
This is my January page for the Bead Journal Project. I called it "Moon Circles" in honor of last week's full moon . . . After piddling around trying to design something for nearly the entire month, I finally just sat down this weekend with a bunch of beads and my piece of backing, and did this on Saturday and Sunday, while we were snowed in and I was tired of reading.
Specs:
The size is 2 1/2" by 3 1/2" (ATC size—I was afraid if I made them too large, I'd never finish). It's worked on something called Bead Backing, from Sova Enterprises, which feels like stiff interfacing; and backed, after I finished the beading, with white wool felt. (I'm using what I have, since money for new toys is mostly not in the cards for a while; at least, not until after the dental x-rays and the car insurance. And I'm pretty sure something else will rear its head after that . . . Fortunately, I have a pretty large supply of odds and ends to draw from.)
Anyway, the face is one I bought a couple of years ago on Ebay; I don't remember who it came from. The long clear-and-silver bugles I purchased from a friend's bead shop (long since closed) when I lived in Charlotte, about 2000 or so. I don't usually use bugle beads, because I never know quite what to do with them, and whatever I do usually doesn't look right, but I loved these and I've been hauling them around for ten years or so now, and getting them out to admire them periodically . . . and I still have a couple dozen left, I think. The circles are mica doughnuts I got a few years ago when I was doing collages, centered with irridescent flower beads from Joggles, and edged with silver beads from Chevron Trading Post here in Asheville. And the background beads are vintage, I think . . . some sort of faceted glass. I had a small hank of them, and I have no idea from whence they came. I suspect that maybe Daddy got them in a box lot from some auction and passed them on to me a few years ago, but I'm not sure.
I'm always amazed at just how much stuff I have accumulated over the past twenty or thirty years, and how I can usually remember where it came from—but usually not why I got it or what I planned to do with it!