of this shiny beauty until I can figure out a way to make it real.

Anyway, thanks for checking in, beadheads...enjoy your day!

K.

Monday, 4/21/08, 5:39 PM

Hola! New beads are up, a set of batik-style crystals in swampy blues and greens on weathered, caramel-tinged ivory. These are great spring and summer beads because they go so well with turquoise and coral, which I always think of as warm-weather stones.

No other real news here; I'm running out the door, but will be back in a day or two with more beads. Thanks as always for checking in — I hope the first day of the new work week is treating you well!

K.

Wednesday, 4/16/08, 9:14 P

Welcome! New beads are up now...the "Gift" set I did last week sold so soon after I listed them that hardly anyone even got to see them before the auction ended, so I decided to do another set this week in deference to those who didn't get a shot at the last ones. This is the third set from the series, a strand of hand-sculpted leaves, lentils and pods in a riot of vibrant hues — prussian blue, violet, magenta, moss and sea green, with earthy touches of rust and caramel. Like the set last week, this is a special "Terra" edition; I parted with some of my precious Terra rods to make half the leaves in this set, and they have beautiful opalescent amber-purple centers. The other half of the leaves were made with a newer Double Helix glass, Khaos, which strikes to blues, magentas, purples and creams. The lentils and pods, all done in shades of blue, were kissed with a reducing flame to produce a shimmery iridescent luster. I really like these a lot...they'll combine beautifully with any number of metals or gemstones for some really elegant, natural-looking jewelry...anyway, hope they inspire you!

Thank God I love my work and we're having some amazing weather this week...otherwise I would be having a really irritating week. Men! Such tricky creatures...I swear I will never figure them out. Say the wrong thing to one of them who happens to be in a sour mood and you can bet he will create more unnecessary drama than a whole room full of women with raging PMS. This is not my idea of a good time.

Oh well...onward. Thanks for checking in, I'll see you again soon.

K.

Wednesday, 4/9/08, 9:47 PM

Well, I got a phone call just before I finished updating this page with the newly-listed auction, and the auction sold with the Buy It Now price while I was still on the phone...so I find myself in the rather schizophrenic position of offering a new set and announcing that they're sold in the very same breath. Sorry about the unintended tease. I'll leave the link up in case anyone wanted to see the beads (a set of Terra leaves, lentils & pods from the "Gift" series) and will be back with something new for you as soon as possible.

Thanks for checking in; hope all is well in your world.

K.

Wednesday, 4/2/08, 8:51 PM

Welcome!

Just listed the last two "Helium" series sets that I'll be doing, at least for a long while...I love making these beads — specifically, the challenge of seeing how many different colors I can pull out of the glass just by changing the characteristics of the flame — but I have a lot of ideas bouncing around in my head that I'm anxious to pursue, so it's about time for me to leave this series and move on to something new. Both of these sets are top-notch, and the beads in No. 4 and No. 5 coordinate perfectly, so the two sets can be mixed and matched. All of the folks who've bought beads from this series have been absolutely thrilled with them; they just really have a lot of visual impact. Anyway, hope you'll take a minute to check them out.

Thanks for stopping by, beadheads. I'll see you soon!

K.

Friday, 3/28/08, 7:29 PM

Hola! New beads just listed — and these are something, made with Khaos, one of the newer Double Helix glasses. I hadn't really had a chance to spend much time with Khaos since I got some in, and WOW! Very beautiful stuff. I made some really neat leaves, lentils and pods...I guess all the green popping out everywhere lately is getting to me. Whoever wins this auction has to promise to send me a photo of the jewelry that is made with these...I don't make much jewelry but I actually felt like making something with these myself, they'd go with so many different semiprecious gemstones, etc.

OK, need to run — I'm meeting a friend tonight, still haven't showered and I'm running way late. Have a great weekend!

K.

Wednesday, 3/26/08, 8:43 PM

Hey, hope you guys had a great Easter. Mine left something to be desired due to the end of a romantic relationship, but life is feeling a lot better this week...in fact, I'm kind of surprised by how fast I've regained my perspective over the past few days. Breakups are never fun, but having had a few days to think about this one, I can see that it was probably for the best. So...no sense being all gloomy about it, is there? It is what it is. Or, was.

Anyway, my focus should be a bit better now...I'm looking forward to putting in some serious torch time in the next few days, now that the weather is warming up, things are blooming and birds are singing. I have a lot of new design ideas that I haven't really had time to work out in the past few months, and it'll be good to be able to focus all of my energy on them.

No other news here right now, really; I just wanted to post a quick update before I went looking for dinner. Thanks for stopping by — have yourself a happy Wednesday, and I'll see you soon!

K.

Wednesday, 3/19/08, 9:56 PM

Welcome! Just did a major cleanup on this page...I can't believe I still had entries here from back in July...surely some kind of personal sloth record. Anyway, hopefully the page will load faster now, and you can see my babies at the bottom of the page without scrolling forever and ever.

2 focals from the new "Dreamscape" series listed tonight, as well as a nice "Prism" series set. I've put "Buy It Now" prices on everything, but I expect that option to disappear pretty fast, since bidding on all of the auctions starts at $.99 and once a bid is placed, the BIN option is no longer there. So if you want to grab something at the BIN price rather than waiting for the auctions to play out, you'll have to step lively. (I'm not sure why that happens, by the way; it's just the way Ebay is set up. I'm still trying to find a balance between BIN/bidding that will make everybody happy. If you have suggestions/opinions, let me hear from you!)

Not sure when I'll be back with more beads; I'm torching every day, but I'm also planning to be very lazy and self-indulgent over Easter weekend, so I may just lay off listing anything else until next week...we'll see.

Hope all is well in your world, and thanks for checking in!

Cheers,

K.